Welcome to the Hand & Foot
card game guide

Hand & Foot is a flexible card game in the Canasta family, playable one‑on‑one or in teams of two when you have four or six players.

This page gives you a clean, easy-to-reference guide to the rules — ideal whether you’re learning the game for the first time or refreshing your memory.

The rules here follow the version played by The Flaming Foursome, organized into the same sections we use when teaching new players: Setup, Gameplay, Rules, and Scoring.

Setup

Use five standard decks of cards, including the jokers.
Decide who shuffles and deals first.
- An easy method is for each player to draw one card, and the player with the lowest card shuffles and deals first.
- Card values, from lowest to highest, are: 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King, Ace, Joker.
Deal each player two piles of 13 cards.
- One pile is the Hand.
- One pile is the Foot.
Place the remaining cards face down in the middle of the table.
- This is the draw pile.
Turn the top card of the draw pile face up beside it.
- This starts the discard pile.
In team play, partners sit across from each other, never next to one another.

Gameplay

Players take turns clockwise, starting with the player to the left of whoever shuffled and dealt.
Each player starts by playing from their Hand. The Foot stays face down and untouched until the Hand is empty.
A turn has three parts: draw, play, discard.
1. Draw two cards — either both from the draw pile, or one from the draw pile and one from the discard pile.
2. Play (if you’re able to and want to):
  - To open — start laying melds on the table — you must meet a minimum point threshold based on your current total score (see the Meld Counts table below).
    - In partner play, only the first player to open needs to meet this minimum.
    - In partner play, the team shares a single building area, with both partners contributing to the same melds.
  - Once opened, you may keep adding cards to your (or your team’s) building area.
  - If you can’t open, have no cards to play, or simply don’t want to, skip straight to discarding.
  - If this step empties your Hand — you played your last card into a meld, not as a discard — pick up your Foot immediately and keep playing. You don’t draw again.
3. Discard — end your turn by placing one card face up on the discard pile.
  - If this discard empties your Hand, your turn ends. You still pick up your Foot, but must wait until your next turn to play from it.
Play continues until a player or team is ready to go out.

Rules

Jokers and 2s are wild cards.
Aces rank above Kings.
Red 3s and black 3s cannot be used in a meld (book or run).
Wild cards cannot be used in a run.
In a run, all cards must be of the same suit.
A meld must contain at least three cards to be placed on the table (your building area) — this can include wild cards if you’re going for a black canasta.
While building your melds, wild cards can never equal or outnumber the regular cards. For example:
- You can lay a book of two Jacks and one wild card in your building area, but not two Jacks and two wild cards, or one Jack and two wild cards.
- If you’re working on a book of 9s in your building area that has three 9s and two wild cards, you can’t add another wild card until a fourth 9 joins the book.
A meld cannot contain more than seven cards. Once it reaches seven, it becomes a canasta and is put aside.
A card drawn from the discard pile must be played immediately, either into an existing meld or a new one.
A meld with six cards is frozen — you cannot complete it by picking up matching cards from the discard pile.
A black canasta must contain at least one wild card, but no more than three.
A red canasta contains no wild cards, except for a book of 2s.
A book of 2s counts as a red canasta and cannot contain jokers.
To go out, a player or team must have completed at least two red canastas and two black canastas.
Once a player or team goes out, the round ends.
- In team play, ask your partner if they agree before going out — this isn’t a strict rule, just good manners.
When playing in teams, no information is to be exchanged between partners beyond asking if you can go out (see previous), and the only allowed answer is “yes” or “no” — no discussion.
During the game, you cannot:
- end up with no cards in your hands, unless you’re going out
- skip a turn
- end your turn without discarding, unless you’re going out
- move cards between melds in your building area and/or canastas
- draw two cards from the discard pile

Scoring

When a round ends, each player or team adds up their points based on the points table below:

Add points for completed red and black canastas.
Add points for all individual played cards — in the building area and completed canastas.
Subtract points for unplayed cards from your Hand and/or Foot.
Add a 100-point bonus for the player or team that ended the round.

For a full step-by-step explanation, including examples, see the Counting Points page.

Points (PDF Version)

Points

Meld Counts

Range	Points
From 0 to 7,499	50
From 7,500 to 9,999	90
From 10,000 to 14,999	120
From 15,000 to 20,000	150

Card and Canasta Points

Item	Points
Red 3s	–300
Black 3s	–100
4 to 7	5
8 to King	10
Ace	20
2 (wild)	20
Joker (wild)	50
Black canasta	300
Red canasta	500
Run – is a red canasta	1,500
Book of 2s – is a red canasta	2,000
First to go out bonus	100

Welcome to the Hand & Foot card game guide