Start here
Card game basics
Never played cards before? Five short lessons and you'll be ready for any game on the site.
1. Meet the deck
A standard deck has 52 cards in four suits — spades ♠, hearts ♥, diamonds ♦ and clubs ♣. Each suit runs Ace, 2–10, Jack, Queen, King.
The Spanish deck has suits of coins, cups, swords and clubs, and numbers its court cards 10, 11 and 12. Our deck guides show every card.
2. How cards rank
In most games the King beats the Queen, which beats the Jack, then 10 down to 2. The Ace is the wild child: high in some games, low in others.
Suits usually don't outrank each other — unless the game names a trump suit. Each guide spells out the ranking.
3. Shuffle, cut and deal
Shuffle at least five or six times so the cards are properly mixed. The player to the dealer's right usually cuts the deck.
Deal one card at a time, face down, clockwise, starting with the player to the dealer's left. The deal then passes to the left each hand.
4. The big game families
Most games fit a family: shedding games (empty your hand), trick-taking games (win rounds), rummy games (build sets and runs), solitaire, and fishing games (capture cards from the table).
Learn one game in a family and you'll pick up its cousins in minutes.
5. Table manners
Keep your cards hidden, play in turn, and leave the discard pile neat so everyone can see the top card.
Most importantly: agree on house rules before the first deal. It saves a lot of arguments!
Your first game
Ready? Start with Crazy Eights.
It's the easiest game to learn and teaches you matching, drawing and wild cards.
Learn Crazy Eights →