Poker chips are catalogued by value and by color. They are an essential element for the development of the games, and they are the element used to quantify the value of the players’ bets.
As you may already know, the value of poker chips is represented by colors. Thus, with just a glance the whole table can know how much the poker chips that a player has moved to the center of the table to bet are worth. But let’s look at this in more detail, because there is a whole world behind it.
Poker chip colors
The color and value of poker chips are two aspects that will always go hand in hand. They represent two fundamental aspects of the game and simplify the quantification of chip value.
Taking into account that poker is a game where many times we play with incomplete data, half information and disguised strategies, having such a visual and representative element as poker chips and their colors is essential to manage vital numerical data for the game in a quick and simple way.
The value on poker chips is usually represented by a number in the center that the player can see when he/she picks it up. However, when betting and bringing the chips to the center of the table, what is seen are the edges of the chips. These edges are of a certain color and represent their value, and allow this information to be transmitted to all participants.
How much are poker chips worth?
Let’s go for the million-dollar question: how much are poker chips worth and what colors are used to represent those values. First of all, you should know that many platforms and casinos use different colors to represent the value of their poker chips. This is not a problem, other than the fact that you are going to have to get used to relating a specific amount to the color of the chip. Nothing insurmountable.
White, red, green-black and blue are colors that you have to keep in mind, because they are the basis on which the relationship between color and value of poker chips is usually based.
White is usually used for the lowest value chips. However, their role is crucial. They allow you to create custom bets, without going over, but without holding back, being able to bet just the amount you want to put on the table. Although in monetary terms they are the least valuable chip, they are the basis that allow bets to flow without the need to put large amounts at risk at all times.
The red color is associated with a rise in the betting level scale. It is a color that is not normally used in the most valuable chips, but represents an intermediate value. Depending on the house where you play, they can move in a fairly wide range of values, but the important thing is that you associate their presence with a rising amount. In addition, as a group they can often form important bets, so be careful.
The green and black chips are the gateway to strong bets. We move here in a somewhat delicate terrain, because it is a color that not only represents a stronger bet, but also a more elaborate strategy. Do not forget that the colors of the poker chips are one more element of the non-verbal language of poker, and you can convey feelings deliberately with bets where chips associated with the more pro game predominate.
On the other hand, we have the blue chips. They are usually used for chips with very high values, with several zeros behind them, and they often occupy rectangular chips and not circular ones, which are the ones used in casinos to make powerful bets.
These blue chips always come from players who have amassed a significant amount of money playing poker. They are used in high-stakes and can serve as a way to increase the pressure, pushing the rest to make a higher bet.
In summary, and always subject to variations, the relation of colors and values that we can take as good to relate a determined amount with the color of the chip in poker would be the following:
- White color: 1 euro.
- Red color: 5 euros.
- Blue color: 10 euros.
- Green color: 25 euros.
- Orange color: 50 euros.
- Black color: 100 euros.
- Pink color: 250 euros.
- Purple color: 500 euros.
- Maroon color: 1.000 euros.
- Light blue color: 2.000 euros.
As you can see, there is a whole range of possibilities and each platform makes use of the colors it prefers according to its distribution of chips, maintaining the base of keeping the color white for chips of lower value, red for those that increase the value of the previous one, green for medium amounts, and light blue for chips of high value.
What can we learn from all this? That the color of a poker chip is not only a useful method to quickly count the value of a bet, but it is another element of the non-verbal language used in a game.
This must be taken into account because in poker you can play a lot with the sensations and perceptions that a particular bet generates in the rest. For example, in preflop play, the size of the bet is especially important, and this will conditionate the decisions that the rest of the opponents make.
