PLO6 (6-card Omaha) is a pot-limit poker variant that plays a lot like regular PLO — with one key difference: instead of 4 hole cards, each player gets 6. You still have to use exactly 2 cards from your hand and 3 from the board to make the best 5-card hand.
The addition of extra cards in hand means that players can hit very strong hands, which makes big cooler situations (where very strong hands clash against each other) far more common than in most game types.
In this article, I will outline the general PLO6 strategy to help you hold your own at the table, whether you’re playing online or live. Let’s get into it!
Figure 1. Shows a Bad beat jackpot being hit at GG Poker. The requirements to hit the bad beat jackpot are far higher than for other formats (quad Jacks to be beaten). You just hit huge too often otherwise!
PLO6 is one of the fastest-growing formats out there right now, which makes it worth looking into.
But how do we navigate this potential minefield of huge hands and coolers?
And can you even make a profit in this game?
PLO6, more so than any of the other main poker games around at the moment, is a game of equity pushing for our hands (maximizing our win %) and equity denial of our opponents’ hands (getting them to fold draws or made hands).
If you’ve heard much information about PLO6 from your peers, it normally goes something like this: “Oh yeah, PLO6 is crazy, equities just run so close it’s all just gambling really.”
While it’s true that 6-card Omaha preflop equity tends to run closer between hands than in other games, that’s only half the story. Once the flop and turn are dealt, equities can diverge significantly, especially when a strong betting range is up against a calling range.
However, before diving deeper, let’s examine how to approach each stage of the hand, starting with a solid preflop strategy, looking at how many players behave, and what we can do to exploit that to make a profit.
PREFLOP Strategy in PLO6
At all stakes of PLO6, many players are far too loose preflop – it is not uncommon to see complete whales playing 80%+ VPIP (voluntarily put money into the pot) and then a bunch more playing 40%+ VPIP.
From extensive population data, we can quite quickly see that playing too loosely from each position will cost you a lot. Take the following example from my database on Hand2Note of 50%+ VPIP players on GG Poker.
Figure 2. Graph showing $401,000 in losses for all players combined with 50%+ VPIP in the Hand2Note database for GG Poker.
Figure 3. Picture showing a general overview of statistics for 50%+ VPIP players on 6-Card Omaha GG Poker.
Figure 4. Picture showing loss rates for 50%+ VPIP players from the different preflop positions.
This is the type of graph we’d ideally like to avoid. Importantly, playing too loose can make you lose from every position, even the button!
So if equities run close, why is it that playing lots of hands is an issue? The main reason is equity realization.
To play properly preflop, we have to select hands that can hit nutted equity. Nutted equity is great because we don’t have to worry about our opponent having something better that often.
If we flop the nut flush or even the nut flush draw, we know that if we hit, we are good.
Playing wider ranges will mean having the best hand almost as often (like we said, equities run close), but hitting the 4th nut flush isn’t the same as hitting THE nut flush.
It’s quite hard for us to bet and get called by that much worse hands (at least for multiple streets), but if you get coolered by a better flush (which will happen often), then you are going to be paying for that, and so we end up having to play cautiously. Nutted hands can focus on building the pot and increasing the winnings.
So how do we select hands?
To start with we want to focus on playing hands that have lots of possibilities to hit the nuts in as many ways as possible.
Starting Hand Selection Guidelines (PLO6)
Focus on playing hands that have multiple ‘nutted’ qualities. Generally, look for starting hands that include at least two of the following attributes:
- High pairs (JJ or better): Big pairs like Jacks, Queens, Kings, and Aces. These give high nut set potential.
- Suited Aces with two or three of a suit in hand, giving nut flush potential.
- Mid-to-high rundowns:* Four, five, or six cards in sequence with minimal gaps, using ranks 5 and above*. (For example, Q-J-T-9-8-7 is a high rundown.) These connected cards can make strong straights with draws to higher straights.
Here are a few examples.
Figure 5. High pair + suited ace + rundown – (This hand has all three desirable features.)
Figure 6. Suited ace rundown – (Lacks a high pair, but still playable due to two strong features.)
Figure 7. High pair + suited ace – (Lacks connected rundown, but two strong features make it worth playing.)
If a starting hand has two or more of the above qualities, it’s usually strong enough to VPIP (voluntarily put money in pot, i.e. play the hand).
Example Hand – What Not to Do
I’ve taken a hand that one of my students played recently on $2/$5 stakes on GG Poker. Instead of seeing my students’ hand preflop, we are going to look at it from the view of one of our opponents at the table. Their name has been anonymised to the nickname c16fcf1a.
Figure 7. Preflop portion of a $2/$5 6-Card Omaha cashgame hand history on GG Poker.
Player c16fcf1a gets folded to the Cut off of a fairly deep game on 2$/$5 and finds themselves with a deceptively pretty hand. It looks fairly connected and has double suits. Obviously not a top-tier hand, but they decide to limp for the 5$ and try to see a cheap flop with the hope of hitting big.
No big deal, right? I mean, it has one of the traits we were looking for in a preflop hand. What’s the harm in a limp?
Player c16fcf1a faces a raise from the button, and it folds back to them. Well, now it’s only 17$ to call into a pot that will be $51. Surely they can’t be folding now, so they decide to call.
Flop
Figure 9. Preflop and flop action of a $2/$5 PLO6 hand history on GG Poker
They flop bottom 2 pairs, a gutshot, and 2 backdoor flush draws. Again, not the best hand, but it should win at showdown at least some of the time. So player c16fcf1a checks. They now face a 2/3rds pot bet from the preflop raiser. Tough spot, but given they have 2 pairs, a gutshot, and 2 backdoor flush draws, it seems unreasonable to be folding now, right? Call.
Turn
Figure 10. Preflop, flop and turn action of a $2/$5 PLO6 hand history on GG Poker
Jackpot! They turn one of the best cards in the deck, hitting a full house with 8’s full of jacks, but they are still out of position, with the 3rd nuts. Probably not good enough to want to play for stacks, so they check. Again, they are faced with a bet, facing a preflop raise, a flop cbet, and now a turn cbet. What could the preflop raiser have? Not much to do here other than call, though. Call.
River
Figure 11. Preflop, flop, and turn action of a $2/$5 6-Card Omaha hand history on GG Poker
Nice! A brick river. As long as the preflop raiser doesn’t bet, they should win this pot. Check. Preflop raiser bets river again this time for full pot.
Disaster!
Clearly the preflop raiser is repping stronger than their hand at this point, but they have the 3rd nuts! Surely they have to call. Call.
Showdown
Figure 12. Showdown of a $2/$5 PLO6 hand history on GG Poker
Ouch.
For quick reference:
Figure 13. Picture showing hand JT8762 double suited as a top 68th-percentile hand
Their hand is ranked as being a top 68.511% hand when run as equity vs a 100% range.
Figure 14. Picture showing hand AAKKQ4 double suited as a top 2nd-percentile hand
My students’ hand, however (the winning hand AAKKQ4 double suited), is clearly a well-defined hand that has plenty of ways to hit nutted. Those being 2 high pairs – AA & KK, and 2 suited aces. Both clubs and hearts can bring us nut flushes.
Conclusion: This unfortunate result was entirely avoidable — the hand was simply too weak to play preflop. In PLO6, even a hand that looks pretty can be a 68th-percentile hand that should be folded.