No Peek
A stud variant where seven cards are dealt entirely face down and unseen, and players flip their own cards one at a time in turn — only revealing them once they choose to beat the current best hand showing.
Coming soon — not yet playable
Rules
No Peek deals seven cards face down to each player, exactly as in Seven-Card Stud — but unlike stud, players do not look at their cards as they're dealt; all seven remain face down and unseen.
Starting with a designated player, each player in turn flips over one of their own cards, choosing which one, but only when they believe doing so will beat the best hand currently showing among all revealed cards at the table. A player who flips a card that doesn't improve on the current best hand may be required to keep flipping (per house rule) until they do, or may simply pass their turn if no house penalty applies. Each time a new best hand is shown, a betting round follows.
Showdown proceeds once all players have revealed enough cards to complete a hand (or a house-defined stopping point), with the standard best five-card poker hand winning.
Strategy notes: Because players don't know their own remaining hidden cards, No Peek turns typical poker hand-reading upside down — instead of reasoning about what opponents might be hiding, the whole table reasons together about probability and betting pressure on cards nobody has actually seen yet, including their own.
Common house rules
Confirm the 'must beat' rule
House rules vary on whether a player who flips a card that doesn't improve on the current best hand must keep flipping until they do, or may simply stop — agree on this before dealing, since it changes the game's pacing significantly.
Try Mexican Sweat for a variant
Mexican Sweat (also in this library) uses the same 'flip your own unseen cards' mechanic but adds a shared face-up target card and a 'kill' rank — a natural next step for a table that enjoys No Peek.
A genuinely different kind of poker
Because no one ever sees their own hole cards until choosing to flip them, No Peek has essentially no pre-flop hand-strength decisions — it's worth explaining this upfront to a table used to standard stud or draw games.
Related games
Based on shared category, origin, and rules that reference each other.
Mexican Sweat
A No Peek variant where a card is dealt face up to the center as the hand to beat, and players flip their own unseen cards trying to top it without matching a designated 'kill' rank.
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