The cards
Canasta is played with two ordinary packs shuffled together, plus the four Jokers: 108 cards. Suits do not matter at all, only ranks.
- Wild cards: the Jokers and all eight 2s. A wild card can stand in for any rank in a meld.
- Red threes (hearts and diamonds) are bonus cards. They are never kept in your hand.
- Black threes (spades and clubs) are blocking cards, useful to throw.
- Natural cards: everything else, the 4s up to the Aces.
The deal
In the two-player game each player gets 15 cards. The rest of the pack is the stock, face down, and its top card is turned up beside it to start the discard pile. If that card is a wild card or a red three, another is turned on top of it. A red three in your hand at the start goes face up on the table at once, and you draw a card to replace it.
A turn
- Draw. Take the top two cards of the stock (in the two-player game you keep both), or take the whole discard pile, if you can use its top card in a meld (see taking the pile).
- Meld, if you want to: lay down new melds and add cards to your own melds already on the table.
- Throw one card face up on the discard pile. Your turn is over.
Melds and canastas
A meld is three or more cards of the same rank, such as three 9s, laid face up in front of you. It must hold at least 2 natural cards, and no more than 3 wild cards: 9, 9, Joker is a meld, but 9, Joker, 2 is not. You may not meld threes in the ordinary way, and in the two-player game each player keeps one meld of each rank, adding to it as the hand goes on. You can only add to your own melds, never your opponent’s.
A meld of 7 or more cards is a canasta. Square it up into a pile, with a red card on top if it is natural (no wild cards at all) and a black card on top if it is mixed (one or more wild cards). A natural canasta is worth 500 bonus points and a mixed one 300. You can go on adding cards to a canasta after it is made; a wild card added to a natural canasta makes it mixed.
Your first meld of each hand
The first time you put cards down in a hand, the cards you lay that turn must add up to a minimum, counted with the card values below. The minimum depends on your total score at the start of the hand:
| Your score | First meld needs |
|---|---|
| Below 0 | 15 points |
| 0 to 1,495 | 50 points |
| 1,500 to 2,995 | 90 points |
| 3,000 or more | 120 points |
You may lay several melds at once to reach it, and when you take the pile for your first meld, the top card counts but the rest of the pile does not. Bonuses such as red threes never count toward the minimum.
Taking the discard pile
Instead of drawing from the stock, you may take the whole discard pile, which can be a great haul late in a hand. To take it you must use its top card in a meld straight away:
- with two natural cards of the same rank from your hand (always allowed), or
- with one natural card and one wild card, or by adding the top card to a meld of yours already on the table, but only when the pile is not frozen.
The pile is frozen while there is a wild card in it, and it is also frozen for you until you have made your first meld of the hand. Then only two natural cards will do. You can never take the pile when its top card is a wild card or a black three. Once the top card is melded, the rest of the pile goes into your hand.
Red threes and black threes
A red three is put face up in front of you as soon as you get it, and you draw a replacement from the stock (one that comes with the discard pile is not replaced). Each is worth 100 points, and all four together 800. But if you have not melded anything by the end of the hand, your red threes count against you instead.
A black three thrown on the pile stops your opponent from taking the pile on their next turn. Black threes cannot be melded, except as you go out: three or four of them, with no wild cards.
Going out
In the two-player game you need 2 canastas before you may go out. You go out by getting rid of your last card, melding it or throwing it, and that ends the hand at once. Going out earns 100 points. If you go out concealed, laying your whole hand down in one turn without having melded anything earlier (a canasta included), it earns 200. Until you have your canastas you must keep at least two cards in hand after melding: one to throw and one to hold.
If the stock runs out, play goes on while each player can take the pile; you must take it if its top card goes on one of your melds and the pile is not frozen. When a player cannot or will not take it, the hand is over and nobody scores for going out.
Canasta scoring
At the end of each hand, each player adds up their bonuses and the cards they have melded, then takes off the cards left in their hand.
| Card | Points each |
|---|---|
| Joker | 50 |
| Ace, 2 | 20 |
| King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8 | 10 |
| 7, 6, 5, 4, black 3 | 5 |
| Bonus | Points |
|---|---|
| Natural canasta (no wild cards) | 500 |
| Mixed canasta | 300 |
| Each red three | 100 (all four: 800) |
| Going out | 100 |
| Going out concealed | 200 |
The game ends when a player reaches 5,000 at the end of a hand, and the higher score wins.
A hand scored
You go out. On the table you have a natural canasta of Kings (seven Kings), a mixed canasta of 8s (five 8s, a 2 and a Joker), three Aces, and one red three. The computer has four 9s with a 2, three 5s, and is left holding a Joker, a Queen, a 7 and a 4.
| You | Computer | |
|---|---|---|
| Canasta bonuses | 800 | 0 |
| Red threes | 100 | 0 |
| Going out | 100 | 0 |
| Cards melded | 250 | 75 |
| Cards left in hand | -0 | −70 |
| This hand | 1,250 | 5 |
Your bonuses are 500 + 300 for the two canastas, 100 for the red three and 100 for going out. Your melded cards count 250: the Kings 70, the 8s 50 with 20 for the 2 and 50 for the Joker, the Aces 60. The computer’s melds count 75, but the Joker, Queen, 7 and 4 in its hand cost it 70.
Tips
- Meld early, but not everything. Getting your first meld down unfreezes the pile for you. Holding pairs back keeps you ready to take the pile.
- Count the pile before you throw. The bigger it gets, the more careful you need to be. Throw cards your opponent has just thrown, or black threes.
- Keep wild cards for when they count. A wild card finishes a canasta, freezes a dangerous pile, or makes a meld that takes the pile. Spending one too early wastes it, and a natural canasta scores 200 more than a mixed one.
- Go out when you are ahead. Once you have 2 canastas, going out stops your opponent scoring their big hand. If you are behind, building one more canasta may be worth more.
- Freeze the pile when you must. A wild card thrown on the pile freezes it, so it can only be taken with two natural cards of the top card’s rank. It costs you the wild card, but it can stop a big pile going the wrong way.
- Do not hold too much. Cards left in your hand count against you when your opponent goes out, Jokers worst of all at 50 each.
A little history
Canasta was invented in Montevideo, Uruguay, in 1939 and swept through Argentina before it reached the United States, where by the early 1950s it was the most popular card game in the country, played at kitchen tables and in clubs everywhere. The word means “basket” in Spanish. It remains a favourite for two players and for partners, and many people learned it from a parent or grandparent.
House rules and other versions
Canasta is played many ways. Four players in two partnerships is the most common form at a club: each player gets 11 cards, draws one card a turn, and a partnership needs one canasta to go out (and may ask the partner’s permission first). Some families let you add to your opponent’s melds, play with three players, or pick up only the top seven cards of the pile. Hand and Foot and Samba are relatives with more packs. The rules on this page, and in the game here, are the classic two-player rules.