The order to learn video poker variants in

Video poker looks like four games: Jacks or Better, Bonus Poker, Double Bonus and Deuces Wild. In practice the first three share most of one strategy chart, and only the fourth asks you to start again. That makes the order you learn them in matter. Pick it well and every new machine costs you a handful of changes instead of a fresh chart.

What carries over to every variant

Three skills work on all four machines, so it pays to get them solid on the first one.

1. Reading the paytable. Check the full house and flush rows first. They are what tell a full-pay machine from a cheaper one. The paytable post covers it.
2. Counting outs from 47 cards. You see five cards, you discard some, and 47 cards are unseen whatever you hold. One draw to a four-card flush has 9 outs: 9 / 47 is 19.1%. An open-ended straight has 8 outs, 17.0%. An inside straight has 4, 8.5%. Those figures do not depend on the paytable, only the value of landing them does. See inside versus outside draws.
3. Ranking holds by value, not by how a hand looks. A made hand is not automatically the best hold, and a pair is not automatically worth keeping. You are always comparing the average result of each choice.

Step 1: Jacks or Better

Start here. It has no wild cards and no rank-dependent rows, and its one paying pair, jacks or higher, gives you something concrete to count. The full-pay 9/6 version returns 99.54% with correct play. Learn the hold order in the Jacks or Better strategy post and play until you are not looking it up. The variant is also the one the Play listing describes as ready from your first hand.

Step 2: Bonus Poker

Bonus Poker keeps the Jacks or Better shape. Four of a kind is split by rank, and the price is a full house of 8 and a flush of 5 instead of 9 and 6. The hold order barely moves, so this is a cheap step: you are learning that quad rank matters, not a new chart. Full pay returns 99.17%. The details are in Bonus Poker and Double Bonus.

Step 3: Double Bonus

Double Bonus is the same chart with a few real edits. Two pair pays 1 instead of 2, and four aces pays 160. Hands that finish as two pair lose value, and aces gain it. With three aces and a pair, you break the made full house and draw two cards. Full pay returns 100.17%, so the variant rewards getting these edits right. Learn it after Bonus Poker because each edit is easy to notice when you know the chart it changes.

Step 4: Deuces Wild, last

Every 2 is wild, so the machine runs on different rules. The lowest paying hand is three of a kind at 1, a lone pair pays nothing, and the full-pay table (25-15-9-5-3-2-2-1) returns 100.76%. Pair instincts from the earlier three machines mislead you here. Your counting and paytable-reading skills carry over, but the hold order does not. Leave it until the first chart is automatic, so that the contrast is the only thing you are learning. Why Deuces Wild breaks your Jacks or Better instincts sets out the differences.

Why not start with the highest return

The figures above are what a perfect player would average over a very large number of hands. They are not what you will see in a short session, and they only apply if you hold correctly. A variant you play at 90% accuracy is worth less to you than one you play flawlessly at a lower nominal return. The gap between the best and worst of the four is 1.59 points. A handful of wrong holds costs more than that. Accuracy first, then variety.

What to take from it

1. Learn Jacks or Better first, until the hold order is automatic.
2. Add Bonus Poker next. It is the same chart with the quad rows split by rank.
3. Add Double Bonus third, and relearn two pair, the aces row and the broken full house.
4. Leave Deuces Wild for last. It keeps your counting and paytable skills and drops your hold order.
5. Check the paytable on screen before every new machine, whatever its name says.