Poker HUD Stats

How to Interpret Your Poker HUD Stats

In order to use an Poker HUD effectively and incoporate it into your strategy, you first need to be familiar with the HUD stats and what these all stand for.  You’d be surprised what each statistic on its own can tell you, for example you can spot a TAG (tight-agressive player) from a LAG (loose-agressive player) purely be their VPIP% alone.  Other than this, I’ve put together a list of the most relevant stats you should be sticking to below and what this tells you about that player.  Each comes with a short explanation and how it should affect your decisions.

VPIP – Voluntarily Puts Money in Pot.  This is the most important statistic as it shows what percentage of hands he/she voluntarily puts money into the pot aka their pre-flop starting hands.  A VPIP figure < 10% indicates a nit, inbetween 10 – 20% is solid TAG and an opponents with a VPIP% of 20-30%  tells you that your opponent is LAG and probably very good.  He’ll limping in to pots with marginal hands like suited connectors or broadway cards.  In short-handed games most regulars fall within 19-25% VPIP.

PFR - Pre-Flop Raise.  This calculates what percentage of hands a player makes at least one raise pre-flop given the opportunity to do.  Your PFR% should be within 4-6% of your VPIP% so if you have a VPIP% of 20% then you’ll raise roughly 15% of your hands.  The larger the disparity between these two figures, the more an opponent is cold calling with.  For example, if he has 20/5 than he’s basically cold calling 15% of his hands and wil probably be a fish. I’d say anything less than a PFR% of 10% is a bit nitty and it should be between 12% – 20% on average for a good player.

AG - Post-flop Agression.  Along with the above two figures, this is usually shown in your top HUD stat line.  This is your opponent’s agression factor (sometimes displayed AF).  Most players fall between 1-3, anything above 3 is very agressive and anything less than 1 is very tight/nitty.  As an example of how to use these stats, if you get re-raised by someone with an AG of 0.5 then you should probably fold, where as if you get re-raised by a player with AG 5 then your TPTK is probably way ahead.

LWPC – Limped With Previous Callers.  Shows how frequently a player limps into un-raised pot with previous callers.  Agressive players tend not to limp often, except for when they have marginal hands in late position.   A high LWPC% player will often limp for implied odds in an attempt to flop a monster hand and set traps.

Cold Call.  A cold call is how many times a player calls a raise when he has not yet committed any chips in the hand.  It is really useful alongside the 3bet% for identifying someone’s pre-flop ranges.  For example, if they are Cold Calling with 15% of hands and 3Betting with 5%, it indicates they 3Bet with their top 5% of hands and flat-call with the next 15% i.e. they play with their top 20% of hands.

RFI – Raised First In.  Shows what percentage of hands an opponent open-raises the pot.  It helps catch out blind-stealers.  For example, if someone from the Cutoff opens the pot with a RFI 30%, then you know they are opening or stealing with their top 30% of hands.

3Bet/4Bet.  Shows how frequently a player 3bets or 4bets given the opportunity to do so.  A 3% 3Bet includes 1010+ and AQ+.  5% 3bet includes a wider range of hands such as AJ and AKo.  You need at least 250 hands to get some meaningful figures but overall anything above 10% bet% is very LAG and anything under 5% is TAG.

4aR – 4Bet after Raise.  This shows how often a player 4bet after opening the raising i.e. defended his initial bet against a 3bet.  You need a massive sample of hands (500+) to get a reliable enough figure.

CBet: Continuation Bet.  This is the frequency with which a player cbets given the opportunity to do so (he must have been the last raiser in the previous street and everyone checked to him).  A typical cbet% is around 55-88%.  You can use the cbet% with the PFR% to get an indication of his hand weakness. The lower his PFR%, the higher his cbet% will since  he will mainly be seeing the flop having been the pre-flop raiser with very strong hands like AK/JJ and so he will be c-betting them a lot more on missed flops.

Folded CBet, Called Cbet, and Raised CBet.  A high fold cbet (FC) indicates a weak player.  A high raised/call cbet indicates a loose player.  You can use FC in combination with the VPIP% to really get a feel for a player’s overall game.

Check Raise Total.  I love this statistic.  It shows how “trappy” a player is and how often they check-raise given the opportunity. A high check-raise means a check can show strength, where as a low check raise total means when they check they tend to be weak.

W$WSF: Won Money When Saw Flop.  This vital statistic shows the percent of hands a player wins when he saw the flop (it can include showdown wins or if everyone else folds).  A high WWSF figure either means he is very good at bluffing pots and forcing other to fold, or if it is combined with a low VPIP indicates he only plays flops with very premium hands.

W$SD: Won Money at the Show Down.  The percentage of pots won at showdown.  A high figure suggests a good player who only reaches showdowns with premium hands.  A low figure indicates a fish – you should look out for these players in table selection.

WTSD: Went To Show Down.  This shows the percentage of hands a player sees showdown after seeing the flop.  Most players will have a WTSD between 20 – 30%.  An opponent with a high WTSD is very hard to bluff, on the other hand a low WTSD means he will fold when he misses the flop.  I think around >39% is over-playing and you should extract maximum value from these type of call stations.

BD: Blind Defense.  Shows how often a person sitting on the blinds defends them to a raise.  A player with a low BD is bluffable, and is prone to high RFI opponents who blind-steal.

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