Computer science. Heads-up limit hold'em poker is solved

Science. 2015 Jan 9;347(6218):145-9. doi: 10.1126/science.1259433.

Abstract

Poker is a family of games that exhibit imperfect information, where players do not have full knowledge of past events. Whereas many perfect-information games have been solved (e.g., Connect Four and checkers), no nontrivial imperfect-information game played competitively by humans has previously been solved. Here, we announce that heads-up limit Texas hold'em is now essentially weakly solved. Furthermore, this computation formally proves the common wisdom that the dealer in the game holds a substantial advantage. This result was enabled by a new algorithm, CFR(+), which is capable of solving extensive-form games orders of magnitude larger than previously possible.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't