Poker Table Positions — Where You Sit Decides How You Play
Two players are dealt the same hand. One of them is under the gun, the other is on the button. Over a year those two hands make very different amounts of money, and nothing about the cards explains why. Position — how many players still get to act after you — is the single largest edge available at a home game, and it is free. Tap any seat on the map to see when it acts, how many players are left behind it, and how wide it can reasonably open.
Read it in the order the action moves: the player left of the big blind speaks first, and the button speaks last on every street after the flop.
Seat
UTG
Name
Under the gun
Acts preflop
1st
Players behind
8
Rough opening range
15%
Seat
UTG+1
Name
Under the gun +1
Acts preflop
2nd
Players behind
7
Rough opening range
16%
Seat
UTG+2
Name
Under the gun +2
Acts preflop
3rd
Players behind
6
Rough opening range
18%
Seat
LJ
Name
Lojack
Acts preflop
4th
Players behind
5
Rough opening range
20%
Seat
HJ
Name
Hijack
Acts preflop
5th
Players behind
4
Rough opening range
23%
Seat
CO
Name
Cutoff
Acts preflop
6th
Players behind
3
Rough opening range
28%
Seat
BTN
Name
Button
Acts preflop
7th
Players behind
2
Rough opening range
45%
Seat
SB
Name
Small blind
Acts preflop
8th
Players behind
1
Rough opening range
40%, raise-or-fold
Seat
BB
Name
Big blind
Acts preflop
9th
Players behind
0
Rough opening range
Defend, not open
Seat
Name
Acts preflop
Players behind
Rough opening range
UTG
Under the gun
1st
8
15%
UTG+1
Under the gun +1
2nd
7
16%
UTG+2
Under the gun +2
3rd
6
18%
LJ
Lojack
4th
5
20%
HJ
Hijack
5th
4
23%
CO
Cutoff
6th
3
28%
BTN
Button
7th
2
45%
SB
Small blind
8th
1
40%, raise-or-fold
BB
Big blind
9th
0
Defend, not open
What the same names mean six-handed
Six-handed does not shrink the table evenly. It deletes the early-position cluster and keeps every late seat, which is why a 6-max game feels so much more aggressive than a full ring one.
6-max seat
UTG
Closest 9-handed equivalent
UTG+2 / lojack
What changes
Five players behind instead of eight — open wider than a full-ring UTG
6-max seat
HJ
Closest 9-handed equivalent
Hijack
What changes
Unchanged in name and role
6-max seat
CO
Closest 9-handed equivalent
Cutoff
What changes
Unchanged, but you reach it far more often
6-max seat
BTN
Closest 9-handed equivalent
Button
What changes
Unchanged, and you are on it every sixth hand instead of every ninth
6-max seat
SB
Closest 9-handed equivalent
Small blind
What changes
Unchanged, and it costs you more per hour
6-max seat
BB
Closest 9-handed equivalent
Big blind
What changes
Unchanged, and you defend it far more often
6-max seat
Closest 9-handed equivalent
What changes
UTG
UTG+2 / lojack
Five players behind instead of eight — open wider than a full-ring UTG
HJ
Hijack
Unchanged in name and role
CO
Cutoff
Unchanged, but you reach it far more often
BTN
Button
Unchanged, and you are on it every sixth hand instead of every ninth
SB
Small blind
Unchanged, and it costs you more per hour
BB
Big blind
Unchanged, and you defend it far more often
Position is information, and information is money
Acting last means you have watched everyone else act before you decide. You know who bet, who checked, who hesitated. Acting first means you commit chips into people who have told you nothing and who can now punish you with the benefit of everything you just revealed. That asymmetry does not average out over a session; it compounds. This is why a mediocre player on the button beats a good player under the gun more often than the cards say they should.
Early position: under the gun and the seats around it
Under the gun is the seat immediately to the left of the big blind, and the name is not decorative — you open the betting with eight players still to speak at a full table. Every hand you play from here has to survive eight separate chances to be raised. That is why the range is the tightest at the table, and why the most common leak in a home game is somebody calling from UTG with a hand they would fold in any other seat. UTG+1 and UTG+2 are marginally better and should be played almost identically.
Middle position: the lojack and the hijack
The lojack sits two seats before the cutoff and the hijack one seat before it. Both names come from the same idea: taking the steal that the seat behind you was planning. This is the part of the table where opening stops being purely about hand strength and starts being about who is left. If the two players behind you fold too much, the hijack becomes a much better seat than any chart says it is.
Late position: the cutoff and the button
The button acts last on the flop, the turn and the river for the entire hand. Nothing else at a poker table is worth as much. The cutoff is the second-best seat and the most wasted one in home games — people play it like middle position out of habit, even though only three players remain and two of them have already paid to be there. If you change one thing after reading this page, widen your cutoff.
The blinds are not good positions, they are a bill
The small blind and big blind post money before seeing a card and then act first for the rest of the hand. They are the two seats where you lose money by default; the goal is to lose less, not to win. The small blind is the worst seat in poker: half a bet in, out of position against everyone, and stuck between the button's steal and the big blind's defence. Raise or fold from it. Calling from the small blind invites the big blind in behind you with position for the whole hand.
Defending the big blind is not stubbornness
Because you have already posted a full blind, you get a discount that nobody else at the table gets. Against a button raise you are often being asked to pay a small amount into a pot you already partly own, which makes a lot of ordinary hands profitable to continue with. Folding eighty percent of your big blinds against late-position steals is the single most common way a recreational player donates money without ever making a visibly bad decision.
Six-handed changes the names, not the logic
Shorten the table and the early seats disappear first. That means you are in the blinds far more often, reach the button far more often, and face far fewer players when you open. The result is a game that plays much more aggressively without anyone deciding to be aggressive. If your home game drops from nine to six players as the night goes on, your ranges should widen with it — most groups keep playing their nine-handed ranges at a six-handed table and wonder why the game got quiet.
Position at a home game with no dealer
A cardroom has a dealer who moves the button and announces the action. A kitchen table has a plastic disc that somebody forgets to move, and the argument that follows. Use a physical button, move it clockwise after every hand before the next deal starts, and say out loud who is under the gun on the first few hands of the night. If you run the game on PokerChip.live, the room tracks seat order and stacks for you, so the button and the blinds move on their own and nobody has to remember whose turn it was to post.
How to use this tomorrow night
Pick one seat and change how you play it. The cutoff is the usual best candidate, because most home games leave money in it. Open more hands there for a session and watch what happens — the players behind you fold, you pick up blinds uncontested, and the pots you do play you play with position. That is the whole edge, and it costs nothing to take.
FAQ
Questions about poker positions
01
What does under the gun mean in poker?
It is the seat immediately to the left of the big blind, which acts first before the flop. The name comes from the pressure of having to decide with the whole table still to speak behind you.
02
What is the best position in poker?
The button. You act last on the flop, turn and river, so you make every postflop decision with more information than anyone else at the table.
03
What is the hijack in poker?
The seat two to the right of the button, one before the cutoff. It is named for hijacking the steal the cutoff was about to attempt.
04
What is the lojack?
The seat immediately before the hijack — three seats before the button. At a nine-handed table it is the first seat where attacking the blinds is a realistic plan.
05
How many positions are there at a poker table?
Nine at a full ring table: UTG, UTG+1, UTG+2, lojack, hijack, cutoff, button, small blind and big blind. Six-handed keeps UTG, hijack, cutoff, button and the two blinds.
06
Does the dealer button move every hand?
Yes. It moves one seat clockwise after every hand, so everyone pays the blinds equally over a session. Forgetting to move it is the most common bookkeeping error in a home game.
07
Is the small blind or the big blind worse?
The small blind, clearly. It posts money, acts first on every street after the flop, and gets a worse price to continue than the big blind does.
08
Which position should I play the most hands from?
The button, by a wide margin — around 40-50% of hands at most home games. The cutoff is second, and most players open far too few hands from it.
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