Poker Variance Calculator

How big can your downswing get? How long until your win rate "converges"? Pick your numbers and see what variance actually looks like.

Your Stats

3
100
50k
50

Quick Presets

50 sample paths over 50k hands

winning paths losing paths
Expected
+1500 bb
Winning %
76%
5th percentile
-2522 bb
95th percentile
+3717 bb
Worst downswing seen
-4571 bb
457σ swing
Best path final
+4923 bb
Worst path final
-3461 bb
Median
+1554 bb

How to read this: Each thin line is one possible future given your stats. The bright green line is the luckiest path; the bright red is the unluckiest. The dashed amber line is your expected EV.

If "Winning %" is below 80% you're going to feel variance hard. If your worst path looks terrifying, that's normal — it's the 50-out-of-50 bad-luck sample. Real downswings tracking-wise tend to fall between the 5th percentile line and the worst path.

We ran this exact per-hand model for 70 billion hands: 81% of true 3bb/100 winners hit a 20+ buy-in downswing within 100k hands — see the full downswing odds study.

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