When deciding whether to play a hand or not, what are the factors a strong player considers before acting ? I decided to go about it from a logical standpoint. Determining the Overall Playability of Each Hand Using the knowledge I’ve gained over the past few years, I tried to come up with a better way of codifying hand rankings. So, what really matters when it comes to weighing hand strength? I decided to take a close look at the problem. However, after that things get a bit murkier. The thing is, everyone always does pretty well on the top 5 or 6 hands. I took a look at a few of the pre-flop hand ranking charts out there and, while most appeared to get it right for the most part, there seemed to be something off. I have used over 10 years of experience in both tournaments and cash games to compile this info. I based this list on both raw equities as well as post-flop playability. To help you out, I have also included the top 24 no-limit hold’em starting hands to give you a further idea of what beats what in poker. Download Free Hand Ranking Charts The Top 24 Hold’Em Starting Hand Rankings