Open-raise
Also: open, RFI, raise first in
The first voluntary raise of a betting round, made when nobody has raised before you. Before the flop it is the standard way to enter a pot: the blinds are dead money, and raising takes the initiative rather than inviting a crowd.
An open-raise does two jobs at once. It builds a pot with your strongest hands and it wins the blinds outright often enough that hands with modest showdown value still profit. Sizes have shrunk over the years — a raise of two to two and a half big blinds is now common online where three to four was once normal, though live games with looser callers still reward bigger opens.
Limping into a pot instead of open-raising gives up both the initiative and the chance to win it uncontested, which is why it is rare in strong games outside deliberate small-blind and short-stack strategies.
Related terms
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What does RFI stand for?
Raise first in — the same thing as an open-raise, the first raise of the preflop betting round.