How to play Whist
Whist is the ancestor of Bridge and Hearts, and it is the purest trick-taking game there is: no bidding, no trump negotiation, no special cards. Deal, play thirteen tricks, count. Everything is in the play.
What you need
Four players in two partnerships, partners sitting opposite. A full 52-card deck, aces high. Play is clockwise.
The deal and the trump suit
- Deal the whole deck out, thirteen cards each, one at a time.
- The dealer turns their own last card face up. Its suit is trump for the hand.
- That card stays face up on the table until it is the dealer's turn to play to the first trick — then it is taken into the hand like any other card.
This is the detail people get wrong: the turned card is part of the dealer's hand from the moment it is turned. It counts for following suit, and the dealer plays it like anything else. It is face up only so everyone can see what trumps are.
Playing the tricks
The player to the dealer's left leads to the first trick. Follow suit if you can; if you cannot, play anything, including a trump. Highest trump wins the trick, or if no trump was played, the highest card of the suit led. The winner leads the next.
There is no obligation to win a trick, and no obligation to trump when you are void. Both are choices, and choosing well is the entire skill.
Scoring: the book
The first six tricks your side takes are the book, and they score nothing at all. Only tricks beyond six count — each one is an odd trick, worth one point.
| Tricks taken | Points |
|---|---|
| 6 or fewer | 0 — no penalty, you simply score nothing |
| 7 | 1 |
| 8 | 2 |
| 9 | 3 |
| 10 | 4 |
| 11 | 5 |
| 12 | 6 |
| 13 (a slam) | 7 |
Thirteen tricks cannot split evenly, so exactly one side scores on every hand. There are no drawn hands in Whist.
First side to five points wins in standard British short whist. Scores accumulate across hands and are not reset.
Honours — agree before you start. Under the traditional rule, the A, K, Q and J of trumps are honours: holding all four between partners scores 4, holding three scores 2. Many groups drop honours entirely, on the grounds that they reward the deal rather than the play. Decide which you are playing before the first hand, because it changes strategy considerably.
Three things beginners get wrong
Playing high early
Aces win tricks whenever you choose to spend them. Spending them in the first two tricks wins six-point tricks that were going to be yours anyway, and leaves you with nothing when it matters at trick ten.
Trumping whenever you can
Being void in a suit is an asset, and trumping a trick your partner was already winning wastes a trump and the trick. Count who has played before you commit.
Forgetting the first six do not count
Taking seven tricks scores one point. Taking six scores nothing, and taking five is no worse than taking six. Once a hand is clearly lost, the tricks you take are irrelevant — but once you are at six, every further trick is a full point.
Common variations
- Honours on or off — the big one. Agree first.
- Target score — 5 is standard short whist; some play to 7 or 9.
- Barred at four — a side already on 4 may not score honours, only odd tricks. Whether the bar is tested on the score at the start of the deal is itself disputed; test it at the start of the deal and say so.
- Cutting for trump instead of turning the dealer's last card.
- The revoke penalty — failing to follow suit when able. Three points to the other side is common; so is transferring three tricks. Agree it in advance rather than during the argument.
Whist needs nothing but a deck — see our deck picks if yours has seen better days, or Hearts for a trick-taking game where the goal is inverted.