Pool glossary
House cut
The share of the pot the venue keeps.
What it means
A percentage of the entry money retained by the bar, usually to cover table time, a prize, or the cost of running the night. Commonly zero, and when it is not, commonly ten to twenty per cent.
Where the word comes from
Gambling vocabulary — the house takes a cut. Also called the rake.
How it sounds at a table
"Does the bar take anything?" "Ten percent, it goes on the table money."
What it means in a three-strikes night
Announce it before anyone pays, every time, without being asked. A cut nobody was told about is the fastest way to lose a weekly night, and the amount is almost never the problem — being surprised by it is. Most bars that run a successful weekly take nothing and make their money on drinks, which is the actual business model.
The mistake people make
Taking a cut without checking what your local rules say about a venue profiting from a players' pot. Worth five minutes of reading before the first night, not after.
Terms that come up alongside it
Written out rather than linked only, because looking up one term usually means you are standing at a table and do not want four more taps.
- Pot
- Two meanings: the prize money, and British for pocketing a ball. In American usage the pot is the total prize money — every buy-in added together.
- Buy-in
- What each player pays to enter. The fixed amount every player puts in to join a tournament.
- Payout
- How the pot is divided between the top finishers. The split of prize money by finishing position.
Where it comes up
House cut matters most in three-strikes pool, where a single turn is one shot and the cost of getting something wrong is a life rather than a visit to the table. If you are learning the game, the guide to running a night puts most of this vocabulary in context, and the format pages show which games the term applies to and which it does not.