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How to play cribbage

Cribbage is a two-player card game where you score points for fifteens, pairs and runs, twice each hand: once while you play your cards one at a time, and again when you count your hand. The first player to 121 points wins. A hand takes a few minutes, a game about nine hands.

By Emre Özen, updated October 7, 2026. These are the rules our online cribbage game uses. They follow the American Cribbage Congress rulebook and the six-card cribbage rules on pagat.com.

What you need

One ordinary 52-card deck, no jokers, and two players. A cribbage board keeps score, with two pegs each: you move the back peg ahead of the front one every time you score, so the gap shows your last score and mistakes are easy to spot. Paper works too.

Cards count at face value. An ace is 1, number cards are their number, and the jack, queen and king are each worth 10. For runs, cards rank from ace (low) up to king. An ace can't follow a king.

Who deals first

Each player cuts the deck and shows a card. The lower card deals first, aces low. If the cards match, cut again. After that the deal swaps every hand. The other player, the one who isn't dealing, is called the pone. In the next game, the player who lost deals first.

The deal and the crib

1. The dealer gives each player six cards, one at a time.
2. Each player picks two cards and lays them face down in a pile called the crib. That's four cards in all.
3. The crib belongs to the dealer. It's an extra hand they count at the end, which is why the deal matters. When it's your crib, throw cards that score together. When it isn't, throw cards that won't help the other player.

The starter and his heels

The pone cuts the rest of the deck and the dealer turns up the top card of the bottom half. That's the starter (also called the cut). It counts as a fifth card for both hands and the crib in the show. If the starter is a jack, the dealer pegs 2 straight away. That's called his heels (or two for his nibs).

The play (pegging)

The pone goes first. Players take turns laying one card face up in front of themselves and saying the running total of every card played so far. The total can't go past 31.

Points stack. Play a 5 on top of a 5 when the count is 10 and you score 2 for fifteen and 2 for the pair. Runs only count unbroken: in 3, 4, 4, 5 the second 4 breaks things, so the 5 makes no run.

Go

If you can't play a card without passing 31, you say "Go". The other player keeps playing as many cards as they can without passing 31. If they reach exactly 31, they score 2. Otherwise whoever played the last card scores 1. You only get the 1 or the 2, never both. Then the count goes back to zero and the player who said go leads the next round. Pairs and runs never carry over from one count to the next.

Keep going until both players have played all four cards. The last card of all scores 1 (or 2 if it makes 31). In our game the table says "Go" for you, so you never have to work out when you're stuck.

The show (counting the hands)

Now everyone picks their four cards back up and counts them together with the starter. The order is fixed: the pone counts first, then the dealer's hand, then the dealer's crib. Order matters near the end, because the game stops the moment someone reaches 121.

Every card can be used in more than one combination. Take 5, 5, 4, 6 with a jack as the starter: each 5 with the jack makes fifteen (4 points), each 5 with the 4 and 6 makes fifteen (4 more), the two 5s are a pair (2), and there are two runs of 4-5-6, one with each 5 (6). That's 16. Our cribbage scoring chart works through the tricky hands, and the hand calculator counts any hand for you.

Winning, and skunks

The first player to reach 121 wins, right then, even in the middle of the play or before the other hands are counted. You don't need to land on 121 exactly.

If the loser hasn't reached 91, that's a skunk, and many players count it as two games. Below 61 is a double skunk. Some groups add a triple skunk below 31.

Words you'll hear

Pone

The player who isn't dealing. They play first and count first.

Crib (or box)

The four cards both players threw away. The dealer scores it.

Starter (or cut)

The card turned up after the crib is made. It counts in every hand.

His heels (his nibs)

The dealer's 2 points when the starter is a jack.

His nobs

1 point for holding the jack of the starter's suit.

Go

What you say when you can't play without passing 31.

Pegging

Scoring during the play, and moving your pegs on the board.

Nineteen

A hand worth nothing. No hand can score exactly 19, so players use it as a joke for zero.

Muggins

An optional rule: if a player misses points when counting, the other player can call "muggins" and take them. Our game counts every hand for you, so nothing is ever missed.

Common variations

• Five-card cribbage: the older game. Five cards each, three-card hands, and a game to 61. Pagat describes it in full.
• Three players: five cards each, one card from each player to the crib plus one from the deck.
• Four players: partners sitting opposite, five cards each, one card each to the crib.
• Muggins on or off: decide before you start.

Ready? Deal a game against the computer, or read our cribbage strategy first.

Sources

• American Cribbage Congress, "Rules of Cribbage", tournament rulebook (2020 edition), cribbage.org.
• John McLeod, "Six Card Cribbage", pagat.com (rules and variations).
• "Rules of cribbage", Wikipedia (skunks, the "nineteen" hand, the loser dealing first next game).

Keep playing

• Play cribbageAgainst the computer or a friend, counted for you.
• Scoring chartEvery way to score, with the tricky hands worked out.
• Hand calculatorCount any hand or crib, and see which two cards to throw.
• StrategyWhat to throw, how to peg, and the numbers behind it.
• Spite and MaliceAnother two-player card race, against the computer or a friend.