The "Hi Lo" System of Card Counting

The "Hi Lo" system Is one of the easiest and most popular "End play" systems available today. The system was developed by "Julian Braun" and refined with the help of "Stanford Wong". Because of it's simply it is highly recommended for beginners. One big difference between the "Hi-Lo" count and the "K-O" count is the seven is no longer counted as +1, but, now equals zero. Because of this the "Hi-Lo" system is considered balanced, meaning that when you get to the end of the deck your count should be zero.

Similar to other card counting systems the running count starts at zero and card values are added or subtracted from it.

With the "Hi-Lo" count, the card values are :

From 2 to 6 (the low cards) are counted as +1,

Cards 7 through 9 are zero,

Tens through aces (the high cards) are counted as -1.

You start the count, after the shuffle, with zero. Every time you see a card you subtract, (or add), its value to a running count. Remember to ignore 7 - 9. With the running count you have an idea of how many high cards, or low cards, are left in the deck. In other words, is the deck becoming more, or less, favorable to the player.

One of the biggest drawbacks to this method is the fact that the running count has to be converted to the true count in order for you to know how much of an advantage it gives you. You will need to know how many extra high cards, per deck, are still in the shoe. Each extra high card, (per deck), gives the player the 1/2 of 1% advantage.

To do this you have to learn to guess-ta-mate how many decks of cards are still in the shoe and divide the running count by this number to get the true count. In other words, if the running count is 15 and you estimate that there are 3 decks left in the shoe, the true count would be 5. You then use this number to determine how you should bet and play.