Practice Bridge with a coach

New to Bridge? Read the full rules, which also explain how real Bridge is bid and scored · All practice games

The Bridge table

The practice game needs JavaScript. The rules page explains how to play with a real deck of cards.

Coach

Goal: the side with more card points plays each deal. If that is your side, win as many of the 13 rounds as your contract promises. If it is the other side, stop them. A round is one card from each player, and the best card wins all four. The first side to reach 500 points wins the match.

What just happened

Tips appear here as you play.

Your progress

Remember my progress on this device

Off by default. When it is on, the totals in the table above are saved in this browser only and never sent anywhere. Pressing Reset progress, or turning this off, deletes them.

About this practice game

Bridge is a game for four players in two partnerships. This is Minibridge, the simple form used to teach it. Every player counts card points, the side with more points plays the deal, and one player there names the strongest suit and a goal. You are South, with North as your partner, against West and East. You play one deal at a time, sometimes as the player in charge and sometimes as a defender. The Coach explains each step. Press Hint when you want a suggestion and the reason for it. Under the table there is also a short practice for the first offer in a real Bridge auction.

Keep going

The full rules of Bridge, including the auction and the scoring
Practice Whist, the partnership game Bridge grew out of
All practice games

Affiliate disclosure · Privacy · SelectACard home

How Minibridge works

Four players, two partnerships. You are South. North, across from you, is your partner. West and East are the other partnership. Everyone gets 13 cards. Cards rank from the 2 (lowest) up to the ace (highest). In a round, each player in turn puts down one card, and the best card wins all four. The winner starts the next round. The 13 rounds, and the dealing before them, are one deal.
Counting card points. Each player counts their own hand: an ace is 4 points, a king 3, a queen 2, a jack 1, and every other card is 0. There are 40 points in the deck, so the average hand holds 10. Everyone says their total, starting with the dealer. The deal on the board shows how yours is added up.
Who plays. The partnership with more points plays the deal. (If each side has 20, the cards are dealt again.) On that side, the player with more points is the declarer. If the two have the same, the one who said the total first is. The other player on that side is the dummy. The other two players are the defenders. You are never left as the dummy here, because the dummy has nothing to decide, so the practice game deals again.
The dummy. The dummy puts all 13 cards face up in the row above the table, and takes no further part. The declarer plays the dummy’s cards as well as their own, choosing which one to play. Every player can see the dummy.
The contract. The declarer looks at both hands and makes a promise, the contract. It has two parts. First, the strongest suit: one suit, or none. Any card of the strongest suit beats any card of the other three suits, even an ace. Second, the goal: a part-score promises to win at least 7 of the 13 rounds. A game promises more: 9 rounds with no strongest suit, 10 with hearts or spades, 11 with clubs or diamonds. A game scores much more when it is made, and costs more when it is not.
The first play. The defender on the declarer’s left plays first. This is called the opening lead. Then play goes clockwise: you, West, North, East. If you have a card of the suit that was played first, you must play one. If you have none, you may play any card. Playing a card of the strongest suit on a round that started in another suit is called a ruff.
Winning a round. The highest card of the strongest suit wins. If nobody played one, the highest card of the suit that was played first wins. A card of any other suit cannot win, even an ace.
Scoring. The declaring side scores only if it wins at least as many rounds as its contract. The first 6 rounds count for nothing. Each round after that is worth 20 points with clubs or diamonds as the strongest suit, 30 with hearts or spades, and with no strongest suit 40 for the first and 30 for each after. A made contract also earns a bonus: 50 for a part-score, 300 for a game. If the contract is not made, the other side scores 50 for each round it fell short.
The match. Scores add up from deal to deal. The first side to reach 500 points wins the match. (Minibridge groups agree their own target. We chose 500 so a match takes a few deals.)

How to use this page

Read the line above the table. It says what to do now, or what just happened. Under it, the scoreboard shows the contract (the strongest suit, the goal and how many rounds it needs), the declarer, the rounds each side has won in this deal, and the match score.
The row above the table is the dummy’s hand. On the table, each player’s name shows the card points they announced, and the card they have put down this round. Your own hand is at the bottom. A gold outline marks a card of the strongest suit.
When you are the declarer, choose the strongest suit, then the goal. The Hint tells you what it would choose and why. After that, click a card in your hand to play it. When it is dummy’s turn, click a card in the dummy row.
When you are a defender, the declarer chooses, and you play only your own cards. You can see the dummy and your own hand. The other hands are hidden.
Cards that look faded and striped cannot be played right now. Click one and the Coach tells you why.
Press Hint at any time you have a choice. It names one card (or one contract) and says why, using only what you can see.
New deal starts another deal. If you press it in the middle of a deal, that deal is thrown away and nothing is scored. Practice as picks the roles you are given from the next deal on.

Counting your sure winners

A sure winner is a card that wins its round whenever it is played, because every higher card of its suit has already been played or is in your own side’s hands. An ace is a sure winner. A king is one once the ace has been played, or if the same side holds the ace.

Go suit by suit. Count the top cards your side holds in a row, starting from the top.
When a suit is split between the declarer and the dummy, you cannot win more rounds in it than the longer of the two hands has cards.
Add the suits up. Compare the total with the rounds the contract needs. The Coach counts for you when a deal starts, and again in the Hint.

Your sure winners are rarely enough on their own. The rest of the rounds come from long suits (small cards win once the other players have run out of the suit), from the strongest suit (a ruff), and from chances you take, such as a finesse.

Ideas for playing the cards

As the declarer

Count first. Count your sure winners before you play a card. The difference between that number and the rounds you need is what the rest of the deal has to find.
Play the strongest suit first. If the other side still holds cards of the strongest suit, they can play one on your winners in other suits. Play your own strongest-suit cards until they have none left, then take your other winners.
Take sure winners. Start with the hand that holds fewer cards of the suit, so the other hand is free to use its cards later.
Set up a long suit. With no winner to play, start with the suit your two hands hold the most cards in. You may lose a round or two, and then your small cards win.
Lead toward high cards. A queen or king in one hand has its best chance when the other hand starts the suit: the opponent in front of it has to play first.
Finesse. When you hold the ace and queen of a suit and the king is missing, play the queen when the opponent before you does not play the king. It wins if that opponent does not hold the king, and costs nothing if the other opponent does, because you still have the ace. Only try it when you are short of rounds.
Ruff. A hand with no cards in the suit that was started can win the round with a card of the strongest suit. Dummy often has a short suit, and ruffs there can win extra rounds.

As a defender

The first play. Start with the top of two or three high cards in a row (such as king and queen). Otherwise start with the fourth-highest card of your longest suit, if it has four cards or more: the lower card keeps your high cards for later. With no long suit, start with a suit where you hold no high card (ace, king, queen or jack).
Count what you need. The contract needs 7, 9, 10 or 11 rounds, so the defenders need 7, 5, 4 or 3 to beat it. When your sure winners and the rounds you have won reach that, play the sure winners at once.
Second to play, play low. Your partner plays after you. Third to play, play high. You are trying to win the round or make the last player use a high card.
Win with the lowest card that wins, and do not beat your partner’s winning card. Keep the higher cards for a round you need.
When your partner started a suit earlier, start it again when you get the lead.

Real defenders also pass messages to each other with the cards they choose. This practice game does not teach that, and the computer players do not do it.

Common beginner mistakes

Choosing game with too few points. Game needs 9 to 11 rounds. With fewer than about 26 points between the two hands, a part-score (7 rounds) is the safer choice.
Playing a high card on a round that is already won. If your partner is winning and nobody left can beat it, play a low card and keep your high ones.
Taking winners before the other side’s strongest-suit cards are gone. A player with no cards in your suit can play a strongest-suit card on your ace.
Forgetting that a card of another suit cannot win. An ace of a different suit loses to a 2 of the suit that was started.
Forgetting the dummy. As the declarer, the dummy’s cards are yours to play, in turn. Look at both hands before every card.

How this differs from real Bridge

Real Bridge has an auction: before play, the players take turns saying how many rounds their side expects to win and with which strongest suit, and the highest offer becomes the contract. Minibridge skips that. The card points decide who plays, and the declarer picks the contract after seeing both hands. In real Bridge the dummy is laid down after the first play, and the declarer must choose from the auction without seeing it. The practice under the table, Practice the first bid, shows a hand and asks for the opening bid, the first offer of an auction. It follows the opening bids on the rules page. The scoring here is the Minibridge scoring. Real rubber Bridge is scored differently. The rules page explains both.

The full rules page →

Practice as

Coach ↓