Spades Bidding Explained: Nil Bids, Bags and Scoring

Spades is a partnership card game, and almost everything interesting about it happens before the first card is played. Bid well and you score steadily; bid badly and you either lose points or slowly fill up with bags. This guide explains how bidding and scoring work, what Nil means, and how to count your tricks.

The basics

Four players form two teams, with partners sitting opposite each other. Each player gets 13 cards. Spades are always trumps: a spade beats any card of another suit. You must follow the suit led if you can; if you cannot, you may play a spade (trump) or discard.

Spades cannot be led until a spade has been played on an earlier trick (spades are “broken”), unless a player has only spades left.

How bidding works

After the deal, each player in turn says how many tricks they expect to take, from 0 to 13. A bid of 0 is called Nil and has its own scoring.

The two partners’ bids are added together. If you bid 4 and your partner bids 3, your team’s contract is 7 tricks. It does not matter which partner wins them, as long as the team takes at least 7 (Nil is the exception, below).

Scoring a hand

Result	Points
Contract made	10 × tricks bid
Each trick above the contract (a bag)	+1
Contract missed	−10 × tricks bid
Nil made (Nil player took no tricks)	+100
Nil failed	−100
Every 10 bags collected	−100

Example: your team bids 7 and takes 9 tricks. You score 70 + 2 = 72, and add 2 bags to your bag count. If you had taken only 6, you would lose 70.

These are the rules used by the game on this site. Some tables give a failed contract no score instead of a penalty, or add a “blind Nil” bid made before looking at your cards; agree on house rules before you play.

Bags: the slow penalty

Bags look harmless: one point each. But every 10 bags costs 100 points. A team that habitually underbids by two tricks will lose 100 points every five hands. The best teams bid close to what they can actually take, and sometimes deliberately avoid winning extra tricks once the contract is safe.

Nil bids

A Nil bid says: “I will not win a single trick.” If you succeed, your team gains 100 points. If you take even one trick, your team loses 100 points.

Your partner’s bid is scored separately: their tricks must cover their own bid. Tricks taken by a Nil bidder do not help the partner’s contract, but they still count as bags for the team.

When to bid Nil

Good Nil hands have:

• no high spades (no Ace, King or Queen of spades, and few spades overall);
• low cards in every suit, especially 2s, 3s and 4s;
• short suits where you can safely discard.

A single unprotected Ace is usually enough to make Nil too risky.

Helping a Nil partner

If your partner bids Nil, your job changes: win tricks that your partner might otherwise be forced to take. Play high cards over theirs, and lead suits where they can play low.

How to count your tricks

A simple counting method for beginners:

1. Spades: count the Ace, King (if you have at least one other spade) and Queen (if you have at least two others). Add one trick for each spade beyond four.
2. Side suits: count Aces as one trick each, and Kings as one trick when you hold at least one other card in that suit.
3. Voids and short suits: if you have no cards in a suit and a few spades to spare, add a trick for ruffing.
4. Adjust: subtract one if your hand feels weak in spades, add one if your partner is likely strong.

Bid what you count, not what you hope for. Missing a contract costs far more than a couple of bags.

A bidding example

Your hand: A♠ K♠ 7♠ 4♠ 2♠, A♥ 9♥, K♦ 5♦ 3♦, 8♣ 6♣ 2♣.

• Spades: Ace (1) and King (1); five spades is one more than four, so add 1. That is 3.
• Hearts: the Ace is 1.
• Diamonds: the King with two others is about 1.
• Clubs: nothing.

That totals about 5 tricks. If your partner has bid 4, bidding 5 makes a team contract of 9, which is ambitious; bidding 4 is the steadier choice.

Strategy tips

• Bid as a team. If your partner bids high, bid conservatively unless your hand is clearly strong.
• Protect your contract first, then avoid bags.
• Watch the bag count. Near nine bags, an extra trick costs 100 points; consider giving tricks away.
• Count spades played. With 13 spades in the deck, knowing how many are left tells you when your low spades become winners.

Play Spades with a computer partner

On this site you play with a computer partner against two computer opponents. You bid by tapping a number, only legal cards are lit, and the score sheet shows bids, tricks, bags and Nil results after every hand. The first team to 500 wins.