How to play Spades

Bid, team up with a partner and take your tricks.

The goal

You and your partner (across the table) play against two computer opponents. Each hand, bid how many tricks you’ll take, then take at least that many. First team to 500 points wins (or 300 for a shorter game).

Bidding

Each player gets 13 cards. Starting left of the dealer, everyone bids how many tricks they expect to win, from 1 to 13.
Your bid and your partner’s are added together: that’s your team’s contract.
Bid Nil to say you won’t take a single trick. The suggested bid is highlighted to help you get started.

Playing tricks

The player left of the dealer leads first. Everyone plays one card, going clockwise.
You must follow the suit that was led if you can. If you can’t, play any card.
Spades are trumps: the highest spade wins the trick. Without a spade, the highest card of the suit led wins. Aces are high.
Spades can’t be led until one has been played on another suit (spades are “broken”), unless you have nothing but spades.
The winner of a trick leads the next one.

Scoring

Make your contract: 10 points for each trick bid, plus 1 point for each extra trick.
Fall short and you lose 10 points for each trick bid.
Extra tricks are “bags”. Every 10 bags your team collects costs 100 points, so don’t take too many.
Nil: +100 if the nil bidder takes no tricks, −100 if they take any. Tricks a nil bidder takes don’t count toward the partner’s bid, but they do count as bags.
The game ends when a team reaches the target after a hand, highest score winning (a tie plays another hand). A team that falls to −200 loses.

Controls

Pick your bid from the panel when it’s your turn.
Tap a card to play it. Cards you can play are raised; the others are faded.
Each name plate shows that player’s bid and tricks won; the dark plate is whose turn it is.
Undo takes back your last bid or card and the computer plays after it, within the current hand.
The list button shows the score sheet. After each hand the sheet opens with how it scored.

Difficulty

Easy: the opponents bid loosely and play the odd careless card; your partner plays a sound game.
Normal: counts its tricks, plays second hand low and third hand high, ducks to avoid bags and covers a partner’s nil.
Hard: also keeps track of who’s out of which suits and plays each option out ahead against many possible deals.
On Normal and Hard your partner plays at the same level as the opponents. Records are kept for each difficulty.

Questions

How do you win Spades?

Is Spades free to play?

Yes. Spades on Everyday Games is free and plays in your web browser on phones, tablets and computers, with nothing to download.

Do I need an account to play?

No. You can play without signing in, and your stats and games in progress are saved in your browser. Sign in with Google or Apple to keep them in your account and pick up where you left off on any device.

What modes does Spades have?

You can play Easy, Normal or Hard. Your record (games played, wins and best results) is kept separately for each.

Strategy guides