Cash Game Preflop Strategy

Good cash-game preflop play is three habits, not a rulebook: open tighter from early seats and wider from late ones, keep your raise size consistent so you never telegraph strength, and 3-bet a mix of value hands and bluffs rather than flat-calling everything. Do those and you enter more pots with the initiative, in position, against ranges you dominate — which is where the money is.

Opening ranges by position

Your opening range widens every seat closer to the button, for two reasons: fewer players remain behind who could wake up with a hand, and you’re more likely to act last after the flop.

Position (full ring)	Approx. open %	Feel
Under the gun	~15%	Big pairs, strong broadways, AK–AQ
Middle	~20%	Add suited broadways, medium pairs
Cutoff	~28%	Suited connectors, weaker aces
Button	~45%	Any pair, most suited, wide offsuit
Small blind	~30% (raise-only)	Don’t limp — raise or fold

Treat these as calibrated starting points, not GTO gospel: tighten in tough games and against aggressive players on your left, widen against weak-passive tables. The formal solver ranges live in the preflop GTO hub, and the reason later position is worth more is spelled out in the positions hub.

Sizing your open — keep it boring

Use one size regardless of your hand, so opponents can’t decode you:

• Online: 2.5x–3x the big blind is standard.
• Live: 3x–5x, because live players call wider and you want to charge them.
• Add a big blind per limper. If two players limp, size up to isolate them and collect the dead money.

Never raise bigger with strong hands and smaller with weak ones — that tell is worth a fortune to anyone paying attention. A single size for your whole opening range keeps you unreadable.

When to 3-bet — and when to just call

A 3-bet is the first re-raise before the flop. Build the range as a polarized mix of strong value plus some bluffs, not a “linear” band of merely-good hands:

• Value 3-bets — QQ+, AK, and sometimes JJ or AQs against loose openers. You want the money in ahead.
• Bluff 3-bets — hands like A5s, K9s, 76s. They block the hands that continue (an ace or king in your hand makes AA/KK less likely) and still play if called.
• Flat-call medium hands that flop well in position — 99, AQ, suited broadways — instead of 3-betting them thin.

Put that to work facing a button open in the big blind: with A♠ 5♠ you 3-bet as a bluff (the ace blocks their aces and ace-king, and you flop draws if called); with K♣ J♦ you call (too good to fold, too dominated to 3-bet for value against a wide button range); with 7♥ 2♦ you fold, because even a discounted price can’t rescue the worst hand out of position. Notice all three turn on the button’s wide range — you’d play them differently against an under-the-gun open. That specific battle has its own guide in defending the big blind.

Adjusting to the table in front of you

The ranges above are a default, not a straitjacket, and the players around you should nudge them. Against a weak-passive table — lots of limpers and calls, few 3-bets — widen your opens and iso-raise the limpers relentlessly, because you’ll take down dead money uncontested and get paid when you hit. There’s little downside to entering pots against players who won’t punish you.

Against aggressive regulars to your left who 3-bet often, do the opposite: tighten your opens from the seats just in front of them, because a hand that opens for a raise and then folds to a 3-bet is bleeding chips. It’s also the spot to add a few more 4-bet bluffs so those regulars can’t 3-bet you with impunity. And against a specific loose caller in the blinds, size your opens up — you’re not trying to fold them out, you’re trying to build a bigger pot to play in position against a range you dominate. None of this replaces the position-based framework; it layers on top of it, one read at a time.

The leaks that cost the most

The disciplined version of preflop is mostly about not doing a few tempting things: don’t call out of position with marginal hands (you’ll be guessing on every street — 3-bet or fold), don’t open-limp (it surrenders both the initiative and the chance to win the pot right there), don’t run one range from every seat, and don’t over-3-bet without a plan for the flop when called. Get those out of your game and the ranges above carry you. From here, the flop-and-beyond decisions these ranges set up are covered in poker cash game strategy and the cash game strategy hub.