Learn to Play

If you only have a few minutes to learn a basic strategy that is easy to implement, below are some simple suggested guidelines. (Disclaimer: The strategy described below is not a generally strong strategy. It is a strategy that strongly prioritizes simple rules that are easy to memorize and implement. If you follow this strategy, you will almost always be playing the wrong percentage of hands, and certainly the wrong mix of hands. But you will typically be in better shape than simply playing by intuition or gueswork.)

Before the flop: 

Which hands to play (see the graphic below for a visual summary):

1. Start by playing the following three categories of hands: (1) any pocket pair; (2) suited Aces (any hand with an Ace and any other card of the same suit); and (3) suited and offsuit broadway hands (any two cards that are both Ten or higher, for example A-T or Q-J, whether the cards are of the same suit or not). These hands are colored red in the chart below, and constitute about 1 out of every 5 hands, which is a relatively strong, tight range for a beginner to start with. You will be playing stronger starting hands than most opponents and will have many more easy decisions after the flop. Chris strongly suggests that you play only these hands when you are one of the first players to act before the flop. 
2. If you want to play more hands, consider adding these two categories of hands: (4) suited connectors (any two cards that are connected and the same suit, for example 5-4 of spades or 8-7 of hearts); and (5) all offsuit Aces (any hand with an Ace even if the other card is not of the same suit). These hands are colored blue in the chart below, and adding these hands to the other categories above will have you playing about 3 out of every 10 hands. These hands will be a bit tricker to play after the flop and you may end up losing big pots where you make a strong second-best hand (e.g. a pair of Aces with a worse kicker than another player, or a low flush against a higher flush). Chris strongly advises that you not play too many hands like these unless a few players have already folded before you act. 
3. Finally, if you are really in the game to play lots of hands, but you still want easy rules to decide what to play, consider playing (6) more suited hands (two cards of the same suit). The next best suited hands to play (after suited Aces and suited connectors) are (a) suited Kings (which can make strong flushes) and (b) suited cards that are almost connected (those that have only one or two gaps between them, and therefore can make a straight). These are colored green in the chart below. All other suited hands are much weaker and are colored gray in the chart below. Adding more suited hands to your range will have you playing between 35% and 45% of your hands, depending on how many you add. Just be aware that the more of these weaker suited hands you play, the more very tough decisions you will have after the flop. You will have to fold a lot on the flop when you don’t connect with the board at all, you will have to decide whether to call bets with very low pairs, and you will have to decide whether to pay to try to hit your flushes when one or two cards of your suit are on the flop. Chris strongly advises that you play the weakest of these hands only when everyone except the blinds has already folded before you act. 
4. Offsuit hands that have no Ace and one or more cards below a Ten are quite weak and should rarely be played. These are colored white in the chart below.