As with all card games, poker has a few basic rules that must be followed to play fairly and to the best of your ability. Some of these are written and some are unwritten, but every player must understand them. If you have a good grasp of these basic rules, you can start to understand the more advanced ones.

The first step in a hand of poker is to put up some money, known as the ante. This is a small amount of money that all players must place before they are dealt cards. Once everyone has acted, the dealer will shuffle and draw 1 to 3 cards to create a new draw stack. These cards are now community cards, which all players can use.

Each betting interval, or round, starts when a player puts chips into the pot equal to or greater than the amount of chips put in by the player before him (call). This is known as opening the betting.

After opening the betting, each player can choose to check (not put any more chips into the pot), call a raise (put in the same number of chips as the player who raised), or fold his cards (drop out). If a player drops, he forfeits all rights to the original pot and all side pots that may have been created during the hand.

It is important to learn how to read the tells of other players, especially in a game where you are not playing against people you know. It is also necessary to have a good understanding of the strength of your own hand and how it stacks up against other hands.