How to Play Spades: Complete Rules and Scoring

These are the rules of the standard American game: four players in two partnerships, a 52-card deck, and a game to 500. They follow Pagat’s spades rules, which say they were revised to match the standard of online play. They’re checked against Bicycle’s rules, university and tournament rule sheets, and the big spades apps. Where tables disagree, this page gives the usual rule and the house rules page gives the alternatives. The game on this site plays these rules.

Your first game in five steps

1. Sit across from your partner. Four players, two teams.
2. Deal 13 cards each. Spades are always trump.
3. Bid once each. Say how many tricks you’ll win. Your bid and your partner’s are added together.
4. Play 13 tricks. Follow suit if you can; if not, play anything. The highest spade wins, otherwise the highest card of the suit led.
5. Score. Make your team’s bid: 10 points a trick bid, plus 1 for each extra. Miss it: lose 10 a trick bid. First to 500 wins.

Players, cards and the deal

Players. Spades is a game for four players in two fixed partnerships. Partners sit opposite each other, so the teams alternate around the table. The deal and the play go clockwise.

Cards. A standard 52-card deck with no jokers. In every suit the cards rank from high to low: A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2. The spade suit is always trump: any spade beats any card of another suit. Nothing beats the ace of spades.

The dealer. Choose the first dealer at random, for example by drawing cards: highest card deals. After each hand the deal passes one player to the left. Tournament rules offer the cut to the player on the dealer’s right.

The deal. The dealer shuffles and deals the whole deck one card at a time, face down, starting with the player on their left and going clockwise. Everyone ends up with 13 cards.

Bidding

After looking at their cards, the players bid, starting with the player to the dealer’s left and going clockwise. Each player bids exactly once, and there’s no second round.

• Every player must bid. Nobody may pass.
• A bid is a number of tricks, from 1 to 13, the tricks you expect to win yourself.
• Or bid nil. Nil is a bid to win no tricks at all (see below). You can’t bid zero without bidding nil.
• Partners add their bids together. If you bid 4 and your partner bids 3, your team must win at least 7 tricks between you. It doesn’t matter which of you wins them.
• No table talk. You may not discuss your hand or signal to your partner. All the information you give is your bid.

The bids don’t have to add up to 13. When the four bids total less than 13, someone will collect extra tricks; when they total more, at least one team will fall short.

Some tables play Board, a minimum bid of 4 for each team. Board isn’t part of the standard rules: see house rules.

Nil and blind nil

Nil is a bid that you will win no tricks in the hand. It’s a separate contract, scored on its own:

• If the nil bidder wins no tricks, their team scores the nil bonus (100 points).
• If they win even one trick, their team loses the same amount.
• Their partner’s bid still counts on its own. The partner has to make the tricks they bid, alone. The tricks a failed nil bidder takes don’t help the partner make their bid, though they do count as bags.

Covering is the partner’s job: playing high cards to win tricks the nil bidder would otherwise be stuck with. That’s ordinary play, not a special rule.

Both partners may bid nil. Each nil is scored separately: +200 if both succeed, nothing if one succeeds and one fails, and −200 if both fail.

Blind nil is a nil bid made before you look at your cards. It’s worth twice as much: 200 points if you take no tricks, minus 200 if you take any. Pagat says it is “usually agreed” that a player may bid blind nil only when their team is losing by at least 100 points, and that’s the rule this site’s game uses. After the bidding, the blind nil bidder and their partner exchange two cards each way: the blind nil bidder passes two cards face down to their partner, and the partner passes two back.

Blind nil is an option, not part of every game. Tournament rules such as the Grand Prix “World Series of Spades” don’t allow it, and some apps let you bid it on any hand. The house rules page has the alternatives.

A word about “double nil”. The name means two different things. Some rules (the University of Chicago’s intramural rules, Hoyle’s software and Microsoft’s Internet Spades) use “double nil” for blind nil. Others (Pagat and several apps) use it for both partners bidding nil. Ask which one your table means.

Playing the tricks

The opening lead. The player to the dealer’s left leads to the first trick. They may lead any card except a spade.

Following suit. Each player in turn, clockwise, plays one card face up.

• You must follow suit: play a card of the suit that was led, if you have one.
• If you have no card of the suit led, you may play any card. You may trump with a spade, or throw away a card of another suit. You’re never forced to trump.

Winning a trick. If the trick contains a spade, the highest spade wins it. If not, the highest card of the suit led wins. A card of another suit (not a spade) never wins, however high it is. The winner gathers the trick face down and leads to the next one.

Breaking spades. You may not lead a spade until spades are broken:

• spades are broken once any player has played a spade on another suit (trumped or thrown one off), or
• the player on lead has nothing but spades left in their hand. They may then lead a spade, and that breaks spades too.

This only limits leading. When you can’t follow suit you may play a spade on any trick, including the first.

Reneging. Failing to follow suit when you could have is a renege. At a real table the penalty varies. Tournament rules such as the Grand Prix rules and the Spades Connection guidelines take away the offending team’s bid and credit the opponents; some college intramural rules move three tricks to the other side instead. Agree on it before you play. The online game only lets you play legal cards, so you can’t renege by accident.

A few tricks played out

North deals, so East leads first. North and South are partners against East and West.

• Trick 1. East leads the K♥. South plays the 4♥, West the A♥ and North the 9♥. West’s ace is the highest heart, so West wins. A spade couldn’t have been led here, but anyone with no hearts could have played one.
• Trick 2. West leads the 7♦. North has no diamonds and plays the 3♠, a low spade. East plays the Q♦ and South the 2♦. North’s spade wins, because any spade beats any diamond. Spades are now broken.
• Trick 3. North leads the K♠. East plays the A♠, South the 6♠ and West, who has no spades, the 10♣. East’s ace of spades wins.

Scoring

Both teams score at the end of every hand. Count each team’s tricks, compare them with its contract, then score each nil on its own.

Making your bid

A team that wins at least as many tricks as its combined bid scores 10 points for each trick it bid, plus 1 point for each extra trick. A team that bid 7 and took 7 scores 70. If it took 9, it scores 72.

Being set

A team that wins fewer tricks than it bid is set and loses 10 points for each trick it bid, whatever it actually took. A team that bid 7 and took 6 scores −70. Bicycle’s rules, and some tables, score a set as zero instead (see house rules).

Bags and the 10-bag penalty

The extra tricks a team takes beyond its bid are called bags or sandbags. Each is worth a point when it’s taken, but the team also keeps a running count. When a team’s bags reach 10, it loses 100 points, and the count starts again. Bags past 10 carry over: a team on 8 bags that takes 3 more loses 100 and is left on 1.

Many players keep the bag count as the last digit of the score. Because bags are the only single points in the game, a score of 243 means 3 bags so far.

The penalty is the reason bidding accurately matters. A team that keeps under-bidding and taking extra tricks will lose 100 points every few hands.

Scoring nil

Score each nil on its own, then score the partner’s bid as an ordinary contract:

• Nil made: +100, plus whatever the partner scores for their bid.
• Nil failed: −100. The nil bidder’s tricks don’t count toward the partner’s bid, so the partner must make their bid alone. The nil bidder’s tricks do count as bags (and a point each).

Some tables count a failed nil’s tricks for the partner instead, or not at all. That’s one of the disputes on the house rules page.

Winning the game

• The first team to reach 500 points wins.
• If both teams pass 500 on the same hand, the team with the higher score wins.
• A team whose score falls to −200 or below loses. Pagat’s main rules have no such floor, but most spades apps and tournament rules use it, and so does the game on this site.
• If the scores are exactly tied when the game would end, play another hand.

Five worked hands

Each example uses the standard scoring above.

1. Contract made, with a bag. You bid 4 and your partner bids 3: a contract of 7. Your team takes 8 tricks. Score: 7 × 10 = 70, plus 1 bag = +71. Your bag count goes up by 1.

2. Set. The other team bids 5 and 4: a contract of 9. It takes 7 tricks. Score: −90. Its 7 tricks earn nothing.

3. Bags over 10. Your team has 8 bags. You bid 6 and take 9. Score: 60 + 3 bags = 63, but that brings your bags to 11, so you lose 100: 63 − 100 = −37, and your bag count is now 1.

4. Nil made, and nil failed. North bids nil and South bids 4.

• North takes no tricks and South takes 5. Score: nil +100, South’s 4 made +40, 1 bag +1 = +141.
• North takes 2 tricks and South takes 4. Score: nil −100, South’s 4 made +40, North’s 2 tricks are bags +2 = −58, and 2 bags.
• North takes 2 and South takes 3. North’s tricks don’t help South, so South is set too: −100 − 40 + 2 = −138.

5. Blind nil. Your team is behind 300 to 450, so you may bid blind nil. You bid it without looking, swap two cards with your partner, and take no tricks. Your partner bid 5 and took 6. Score: blind nil +200, partner’s 5 made +50, 1 bag +1 = +251.

Spades terms

• Bag (sandbag). A trick taken beyond your team’s bid. Ten of them cost 100 points.
• Book. Another word for a trick.
• Nil. A bid to take no tricks. Worth 100 made, −100 failed.
• Blind nil. A nil bid made before looking at your cards. Worth 200 made, −200 failed.
• Set. Failing to make your team’s bid. You lose 10 points a trick bid.
• Breaking spades. The first spade played on another suit. After it, spades may be led.
• Cover. Playing high to win a trick, so your nil-bidding partner doesn’t have to.
• Board. A house rule: each team must bid at least 4.
• Renege. Failing to follow suit when you could have.
• Boston. Taking all 13 tricks. Some house rules give a bonus or the whole game for it.
• Cutthroat. Spades with no partners, where every player bids and scores alone.

Other ways to play

These rules are for four players in two partnerships, which is how spades is normally played. Tables also play with jokers and high deuces, with Board, with 10 for 2 and with other house rules: the house rules page covers each one. Spades can also be played by two or three players, or cutthroat with no partners. Those versions change the deal and the scoring.

Coming from another game? Euchre vs spades on euchre.cards, bridge vs spades and bid whist vs spades on Rare Pike compare the games, and Rare Pike’s games like spades suggests what to play next.