Home
bs.fyiCARD GAMES
Spadey mascot

Skat

German Skat · 3 players

Germany's national card game. Bid, take the skat or play Hand, and win your game alone against the other two.

Learn how to play
Game
Scoring
All pass

Play the Skat card game online for free

Skat is Germany's national card game, and you can play it free in your browser: against two bots, or at a private table with friends and family. No download, no account.

It is a trick-taking game for three players with a 32-card deck. Each deal the players bid for the right to play alone against the other two. The winner of the bidding may take the two cards of the skat, chooses a suit game, Grand or Null, and needs 61 of the 120 card points. The four jacks are always the top trumps.

How to play Skat

  1. Deal. Everyone gets ten cards, and two go face down to the skat. The player left of the dealer is Vorhand, then Mittelhand, and the dealer is Hinterhand.
  2. Bid. Mittelhand bids game values to Vorhand (18, 20, 22, 23, 24 …), who holds or passes; then Hinterhand bids to whoever is left. The last one in becomes the declarer.
  3. Skat and game. The declarer picks up the skat and discards two cards, or plays Hand, then announces a suit game, Grand or Null.
  4. Play. Vorhand leads. Follow suit if you can, and remember that the jacks belong to the trumps. The highest trump or the highest card of the suit led takes the trick.
  5. Score. The declarer needs 61 card points, skat included (Null: no tricks), and a game worth at least the bid. On the Seeger-Fabian list a win scores the value plus 50; a loss costs twice the value plus 50 and gives each defender 40.

Play against bots on three levels

The bots never see your cards or the skat. Easy bots bid on a hunch; Medium bots count their jacks, trumps and aces before they bid and cash their winners; Hard bots also plan the discard, choose Grand or Null when the hand calls for it, count every card played, fetch trumps as declarer and smear points onto their partner's tricks in defence. Choose 12 or 36 deals, the Seeger-Fabian or the plain list, and whether a deal everyone passes is thrown in or played as Ramsch.

Learn the full Skat rules

Card order and points, bidding with game values, taking the skat or playing Hand, how a game value is worked out with and without matadors, Schneider, Schwarz, Null, overbidding and the Seeger-Fabian list.

Read the full Skat rules

Rules in other languages: EnglishDeutsch

Play in other languages: Deutsch