Canasta rules: how to play Canasta, step by step

01What is Canasta?

Canasta is a rummy-style card game for two teams of two, born in Uruguay around 1939. The name is Spanish for basket, and the basket is the canasta itself: a meld of seven or more cards of the same rank. You score by building melds and canastas with your partner, collecting red threes and going out first, and you play several hands until one team reaches 5,000 points.

If you would rather learn by doing, open play Canasta online free in another tab and follow along against Easy computers. The game enforces every rule below, so you cannot make an illegal move by accident.

02What you need: players, cards and values

Classic Canasta is for four players in two partnerships, partners sitting opposite. There is also a 2-player version, covered further down. You need 108 cards: two standard 52-card decks plus four jokers. Jokers and 2s are wild.

Every card has a point value. It counts for your team when the card is melded and against you if it is still in a hand when the hand ends:

• Joker: 50
• 2 and Ace: 20
• King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, 8: 10
• 7, 6, 5, 4 and black 3: 5
• Red 3: 100 as a bonus card, never melded

03How to play Canasta: the deal and a turn

Each player is dealt 11 cards (15 each in the 2-player game). The rest of the pack is the stock, and its top card is turned face up to start the discard pile. If that first upcard is a wild card or a red 3, another card is turned and the pile starts frozen.

Every turn follows the same pattern:

• Draw. Take the top card of the stock, or take the entire discard pile if you are allowed to.
• Meld. Optionally lay down new melds or add to your team's existing melds.
• Discard. Put one card on the discard pile to end your turn.

04Melds and canastas

A meld is three or more cards of the same rank. Suits do not matter, and runs such as 5, 6, 7 of hearts are not allowed in Canasta. Wild cards can join a meld, with two limits: at least two natural cards, and no more than three wild cards. You can never meld wild cards on their own.

Melds belong to the team, not to the player. If your partner has melded Jacks, any Jack you draw can be added to that meld. A meld that reaches seven cards becomes a canasta. A natural canasta (also called clean) has no wild cards and earns a 500 point bonus. A mixed canasta (dirty) has one or more wild cards and earns 300. Once a canasta is closed you can keep adding cards of the same rank to it.

05Red threes and black threes

Red threes are pure bonus. Each is worth 100, and a team holding all four scores 800. The only danger is that if your team has not made any meld by the end of the hand, the red threes are subtracted instead of added.

Black threes are a defensive tool. When you discard one, the next player may not take the discard pile on their turn. They are worth only 5 points and you cannot meld them in the normal way. The one exception is when you go out: then you may meld three or four black 3s together, with no wild cards.

06The discard pile and freezing the pile

Taking the discard pile is how hands are won. When you take it, you must immediately use the top card in a meld, then the rest of the pile goes into your hand. In the middle of a hand that can be a dozen cards or more.

The pile is frozen when it contains a wild card or a red 3, and it is frozen for any team that has not yet made its first meld. A frozen pile can only be taken with a natural pair from your hand that matches the top card.

When the pile is not frozen and your team has already melded, you have more ways in: a natural pair, one natural card plus a wild card, or adding the top card to your team's meld of that rank. Two cards can never be picked up: a black 3 or a wild card on top of the pile blocks it completely.

Discarding a wild card is how you freeze the pile on purpose. Players do this when the other team looks ready to take a big pile, because from then on they need a natural pair.

07The first meld: how many points to go down

Each hand, your team's first meld must add up to a minimum value, which rises as your score grows:

• Team score below 0: 15 points
• 0 to 1,495: 50 points
• 1,500 to 2,995: 90 points
• 3,000 or more: 120 points

08Counting toward the minimum

Only card values count. You may combine several melds made in the same turn, so three Kings (30) plus two Aces and a 2 (60) make 90. If you open by taking the discard pile, only the pile's top card and the cards from your hand count; the rest of the pile does not help. Once you or your partner has opened, the minimum no longer applies to anyone on your team for that hand.

09Going out and ending the hand

You can go out only after your team has at least one canasta. You go out by melding every card in your hand, or all but one and discarding it. Going out scores 100. If you meld your whole hand in a single turn without having melded before in that hand and without taking the pile, it is a concealed going out and scores 200.

Many players use the house rule "Partner, may I go out?": before melding, you ask your partner, and the answer is binding. If the answer is yes and you do not go out, your team loses 100. Our game uses this rule by default in the 4-player version.

If the stock runs out, the hand ends. After the last card is drawn a player may still take the discard pile if they can do so legally; if not, the hand is over. If the last card of the stock is a red 3, the hand ends at once.

10Canasta scoring with a worked example

Each team's score for a hand is: canasta bonuses, plus red threes, plus the going-out bonus, plus the value of all melded cards, minus the value of the cards left in its players' hands.

Example. Team A has one natural canasta (500) and one mixed canasta (300), two red threes (200), and went out (100). Their melded cards are worth 410, and the partner who did not go out holds 35 points. Team A scores 500 + 300 + 200 + 100 + 410 minus 35, which is 1,475.

Team B made no canasta. They melded cards worth 180, have one red 3 (100) and hold 95 points in their hands. Team B scores 180 + 100 minus 95, which is 185. Notice the gap: canastas and going out matter far more than individual cards.

Scores carry over, and the first team to 5,000 wins. If both pass 5,000 in the same hand, the higher total wins.

112-player Canasta rules

With two players, each person is dealt 15 cards. On every turn you draw two cards from the stock and discard one, and you need two canastas instead of one before you can go out. Everything else, from card values to the pile rules, stays the same.

12Canasta vs Hand and Foot

Hand and Foot is the most popular Canasta variant in North America, and it is easy to confuse the two. They share the same core: melds of the same rank, wild jokers and 2s, red threes as bonuses and canastas worth 500 or 300. The differences are in the structure:

• Two hands each. In Hand and Foot every player is dealt a hand and a foot. You play the hand first and pick up the foot once the hand is gone. Classic Canasta has one hand per player.
• More decks. Hand and Foot usually uses five or six decks for four players; classic Canasta uses two.
• Going out. Hand and Foot normally requires several canastas, often a set number of clean and dirty ones, before you may go out. Classic Canasta needs one (two in the 2-player game).
• The pile. Many Hand and Foot tables take only the top seven cards of the pile, while classic Canasta takes the whole pile, with the freezing rules above.
• Length. Hand and Foot is usually played over a fixed number of rounds with rising meld minimums; classic Canasta is played to 5,000 points.

13Which should you learn first?

Learn classic Canasta first. It has fewer cards to manage and the pile rules teach the real skill of the game. Once you know it, Hand and Foot takes about ten minutes to pick up. Samba and Bolivia, two South American variants that add sequences, also build directly on the classic rules.

If you already play Rummy, Canasta will feel familiar: draw, meld, discard. The big changes are wild cards, partnerships and taking the whole pile. For a refresher on the basics, read how to play Rummy.

14Five beginner mistakes to avoid

• Spending wild cards early. A natural canasta is worth 200 more than a mixed one, so keep jokers and 2s for melds that cannot grow without them.
• Breaking up pairs. A natural pair is the only key to a frozen pile.
• Discarding a card the next player obviously wants. Watch what they pick up and what they have melded.
• Holding too many high cards at the end. If the other team is close to going out, meld or discard your Aces and jokers before they cost you.
• Forgetting black threes. A black 3 thrown at the right moment can stop a 20-card pile from changing hands.

15Play now

The fastest way to make these rules stick is to play a few hands. Play Canasta online free against Easy, Normal or Hard computers, choose the 2-player or 4-player game, or invite friends with a link and play together in your browser, with no download and no sign-up. The table shows your team's opening requirement, turns a frozen pile sideways and puts a STOP badge on a black 3, so the rules on this page are always in front of you.

Looking for more card games to play with family? See our list of the best free card games to play with family online.