Bridge Basics

Bridge is a card game that combines strategy, teamwork, communication, and a bit of luck. It offers a richness and complexity that few other card games can match. Despite its intricacies, though, bridge can be learned in a single weekend. The game keeps players of all levels engaged and offers a lifetime of entertainment. In this guide, you’ll learn everything you need to play contract bridge, the most commonly played version of the game.

Bridge requires four players, with two teams of two players each. A two-player team is called a partnership, and each partnership works as a cooperative unit to defeat the other team.

In a game of bridge, the four players sit in a square around the bridge table. Partners always sit directly across from each other, so each player has opponents on either side. Generally, players are referred to by points on the compass. If you and your partner are sitting in the North and South positions, your opponents are sitting in the East and West positions. This guide (like most bridge references) assumes that you are sitting in the South position.

In formal bridge, partners are determined by drawing cards from the deck. The two players who draw the two highest cards are partners, and the two players who draw the lowest cards are partners. (Break a tie with a redraw by the tied players.) The player who draws the highest card is the dealer for the first hand. For subsequent hands, the deal passes clockwise around the table.

If you and the other players have already established partners or would rather decide partnerships by mutual agreement, you don’t need to follow a formal procedure for selecting partners. Just make sure you sit directly opposite your partner.

Bridge is played with a standard deck of 52 cards—jokers and other wild cards aren’t used. Each player starts with 13 cards. Because a player holds all 13 cards simultaneously, bridge cards are usually narrower than poker cards, to permit easier handling of so many cards at once.

The rank of a card is its denomination. The highest-ranking card is the ace, followed by the king, queen, jack, and then the numbered cards, from 10 down to the lowest-ranked 2 (also called a deuce). The 10, jack, queen, king, and ace are collectively called honor cards (or simply honors).

A card’s suit is the set or class to which the card belongs. Each suit consists of 13 cards. In bridge, the suits are ranked as follows, in order from strongest to weakest:

To remember the relative strength of each suit, note that the suits are ranked in reverse alphabetical order: S, H, D, C. Spades and hearts are collectively known as major suits; diamonds and clubs are collectively known as minor suits. Stronger suits are worth more points.

Each bridge hand has what is called a trump suit. For the duration of a hand, the trump suit outranks all other suits. For example, a 3 of the trump suit would beat an ace of any other suit. The team that wins the bid (for an explanation of bidding, see How to Play Bridge) decides the trump suit.

The following abbreviations are used for ranks and suits:

The numbered cards from 2–9 are denoted by the appropriate single digit. Standard bridge shorthand denotes the suit first, followed by the card or cards a player holds of that suit. For example, shorthand for the 3, 10, and queen of hearts is QT3. (Note that bridge bids are notated in the opposite order, with number first and then suit.)

As soon as all the cards are dealt, your first step is to arrange your cards in a logical sequence. The most common organizational system is to divide all your cards by suit first, then arrange cards within each suit from highest to lowest, going from left to right. Having your cards in a logical sequence can make bidding and playing your hand easier.

As you get better at bridge and you start playing against sophisticated opponents, though, you may want to consider not organizing your hand. Seasoned bridge players can often determine crucial information about your hand based on how you organize it.

Though only one deck is in play at any given time, most groups of bridge players keep two decks at the table. While one deck is being dealt, the dealer’s partner shuffles the other deck in preparation for the next hand. This speeds play and keeps up the momentum of the game.

After the cards are shuffled, the player to the dealer’s right cuts the deck of cards by splitting it into two piles. It’s proper etiquette to cut toward the dealer—taking a pile of cards off the top of the deck and placing it toward the dealer. The dealer then restacks the two piles in reverse order. Once the cards are cut, the dealer deals them one at a time, starting with the player to the dealer’s left and moving clockwise. The entire pack of 52 cards is dealt, so that each player has a total of 13 cards in his hand.