Types of Pool Games: 8-Ball, 9-Ball, Snooker & More

Walk into a bar with a pool table and you’ll usually see the same game: 8-ball, solids against stripes, first to sink the black. Turn on a televised tournament and it’s almost always something else entirely, balls numbered 1 through 9, a completely different scoring logic, sometimes a completely different table. Pool isn’t one game with one set of rules. It’s a family of games that share a cue and a set of pockets and not much else.

The main types of pool games

Game	Balls Used	Objective	Skill Level
8-Ball	15 object balls + cue	Pot your group (solids/stripes), then the 8-ball	Beginner–Intermediate
9-Ball	Balls 1–9 + cue	Pocket balls in numeric order; pot the 9 to win	Intermediate–Advanced
10-Ball	Balls 1–10 + cue	Like 9-ball but must call your shots	Advanced
Straight Pool (14.1)	15 object balls + cue	Reach a target score by pocketing any ball	Advanced
One-Pocket	15 object balls + cue	Score 8 balls into your designated pocket	Advanced
Bank Pool	15 object balls + cue	All pots must be banked off a cushion first	Advanced
Snooker	21 object balls + cue	Score points in sequence; red, then colour	Intermediate–Advanced
Cutthroat	15 object balls + cue	Multiplayer; eliminate opponents’ groups	Beginner–Intermediate

8-ball: the format everyone learns first

Players split the 15 object balls into two groups after the break, solids (1 to 7) and stripes (9 to 15). Each side has to clear its own group before touching the 8-ball. Pot the 8-ball early, or on the wrong call, and the game is over on the spot. The rules are simple enough to pick up in a few minutes, which is exactly why 8-ball ended up as the default game in pubs, rec centers, and amateur leagues almost everywhere.

9-ball: the professional standard

Televised professional pool almost always means 9-ball. Only the balls numbered 1 through 9 are in play, and a player has to contact the lowest numbered ball on the table first on every shot. The 9-ball itself can drop at any point, including off the break, and win the rack instantly. That combo possibility is what makes 9-ball fast and occasionally chaotic to watch. Most major WPA tournaments run on this format.

Straight pool (14.1 continuous)

In straight pool, a player can pot any ball in any order, but has to call the shot first. Once 14 balls are down, the table gets re-racked and play continues without a break in the count. Games run to a pre-agreed score, often 100 or 150 in professional matches. Willie Mosconi once ran over 500 balls consecutively in an exhibition, which gives some sense of how deep the ceiling is once you take away the safety net of a small rack.

Snooker: a separate tradition

Snooker moves to a 12-foot table with smaller pockets and 22 balls, 15 reds plus six colours (yellow, green, brown, blue, pink, black). Play alternates between potting a red, worth 1 point, and nominating a colour worth 2 to 7. The World Snooker Championship at the Crucible in Sheffield draws huge audiences across the UK and Asia every spring, and it runs on rules different enough from pool that a strong 8-ball player can still look lost at a snooker table.

Carom billiards: no pockets at all

Carom billiards drops pockets entirely. A player scores by making the cue ball contact both object balls in one shot, a carom. Straight rail, three-cushion billiards, and artistic billiards are the main variants, and three-cushion is the hardest of the three: the cue ball has to hit at least three cushions before it can complete the carom.

One-pocket and bank pool

In one-pocket, each player is assigned one of the two corner pockets at the foot of the table, and the only way to win is to sink eight balls into that single pocket. Raw potting ability matters less here than ball control and safety play; a good one-pocket player spends half the match hiding the cue ball rather than shooting. Bank pool removes the direct shot altogether: every pot has to rebound off at least one cushion first, which means the player needs a real feel for angles and how fast the table plays before they can compete.