Increase Your Winning Percentage in the Card Game Spades

Spades is a traditionally a four-person card game requiring both strategy and verve. Lots of people know how to play as the game has been around since the late 1930's. Much of its popularity derives from Spades being a simpler but still challenging version of Bridge. The goal in Spades is to guess correctly how many tricks your team will win in order to get a positive score. Couples find the card game well suited for an evening in with friends. Learning some simple winning tips will help you enjoy Spades even more.

Bet your non-spade aces every time you have them as the odds are greatly in your favor that you will take a trick with each one.

Hold your non-spade king when it is the only card of its suit you have. This is because if someone else leads with this suit you are will be forced to play your king and likely the ace of the suit will take it. In most other cases, kings are a good card to bet.

Think carefully before betting your non-spade queens. They are a pretty safe bet except when you have no more than 2 cards of the same suit as your Queen or you have 5 or more cards of her suit. In cases where you have many card of the same suit there is a good possibility that the other team will trump your team's queen.

Gamble occasionally by betting a non-spade jack only when you possess exactly four of its suit. You are still taking a risk that your jack will be trumped so be careful with the timing of this play.

Keep your non-spade numbers cards rather than betting them. The reasoning is that if the players each hold four cards of a suit and the jack takes it there remains just one card of that suit. This means your number card will invariably be trumped.

Remember your ace of spades always wins and if you hold the king of spades too it is a guaranteed winner. If you have three or more spades bet the 10 and all higher ones. If you have only a couple of cards in another suit, you might try betting your nine or eight of spades to try to trump a card played.

Play a card other than a king of a suit if the ace of that suit has not yet been played. This is to let the player with the ace take the trick, allowing you to play your king later and hopefully win with it.

Lead with a card of a suit of which you only have 2 or 1. This works to your advantage when a card of that suit is led by another player so that you can hopefully be out of that suit and able to play your lowest spade.

Dump all your tricks if you are in need of only one more and hold an ace of spades or king of spades.

Try cutting if your opponents have a big lead in the game. Cutting means playing so that you get as many tricks as possible to keep the others from getting the number they guessed as this will cost them 10 times their bet.

Take a chance by betting blind (not looking at your cards) when you are well behind in a game. If you win you will get double points.