Practice Spades: guess how many rounds your cards will win

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Your Spades hand

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Coach

Goal: guess how many of the 13 rounds your cards will win. Off by 0 or 1 is a close guess. Off by 2 or more is a miss. For an extra challenge, beat the habit of always guessing 3. Most deals win about 3 rounds, so that habit is close on about 3 deals in 4. To beat it, be close on more than 3 of every 4 guesses.

What just happened

After you press Check my guess, the real answer and the reasons for it appear here.

Your progress

Guesses made is how many guesses you have checked. Skipping cards does not count. Close guesses is how many of those were off by 0 or 1. Exactly right is how many matched the real answer. Close guesses in a row now, above the cards, is how many close guesses you have made one after another, ending with your latest. Most close guesses in a row is the best that number has been. “This visit” counts from when you opened this page.

Remember my progress on this device

Off by default. Until you tick the box, nothing is saved and the table has only the “This visit” column. When it is on, a column called “All time” appears and adds up all your visits. Your progress numbers are saved in this browser only and never sent anywhere. Pressing Reset progress sets every number to 0. Unchecking the box deletes what was saved.

About this practice game

In Spades, every player puts down one card, and whoever played the best card picks up all four. That is called a round. Each deal is played in 13 rounds. Before the first round, each player guesses how many rounds their own cards will win. Here you practice that guess. You get 13 cards and type your guess. Then the Coach shows how many rounds your cards really win, and a quick way to estimate it.

New to Spades? Start with How Spades works in the Rules tab (just below). The full rules end with a list of card-player words, such as bid for a guess, and the glossary explains them.

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How Spades works

The goal. Four people play, in two teams of two. Your teammate sits across the table from you. Before play starts, each player guesses how many rounds their own cards will win. A team scores points when it wins at least as many rounds as its two players guessed between them. It loses points when it wins fewer.

A bolder goal. Guess 0 if you think your cards will win nothing. That is called nil. You then play low cards and try to lose every round. If you really win no rounds, your team gets 100 bonus points. If you win even one, your team loses 100 points.

What happens, in order:

Deal. Each player gets 13 cards, so each deal has 13 rounds. Cards rank from ace (highest) down to 2 (lowest).
Guess. Each player says how many of the 13 rounds their own cards will win. Real players call this guess a bid. Teammates add their two numbers together, and that total is what the team promises to win.
Play a round. One player puts down a card, and then each other player puts down one card, going around the table. In the first round, the player to the left of the dealer goes first. After that, the winner of the last round goes first. If you have a card in the same suit as the first card, you must play one. If you have none, you may play any card, even a spade.
Win the round. Spades beat every other suit, even an ace. So the highest spade wins. If nobody played a spade, the highest card of the same suit as the first card wins. The winner picks up all four cards and puts down the first card of the next round.
Score. After 13 rounds, each team counts the rounds it won. A team that won at least as many as it promised scores 10 points for each round promised. A team that won fewer loses 10 points for each round promised.
The end. Deal again and repeat. The game ends when a team reaches 500 points, and the team with more points wins.

Why the guess matters. Guess too high and your team may fall short and lose points. Guess too low and any extra rounds your team wins are worth only 1 point each. Extra rounds also add up from deal to deal: each time a team has collected ten of them, it loses 100 points. So the best guess is the number your cards really win.

How to use this page

Look at your 13 cards. Spades have a gold outline because spades beat every other suit.
Type how many of the 13 rounds you think these cards will win. Then press Check my guess.
Not sure how to count? Press Show the quick count before you guess.
The Coach then shows the real answer. The computer plays your 13 cards 400 times, always trying to win rounds, with random cards for the other three players. The answer is the average number of rounds your cards win, rounded to a whole number.
Press Deal new cards to try again. Before you guess, the same button says Skip these cards.

How to count your guess

The quick count is a shortcut for guessing how many rounds your cards will win. Remember that when a round starts with a suit, you must play a card of that suit if you have one. So other cards of the same suit let you play small cards first and keep a high card back. Below, “cards of that suit” means every card you hold in that suit, counting the card itself. Go through your cards and add up:

Aces in hearts, diamonds or clubs: 1 each. Only a spade can beat an ace. Count just ½ if you hold 7 or more cards of that suit, because the other players run out of that suit and can win with a spade.
Kings in hearts, diamonds or clubs: 1 each, if you hold 2 to 5 cards of that suit, counting the king. You play your small cards of that suit first and keep the king back until the ace has been played. A king on its own usually loses to the ace. With 6 or more cards of that suit, count nothing, because the other players run out of it and can win with a spade.
Queens in hearts, diamonds or clubs: ½ each, if you hold 3 or 4 cards of that suit, counting the queen. You need two small cards to play while the ace and king are played. With 1 or 2 cards of that suit, count nothing, because a higher card usually beats your queen. With 5 or more, count nothing, because the other players run out of that suit and can win with a spade.
High spades: count 1 for the ace of spades. Count 1 for the king of spades if you hold at least one other spade. Count 1 for the queen of spades if you hold at least two other spades. Without those other spades, count nothing for the king or queen.
Spades after your third: count 1 more for each one. Apart from the high spades above, your first three spades add nothing, because the other players still have spades that can beat them. Once the others run out of spades, even a small spade wins a round.
Suits where you have almost no cards: this counts only if you hold 3 or more spades, because you need spades to win these rounds. Count 1 for each suit where you have no cards: when a round starts with that suit, you can play a spade, and a spade beats every other suit. Count ½ for each suit where you have just one card. The first time that suit is played, you must play your one card. After that, you can play a spade whenever a round starts with that suit.
Everything else counts nothing. Jacks, tens and small cards add nothing by themselves.

Add it all up. If the total ends in ½, round up. This lands within 1 of the real answer on about 19 deals in 20.

Example: spades king, 9, 6, 2; hearts ace, king, 5; diamonds queen, 7, 3; clubs 8, 4, 2. Ace of hearts: 1. King of hearts: 1. Queen of diamonds: ½. King of spades: 1. Fourth spade: 1. The total is 4½, which rounds up to 5. The real answer for these cards is 4, so the quick count is 1 too high here. That is normal, because the quick count is only a shortcut.

Rules in detail

Teams. Teammates sit across the table from each other. Each player makes a separate guess. A team adds its two guesses together, and that total is its promise.
Spades beat everything. Any spade beats any card of another suit. Between two spades, the higher one wins.
Matching the suit. You must play a card of the same suit as the first card if you have one. If you have none, you may play any card, including a spade.
Starting with a spade. The first player of a round may not put down a spade until a spade has been played earlier in the same deal. A spade usually gets played when someone has none of the first card's suit and chooses a spade. The one exception is a player who holds nothing but spades.
Scoring. A team that wins at least as many rounds as it promised scores 10 points for each round promised. A team that wins fewer loses 10 points for each round promised.
Extra rounds. Each round a team wins above the number it promised is worth only 1 point. Players call these extra rounds bags. They add up from deal to deal. Each time a team has collected ten of them, it loses 100 points.
Nil. A guess of 0 is called nil. You play low cards and try to lose every round. Win no rounds at all and your team scores 100 bonus points. Win even one and your team loses 100 points. Your teammate still makes a normal guess.
Ending. Most games are played until a team reaches 500 points.

Common beginner mistakes

Counting every king and queen. A king that is your only card in its suit usually loses to the ace, so count it as nothing. A queen only counts when you hold 3 or 4 cards of its suit, counting the queen.
Ignoring how many spades you hold. With five or six spades, even your small spades win rounds once the other players run out of spades. Count 1 for each spade after your third.
Guessing low to feel safe. In a real game, each round a team wins above the total its two players guessed is worth only 1 point, instead of 10. Over a whole game, ten of those extra rounds cost the team 100 points.
Never trying nil. Nil means guessing 0. You promise to win no rounds, so you play low cards and try to lose every round. Your team scores 100 bonus points if you manage it, and loses 100 points if you win even one round. Good cards for a nil have no aces, no kings and no high spades (the ace, king or queen of spades). Those cards can win a round when you would rather lose it. Good cards also have 3 or fewer spades, and fewer is better. Late in the deal, the other players run out of spades, and then even a small spade wins a round.

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