Play Gin Rummy

How to play Gin Rummy

Gin Rummy is a game for two. You are each dealt ten cards from a standard deck. The twenty-first card is turned face up to start the discard pile, and the rest becomes the face-down stock.

On your turn you do exactly two things: draw one card — from the top of the stock, or the top of the discard pile — and then throw one away. Your hand is back to ten and it is the other player’s turn.

That is the whole mechanic. Everything else is about what you are trying to build.

Melds

A set — three or four of the same rank

7♣ 7♦ 7♥ is a set, and so is all four sevens.

A run — three or more in sequence, one suit

4♥ 5♥ 6♥ is a run. So is 8♠ 9♠ 10♠ J♠.

The Ace is always low. A♠ 2♠ 3♠ is a run; Q♠ K♠ A♠ is not, and neither is K♠ A♠ 2♠.

A card can only be used in one meld at a time. If you hold 7♣ 7♦ 7♥ and also 7♥ 8♥ 9♥, that seven of hearts has to choose. This table works out the best arrangement of your hand for you and groups the cards on screen so you can see it.

Deadwood

Everything that will not fit into a meld is your deadwood, and it counts against you:

Ace: 1 point
Two through ten: Face value
Jack, Queen, King: 10 points each

Your deadwood is always counted from the best arrangement your cards allow — you are never penalised for missing a better way to group them. The number under your hand is that count.

The first turn

The very first turn of each hand is special. The player who did not deal gets first refusal on that face-up card. If they pass, the dealer may take it. If both pass, the non-dealer draws from the stock and ordinary turns begin.

Ending a hand

Knock

When the discard you are about to make would leave you with 10 points of deadwood or fewer, you may knock instead of playing on. Both hands go face up and the difference between the counts is your score. Knocking is always optional.

Gin

Every card melded, no deadwood at all. Your opponent may not lay anything off, and you score their whole count plus a 25-point bonus.

Laying off

After an ordinary knock, the defender may add their loose cards to the knocker’s melds — a fourth seven onto three sevens, an eight onto 5-6-7 of the same suit — and shrink their own count. The knocker never lays off.

Undercut

If the defender ends up level with or below the knocker after laying off, they take the hand instead: 25 points plus the difference. Knocking on ten is not safe.

Worked example: you knock holding 7 points of deadwood; your opponent lays two cards off and finishes on 5. They are level or lower, so they undercut you — 25 for the undercut plus the 2-point difference, 27 to them and nothing to you. Had they finished on 20 instead, you would have scored 13.

When the stock runs out

If the stock is reduced to two cards and the player who took the third-from-last discards without knocking, the hand is cancelled: nobody scores, the same dealer deals again, and the discard pile is never shuffled back into a new stock. Those last two cards are never drawn.

Winning

Hands continue until one player’s total reaches 100 or more. The winner of each hand deals the next one.

The rules at this table

Gin Rummy scoring genuinely varies from table to table — even the two most commonly printed bonus values disagree with each other. These are the choices PlayCards made.

Players: Two
Deck: Standard 52 cards, no Jokers
Ace: Low only — never above the King
Knock at: 10 deadwood points or fewer
Gin bonus: 25 points
Undercut bonus: 25 points, plus the difference
Game ends at: 100 points
Next dealer: The winner of the hand
Stock at two: Hand cancelled, nobody scores
End-of-game bonuses: None

Other tables do it differently: many print the Gin bonus at 20 and the undercut at 10, and traditional scorecards add a 100-point game bonus, 20 or 25 per hand won, and a doubling if the loser never scored. PlayCards leaves all of those out, so the number on screen is exactly the sum of the hands. Also not offered here: Big Gin (melding all eleven cards without discarding), Oklahoma Gin (where the upcard sets the maximum knock), and round-the-corner runs.

If you are just starting

Keep cards that can go two ways. A 7♥ sitting next to 6♥ and another seven is worth far more than a lone King, whatever the point values say.
Throw high, lonely cards early. A King with nothing near it costs ten points and is unlikely to become anything. Get rid of it while it is cheap to.
Watch what your opponent takes. Every card they pick off the pile tells you something. The History panel keeps the record so you do not have to.
Do not feed them. If they took a seven, think twice before throwing another one — or its neighbours in that suit.
Do not always hold out for Gin. A knock at five points is a perfectly good hand. Waiting for the perfect one is how you get knocked on first.
Mind the stock. As it thins, the value of a modest knock goes up and the chance of a cancelled hand goes up with it.
Respect the undercut. Knocking on ten against an opponent who has been shopping the discard pile is how you hand them 25 points.

Gin Rummy is the two-handed game at the PlayCards table. If you would rather take tricks than build melds, there is Hearts and Spades, both for four. For a game on your own there is Klondike Solitaire, FreeCell and Spider, or Blackjack against the house — all free, all in the browser, none needing an account.