Squeeze

Also known as: squeeze play, squeeze 3-bet

A 3-bet made after an open-raise and one or more cold-callers, exploiting the dead money and the callers' capped ranges.

A squeeze is a 3-bet into an opener plus at least one caller. It's stronger than a heads-up 3-bet for two reasons: there's more dead money in the pot to win immediately, and the cold-caller's range is capped — they usually didn't 3-bet themselves, so they hold few premiums and must fold a lot.

Sizing is larger than a standard 3-bet because you're charging multiple players: a common rule is roughly the open size plus one extra big blind per caller, often landing around 4–4.5× the open OOP. The extra dead money sweetens the bluff side, so squeeze ranges can be polarized with value (QQ+, AK) and blocker-driven bluffs (A5s, KQs) — but beware the opener's 4-bet and the caller occasionally trapping.

The equity math is just fold equity: with two opponents who each fold often, your immediate-profit threshold drops, making light squeezes attractive against passive, cold-calling-heavy pools. In MTTs, the squeeze is a premier tool for accumulating chips against loose late-position opens and station-y flat-callers — but ICM tightens it near pay jumps.