02 May
How to play German Whist Cover Image

How to Play German Whist Card Game & Game Rules

Ever played Whist? German Whist is like its trickier cousin. You’re still battling for points, but there’s a twist! It’s the perfect game if you want a quick head-to-head challenge with a good dose of strategy. Ready to give it a go?

How to Play German Whist

What You’ll Need

  • Just two players: German Whist is at its best as a one-on-one duel.
  • A standard deck of cards: Nothing fancy, just your regular 52-card deck.
  • A bit of table space: You’ll need room to spread out a bit.

The Objective of German Whist

The whole point of German Whist is to win the most tricks… but only in the second half of the game.

The first part is a sneaky setup phase, so hang tight!

The Set Up

Start by picking the dealer. Flip a coin, play rock-paper-scissors, draw a card and see who has the highest… whoever wins gets to shuffle first!

The dealer then shuffles the complete deck and deals 13 face-down cards to each player. The remaining deck then becomes the Draw Pile.

Flip the top card of the Draw Pile up. This is the Trump suit for the whole round. This is important when moving forward!

The Gameplay

To start with, understand that cards have different values in German Whist. Just so we’re on the same page, here’s the card ranking, strongest to weakest:

  • Ace
  • King
  • Queen
  • Jack
  • 10, 9, 8… all the way down to…
  • 2 (the lowliest card!)

Now the game is broken down into two halves.

Phase One: Stockpile Showdown

The non-dealer starts the round by placing any card of their choosing down into the middle of play. The dealer then plays a card of the same suit (if they can) and you compare the two. If they can’t match suit, they can play any card they want.

For example;

  • The Trump card is the Three of Diamonds (Remember this is the Trump card for the WHOLE game)
  • The non-dealer plays the Six of Hearts
  • The dealer plays the Eight of Hearts

In this case, the dealer wins because they have the highest value. However, if the dealer played the Four of Diamonds, they would win the trick because they matched with the Trump suit. They can only do this if they don’t have a Hearts card.

The winner takes the Trump card and places in a “foundational” pile beside them, ready for the second half. The loser takes the facedown card from the Draw Pile and puts that in their foundational pile.

The two cards that were played in comparison can be discarded completely.

Don’t worry if the reasoning for this sounds a bit odd or you’re not sure what the strategy is here. There are some cards you want to win for the second half, and some you’ll absolutely want to avoid having in your hand, so this is how you play it.

The winner of the trick flips the top card of the draw pile to reveal a new Trump card and the round starts again in the same way. This repeats over and over until the entire Draw Pile is gone and both you and the other player have a pile of discarded cards to the side of you.

You should end up with a new 13 cards in your hand in total.

So, to recap;

  • Flip the top card on the draw pile and note the suit.
  • One player plays a card trying to match the suit or plays another card.
  • To win the trick, the second player needs to match the suit of the first player, but a card of a higher value. For example, a King beats a Jack.
  • The player who played the highest card wins the face up Trump card. The loser wins the top card of the Draw Pile. Both played cards are discarded.

Play a dummy hand along with this guide and it will make far more sense once we get into the second half.

Phase Two: Trick Mania

Now you’ve got your final hand of 13 cards. The goal? Win as many of those last 13 tricks as possible.

Count up how many tricks you win each (these are one-on-one card battles) and the player with the highest score wins the whole game.

Remember, the trump card drawn first (in this example, it was a Diamond), that still stands now. So one player might play an Ace of Spades (the highest Spades that can be played), but the other could still win playing the 2 of Diamonds.

Same rules apply as before with who leads and how tricks are won. Once the cards are over, count how many tricks you won. The player with the most gets to add the difference between how many tricks you scored to their main score.

Tricks are ONLY scored by the number of plays won by using the Trump suit.

A simpler variation would be like this;

  • Player one won 7 plays
  • Player two won 6 plays.

Player one got the most, so they add 1 point (7 – 6) to their main score.

In both variations, the first to 25 overall points wins.

Strategy, Tips, and Tricks for German Whist

Okay, so this can all sound a little confusing and the strategy can feel a little all over the place when you’re playing for the first time, so here’s some tips to help you out.

  • The first card flipped from the top of the deck is the Trump card and that suit ALWAYS wins every trick. Both in the first and second round.
  • Therefore, in the first round, you want to collect as many cards of the Trump suit as possible, while minimizing how many your opponent gets.
  • Also, you want to clear your card off all the low cards and ones that won’t win tricks in the second round, like Twos. Therefore, during the first round, when there’s no Trump card, try to get rid of as many lows as you can.
  • Ideally, when you get to the second round, you’d only have a hand of trump suit cards and you’d win every trick!

Play a few rounds and this makes a lot more sense 😊

Wrap-Up

Count up who won the most tricks in Phase Two. That’s your round winner! You can play single rounds or keep a score tally for a longer German Whist championship.

See? Not so scary!

Give it a try and prepare to get hooked (and maybe just a tiny bit competitive).