Small Blind vs Big Blind Strategy: How to Play the SB at Every Stack Depth

Small Blind vs Big Blind Strategy: How to Play the SB at Every Stack Depth

You’re not supposed to win money from the small blind. You are forced to put money in before seeing your cards, and you will be out of position for every street after the flop.

But blind vs blind situations are also the most frequent spots you will face in tournament poker. If your small blind strategy is off, you are bleeding chips every single orbit.

In this guide, BBZ coach and MTT legend Jon “apestyles” Van Fleet breaks down exactly how the solver wants you to play the small blind when it folds to you. We will walk through solver-approved ranges at five key stack depths: 10, 15, 20, 30, and 60 big blinds.

Whether you are working with preflop charts for the first time or looking to sharpen your blind vs blind game, this breakdown will give you a clear framework for every stack depth you will encounter in MTTs.

Small Blind Strategy at 10 Big Blinds

At 10 big blinds, the solver wants you to play about 79% of hands from the small blind. Your strategy here is polarized: limp with the top and bottom of your range, and shove the middle.

There is no non-all-in raising range at this stack depth. Apestyles did not include it in the solver sims because there is no profitable small raise at 10 bigs.

The logic is simple. With 10 big blinds, a standard raise commits too much of your stack to fold afterward. So you either put it all in or you limp to see a flop cheaply.

Small Blind Strategy at 15 Big Blinds

At 15 big blinds, things start to shift. You are now playing 83.5% of hands, and a new option enters the mix: the non-all-in raise.

Limping becomes the most common action at this depth, taking over from shoving. But the shove range is still significant at 25% of hands.

The non-all-in raise only shows up as a pure action for a handful of combos. “Nothing except for pocket aces and 10-9 suited really likes it,” says apestyles. For most other hands, the small raise is mixed into the strategy at a low frequency.

Your shoving range at 15 big blinds is made up of ace-x, king-x, Q-J offsuit, low pocket pairs, and a characteristic C-shaped curve of suited hands running from the top right to the bottom right of the chart. The middle of that C-shape includes hands like 9-7s, T-7s, J-7s, and Q-6s.

Small Blind Strategy at 20 Big Blinds

With 20 big blinds, the raising range expands significantly and the shoving range shrinks. You are playing 85.5% of hands.

The shoving range has faded to just ace-x offsuit and a few king-x combos. Meanwhile, the non-all-in raise has jumped from 7% to 18% of hands.

An interesting detail at this stack depth: your bluff-raising range comes from high cards paired with a four or five, and from two cards both above a seven. You should be raising more with hands like T-x suited and 9-x suited than with hands that have straight potential like 5-4s or 3-4s.

“I call it bluff-raising because it is raise-folding,” says apestyles. You are putting in a raise with the intention of folding if you get 3-bet.

This is the stack depth where knowing your preflop ranges becomes critical. The strategy has three distinct actions at different frequencies, and guessing leads to big mistakes over time.

Small Blind Strategy at 30 Big Blinds

At 30 big blinds, the shove is almost completely gone. Raising and limping now dominate your strategy, with 86.2% of hands played.

The only hands that still shove are a tiny number of combos like A-9 offsuit and pocket threes, and even those are at very low frequency.

Your raise range consists of hands with blocker value (two offsuit cards above a seven) and suited hands that can make straights or have a high card kicker.

One important shift: you are now pure raising with your big pocket pairs (AA, KK, QQ). This is different from both shorter stacks (where you shove them) and deeper stacks (where you will start limping them again). The reason is the raise sizing. At 30 bigs with a 4x raise, you can build a pot efficiently with premiums while still having room to play postflop.

This is also where the ranges from the apestyles course material in his BBZ Bundle go deeper. He covers not just the small blind opening strategy, but how the big blind should respond, and how to navigate the postflop spots that follow from each action.

Small Blind Strategy at 60 Big Blinds

Deep-stacked at 60 big blinds, the strategy completes its transformation. You are now playing 88.9% of hands, and limping dominates everything.

This is where the strategy comes full circle. At 10 big blinds, you limped your premiums because you wanted to limp-shove. At 60 big blinds, you are limping premiums again, but now it is because you want to limp-raise against aggressive big blind opponents who will attack your limp.

If you’re looking for more about this from the big blinds perspective you can get a detailed breakdown of how the big blind should isolate against small blind limps at different stack depths, read our article on blind vs blind isolation strategy from the big blind.

Limp-raising becomes a much bigger part of your game at this depth. When you limp AA or KK and the big blind raises, you get to put in a 3-bet from what looked like a weak position. That is where the big pots come from in blind vs blind play.

How Your Small Blind Strategy Changes by Stack Depth

The thread connecting all of it: the solver does not play the small blind passively at any stack depth. Whether you are limping, raising, or shoving, there is always an aggressive plan behind the action.

For a deeper look at blind vs blind play from both sides of the table, including postflop strategy, check out our Complete Guide to BvB Play in MTTs.

Put These Ranges Into Practice

This guide covers the framework, but the solver outputs cover thousands of specific hand combinations across every position, not just the small blind.

Related articles:

• Blind vs Blind Strategy: Isolating Limps With Weak Hands
• A Guide to 3-Betting From the Small Blind in MTTs
• 3 Common Preflop Mistakes That Poker Charts Can Fix