What is Range?

A range in poker is the full set of hands a player could plausibly hold in a given spot, letting you reason about every possible holding at once instead of guessing at one specific hand. Because you almost never know an opponent's exact two cards, skilled players think in ranges: the group of combinations consistent with the actions taken so far. A range narrows as the hand unfolds, since each bet, call, raise or fold removes hands that would not have played that way. Ranges are often written as combinations. A pair like pocket aces has 6 combinations, an offsuit hand like AK has 12, and a suited hand like AKs has 4. Counting combos lets you estimate how often an opponent holds a strong hand versus a bluff, which drives calling, folding and value-betting decisions. Worked example: an opponent raises from early position, a spot where you assign them roughly the top 8% of hands, about 106 combinations covering big pairs, strong Broadways and a few suited connectors. The flop comes A-K-4. If only 16 of those 106 combinations hit that board hard (sets and top pairs), then roughly 15% of their range connects strongly, meaning a well-timed bluff on a scary later card can fold out much of the remaining 85%. Your own range matters too: strong players balance value hands and bluffs so their range is hard to exploit. The common mistake is fixating on the one hand you fear rather than the full distribution of hands your opponent can actually have. Compare with equity, pot odds, blockers and GTO.