Poker Online — Multiplayer Texas Hold'em for PHP

A complete, self-contained 9-seat Texas Hold'em platform written in plain PHP. No MySQL required — game state is stored in JSON files on disk, so it runs on any shared host with PHP 7.4+.

The strategic bots work fully offline; you can optionally plug in a DeepSeek API key to make them even sharper — one file, off by default.

Strategic bots
Preflop GTO-informed ranges and Monte Carlo equity — plus an optional DeepSeek AI layer for sharper, exploitative play.

Hand history & replay
Every hand is recorded and can be replayed street by street.

Theme system
Auto-discovered CSS themes; players pick their own in the Profile dialog.

Quick start

Upload the CONTENTS of the Source/ folder to your web host (the files go directly into the web root, NOT into a "Source" sub-folder). Do NOT upload Documentation/.
Run setup: open https://your-site.com/setup.php and follow the 2 steps.
Play: open index.php, register, and take a seat.

Important: after setup, use the one-click cleanup button to delete setup.php.

Page	What it covers
Installation	Requirements, the 2-step wizard, FTP upload, file permissions, verification.
Configuration	Every `POKER_*` option in `config.php`, with types, defaults and examples.
Admin & Settings	The tabbed settings page (`admin.php?cfg=1`), validation, player permissions, rooms, plus observer, kick and bans.
User Guide	Accounts, sitting in, betting controls, pre-actions, bot personalities, fair deal, chat, profiles, replay, mobile.
Tournament Mode	Vote, blind ladder, scheduled breaks, late registration, rebuys, payout splits and the poker rules used (TDA).
Troubleshooting	Common problems and their fixes.
Changelog	Everything in the release (v1.0.0).

Feature highlights

2–9 players per table; multiple rooms via the URL hash (index.php#RoomName).
Tournament mode — the seated players vote a freezeout: buy-in from the account, rising blinds with a PokerStars-style ladder, scheduled breaks, late registration, limited rebuys and a payout split (winner takes all / percentage / fixed). See Tournament Mode.
Account system with avatars, country flags and per-user themes.
In-game chat with moderation (configurable banned-word list).
All-in run-out with equity display, hand history with replay.
Fair, unpredictable deal — the deck is shuffled server-side with PHP's CSPRNG random_int() inside a Fisher–Yates loop (never rand()/mt_rand() /shuffle()), one deck per hand, cards removed as dealt, and the deck never sent to the browser. See User Guide.
Responsive layout with a dedicated mobile stylesheet.
Pure PHP — no Composer, no database (JSON file storage).
15 bundled CSS themes (14 load optional Google Fonts — see Configuration to make them offline).
Live win-% display at all-in showdowns, hand-name display under the pot.
Rabbit Hunt — when a hand ends by fold-out, the cards that would have come next fly out of the deck and flip over for about 3.5 seconds (5 cards after a preflop fold-out, 2 after the flop, 1 after the turn). See User Guide.
Full side panel: Chat, Game info (log), Hands (replay).
Optional AI opponents (DeepSeek) — a hybrid layer that judges on top of the bot engine's own equity/pot-odds numbers; validated, leashed, auto-fallback, and off by default. See Configuration.
Bot personalities — every bot draws one of four archetypes when it sits down (TAG 40%, Rock 25%, LAG 25%, Station 10%) on top of the same GTO + Monte-Carlo engine, with a human-like thinking time that depends on the style and on how close the decision is. One switch (POKER_BOT_STYLES_ENABLED) makes them identical again. See User Guide.