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How to play Hand and Foot

Hand and Foot is a canasta-style card game played with several decks and jokers. Each player gets two piles of cards: a hand you play first and a foot you pick up once the hand is gone. You lay down sets of the same rank, build them into seven-card books, and go out once your side has the books the rules ask for. Most points after four rounds wins.

By Emre Özen, updated October 8, 2026. These are the rules our free Hand and Foot game uses. They follow the main Hand and Foot rules on pagat.com, with 11-card hands and feet as in Bicycle's rules. Families play it many ways, so the common variations are at the end, and most of them are settings in the game.

What you need

Ordinary decks with their two jokers left in, so 54 cards a deck. Pagat's rule of thumb is one more deck than there are players: three decks for two players, five for four. Shuffle them all together.

Four players in two partnerships is the classic game, partners sitting across from each other. Pagat says partnership play for four is said to be best. Two, three or five players each play for themselves. A pencil and a score sheet help, because the numbers get big. Ours is a free Hand and Foot score sheet you can fill in on a phone or print.

Card values

Cards count for you when they're melded on the table and against you when they're still in your hand or foot at the end of a round.

The deal

1. Each player gets 11 cards for the hand and 11 more for the foot. (Pagat deals 13 of each. Both work.)
2. Pick up your hand. Leave your foot face down and don't look at it.
3. The rest of the cards are the stock. Turn the top one face up to start the discard pile. If it's a wild card or a red 3, bury it back in the stock and turn another.
4. Any red 3 in your hand goes face up on the table straight away, and you draw a card to replace it.

The player to the dealer's left goes first, and play goes around to the left. The deal moves one seat each round.

Your turn

1. Draw two cards from the stock, or take the pile (see below).
2. Meld as many cards as you like and can, or none.
3. Discard one card face up on the pile. That ends your turn.

A red 3 you draw goes on the table at once and you draw again to replace it.

Melds and books

A meld is three to seven cards of the same rank, face up on the table. Suits don't matter. Melds belong to the whole side, so partners add to each other's. Only aces and 4s through kings can be melded. Threes never can.

Wild cards (2s and jokers) can stand in for the rank, but a meld must have at least twice as many natural cards as wild ones:

A side can only have one unfinished meld of each rank. Extra 8s go on your 8s, not into a second pile of 8s. Once a meld reaches seven cards it's a book and nothing more can go on it. Then you may start a new meld of that rank.

The first meld each round

Before your side puts anything down in a round, its first melds have to add up to a minimum, counting card values only. You can use several melds at once to get there. Once your side is down, there's no minimum for the rest of that round.

Red 3s and book bonuses don't count toward it. Three kings (30) and a pair of aces with a 2 (60) make 90, enough for round 2.

Taking the pile

Instead of drawing, you can take the discard pile if all of these hold:

• The top card is not a 3. A black 3 on top blocks the pile for the next player, which is the only good thing about black 3s.
• You hold two natural cards of the top card's rank. Wild cards don't count for this.
• You meld the top card with those two right away.

You then take the top seven cards of the pile (counting the one you melded), or the whole pile if it's smaller. If your side isn't down yet, the top card and your two cards count toward the minimum, and so do other melds from your hand that turn, but the other six cards you pick up don't.

If the top card is wild, nobody can take it in our standard rules. With pagat's wild books switched on, it takes two wild cards from your hand. If your side's unfinished meld of that rank is too full to take three more cards, finish it from your hand first; then the top card and your pair start a new meld.

Black 3s and red 3s

Black 3s can't be melded. The only way to get rid of one is to discard it, one a turn, and each one left at the end costs you 5. Red 3s are laid face up the moment you get them, from the deal, a draw or your foot, and replaced. Each one on the table is worth 100 to your side. A red 3 still sitting in a foot you never picked up costs 100.

Picking up your foot

When your hand runs out, you pick up your foot and play it like a new hand. There are two ways to get there:

• Meld every card in your hand. Pick up your foot at once and keep playing your turn from it, ending with a discard.
• Meld all but one card and discard that last one. Pick up your foot and start playing from it on your next turn.

Once you're in your foot, you must keep at least two cards after melding (one to discard and one to carry on) until your side is allowed to go out.

Going out

You go out by playing every card from your foot: meld them all, or meld all but one and discard it. That ends the round. You can only do it when:

• Your side has the books the rules call for. Our standard game asks for two clean and two dirty books. Pagat's main version asks for two clean, two dirty and one wild book; Bicycle's asks for one clean and one dirty.
• You're playing from your foot.
• With partners: your partner has picked up their foot too, and you've asked "May I go out?" and they said yes. A yes means you must go out that turn. A no means you can't go out this turn.

Pagat's main rules add one more condition: your partner must also have played part of a turn from their foot, not just picked it up. In our game, we only check that your partner has picked up their foot.

The side that goes out gets 100. If the stock runs out when someone needs to draw, the round ends there and nobody gets the 100.

Scoring a round

Each side adds up:

Both sides score their books, not just the side that went out. Book bonuses make up most of a round's score: in our computer test games a side averaged about 2,450 points a round one on one, and 3,550 with four players. The game is four rounds, and the higher total wins. Our Hand and Foot score keeper does this sum for a real game; in our online game it's shown line by line after every round.

Words you'll hear

Hand

The first pile of cards you play from.

Foot

The second pile, face down until your hand is used up.

Meld

Three to seven cards of one rank laid on the table.

Book (or pile, or canasta)

A finished meld of seven cards.

Clean, natural or red book

A book with no wild cards.

Dirty, mixed or black book

A book with one or two wild cards.

Natural card

Any card that isn't wild.

Going down, or opening

Your side's first melds of the round, which have to reach the minimum.

Stock

The face-down cards you draw from.

Common variations

House rules vary a lot in Hand and Foot, so agree on these before you deal. The ones with a star are settings in our online game.

• Books to go out*: one clean and one dirty (Bicycle), two clean and two dirty (our standard, and a version on pagat's page), or two clean, two dirty and one wild (pagat's main rules, with wild melds allowed).
• Cards per pile*: 11 (Bicycle) or 13 (pagat). Pagat's Saskatchewan version deals 11 for the hand and 13 for the foot.
• Number of decks*: one more than the players, or more. Bicycle's page uses five or six.
• First-meld minimum*: 50, 90, 120 and 150 by round in both sources. Our game also lets you turn it off while you learn; that's our own option, not a rule from either source.
• Red 3s*: pagat's main rules give 100 each. In Steve Simpson's no-partner rules on pagat, threes can't be melded, you discard them, and each red 3 you're caught with costs 500. Brian Brouillette's rules also count red 3s at minus 500 but allow a meld of black threes. Our minus 500 setting follows Simpson's version: red 3s stay in your hand and get discarded like black 3s.
• Taking the pile: the Saskatchewan version takes the whole pile, not just seven cards.
• Bigger books: in the Saskatchewan version a book can grow past seven cards and a dirty one can hold up to three wilds.
• The first upcard: by agreement, a wild card or red 3 turned up to start the pile can stay there and go to whoever first takes the pile.
• Round 4: some versions ask for more, such as four clean and four dirty books (Brouillette's partner rules) or a book made without the pile (Saskatchewan).

Ready to try it? Play Hand and Foot against the computer, or read our Hand and Foot strategy guide first.

Sources

• John McLeod, "Hand and Foot", pagat.com (main rules, scoring, and the Saskatchewan, Steve Simpson and Brian Brouillette variations).
• Bicycle Cards, "Hand and Foot" rules page, bicyclecards.com (11-card hands and feet, book values, going out with a clean and a dirty book).
• "Canasta", Wikipedia (Hand and Foot as a member of the canasta family, asking a partner's permission to go out).

Keep playing

• Play Hand and FootAgainst the computer, with a computer partner, or one on one with a friend.
• Score sheetKeep score for a real game, or print a sheet for the card table.
• StrategyWhat wins rounds, with numbers from thousands of computer games.
• CribbageFifteen two, fifteen four: another classic for two, counted for you.
• Spite and MaliceA two-player card race, against the computer or a friend.
• Gin RummyMake sets and runs, knock low or go gin, against the computer or a friend.
• Mexican TrainDouble-twelve dominoes: build your train and go out first.