Printable Spades rules

Spades in one page

4 players in 2 teams · 1 deck · score sheet

Four players in two partnerships are each dealt 13 cards. Everyone bids how many tricks they expect to win, partners add their bids together, and spades are always trump. A team that makes its bid scores 10 points per trick bid plus 1 per extra trick (a bag), loses 10 per trick bid if it falls short, and loses 100 for every 10 bags; the first team to 500 wins.

In brief

• Deal 13 each; partners sit opposite
• Everyone bids tricks; no passing; partners add bids
• Nil = promise zero tricks: +100 made, −100 failed
• First lead from dealer's left, any suit but spades
• Follow suit if you can; spades are always trump
• No leading spades until broken (or only spades left)
• Make bid: 10 per trick bid, +1 per bag
• Miss bid: −10 per trick bid
• Every 10 bags: −100
• First team to 500 wins

Setup

1. Four players form two teams of two. Partners sit across from each other, so play alternates between teams.
2. Pick a first dealer by any method, such as high card. The deal moves one seat to the left after each hand.
3. The dealer shuffles and deals the whole deck one card at a time, face down, starting on their left, so each player has 13 cards.
4. Cards rank from high to low: A, K, Q, J, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2. Spades are always trump.
5. Set up a score sheet with two columns, one per team, and leave room to track each team's bags.

On your turn

1. Bidding: starting with the player to the dealer's left and going around once, each player says how many tricks they expect to win. Nobody may pass. Partners' bids are added together to form the team's contract, so bids of 4 and 3 make a team contract of 7.
2. A player may bid nil, meaning they promise to win zero tricks. Their partner's bid stands alone as the team contract.
3. Play: the player to the dealer's left leads the first trick. They may lead any suit except spades. Going clockwise, each player plays one card.
4. You must follow suit if you can. If you have no cards of the suit led, you may play any card, including a spade (trump) or a throw-away from another suit.
5. The highest spade in a trick wins it. If no spade was played, the highest card of the suit led wins. The winner of the trick leads the next one.
6. Spades cannot be led until a spade has been played on an earlier trick (spades are 'broken'), unless the leader has nothing but spades left.

Scoring

Winning

The first team to reach 500 points wins. If both teams pass 500 on the same hand, the team with the higher score wins. Shorter games to 200 or 300 work well when time is tight. Some groups also end the game when a team falls to minus 200 or lower, counting that as a loss.