What Is Hearts?
Hearts is a classic four-player card game where the goal is the opposite of most card games — you are trying to AVOID winning certain cards. Every heart card you win counts as a penalty point against you. The Queen of Spades is worth a massive 13 penalty points all by herself. The player with the LOWEST score when someone reaches 100 points wins. But here’s the exciting twist: if you manage to collect every single heart AND the Queen of Spades in one round, instead of hurting you, it hurts everyone else. This bold move is called Shooting the Moon.
What You Need
- One standard deck of 52 playing cards
- Exactly four players
- Paper and pen to track scores
Understanding Tricks
Hearts is a trick-taking game. A trick works like this: one player leads by placing a card face-up in the center. Going clockwise, every other player places one card face-up on top. The player who placed the highest card of the suit that was led wins all four cards and takes them into their personal pile. That player then leads the next trick. You play 13 tricks per round since each player holds 13 cards.
Understanding Suits
Every card belongs to one of four suits: Spades ♠, Hearts ♥, Clubs ♣, and Diamonds ♦. When a trick is led with a Spade, only Spades compete to win it — unless a player has no Spades, in which case they can play any card (but a different suit card cannot WIN the trick, it just gets discarded). There is no trump suit in Hearts — the highest card of the led suit always wins.
Setting Up the Game
- Shuffle all 52 cards and deal them all out — 13 cards to each player.
- Players pick up their cards and sort them by suit so they can see what they have.
- Before play begins, everyone passes three cards face-down to another player. In the first round, pass to the player on your left. In the second round, pass to the right. In the third round, pass across the table. In the fourth round, keep your cards — no passing. Then the cycle repeats.
- Pick up the three cards passed to you before playing.
How to Play — Step by Step
- The player holding the 2 of Clubs must lead it as the very first card of the round. This is always how Hearts begins.
- Going clockwise, each player must play a card of the same suit as the card that was led — in this case, a Club. This is called following suit.
- If you have no cards of the led suit, you may play any card from your hand. However, on the very first trick of the round, you may not play a Heart or the Queen of Spades — even if you have no Clubs.
- After all four players have played one card, the player who played the highest Club wins all four cards. They add them face-down to their personal pile and lead the next trick.
- The winner of each trick leads the next one. They can play any card — with one exception: you cannot lead a Heart until Hearts have been ‘broken.’
Breaking Hearts
Hearts are broken the first time any player plays a Heart card on a trick they couldn’t follow suit on. Once Hearts are broken, any player may lead a Heart on future tricks.
Shooting the Moon
If one player wins ALL 13 Hearts AND the Queen of Spades in a single round, they have Shot the Moon. Instead of receiving 26 penalty points, every OTHER player receives 26 points and the shooter receives zero. This completely flips the round and can dramatically change the game standings. Shooting the Moon is risky — if you try and fail, you end up with a huge penalty score.
Scoring
- Each Heart card won = 1 penalty point
- Queen of Spades won = 13 penalty points
- All other cards = 0 points
- Shoot the Moon = 0 points for shooter, 26 points for everyone else
After each round, add up each player’s penalty points and record them. Keep a running total.
Winning
The game ends the moment any player’s total score reaches 100 points. At that point, the player with the LOWEST total score wins.
Tips for New Players
- The Queen of Spades is your biggest danger. If you receive her in the passing round, pass her immediately to someone else if you can.
- When passing cards, pass high Spades like the Ace and King — they might force you to win the Queen of Spades later.
- If one player is winning every single trick, they might be attempting to Shoot the Moon. Play your highest cards to stop them from getting everything.