Euchre Strategy: Order Up, Pass or Go Alone

Good euchre strategy starts with one count: how many tricks your hand takes if the up-card's suit is trump. Three trumps plus an off-suit ace is the classic hand to order it up, because your side needs three of the five tricks and your partner is worth roughly one. Two small trumps and nothing else is a pass.

Every hand gives you at most three decisions before a card is played: order up or pass, which suit to name if it comes round again, and whether to go alone. This page takes them in that order, then the play.

Round one: what the up-card is worth

• Count the bowers first. The Jack of the up-card's suit and the Jack of the same colour are the two best cards. Either one turns a marginal call into a sound one. Hold both and you should be thinking about a loner.
• Know who gets the card. Ordering it up puts the up-card in the dealer's hand. If the dealer is your partner, that is a trump for your side. If the dealer is an opponent, order it up only when your hand still wins after the gift.
• Dealer, count the up-card as yours. If you pick it up, it joins your hand. Plan the discard before you decide, and throw away a lone card in a side suit if you can, so you can trump that suit later.

Our bots weigh it the same way. When the dealer is on their side they count the up-card as extra strength, and when the dealer is an opponent they want a stronger hand before ordering it up.

Round two: calling next

Once the up-card is turned down, its suit is dead. "Next" is the other suit of the same colour: if a heart was turned down, diamonds is next. It is an Indiana and Ohio table term. The reasoning players give is that the dealer just passed up a red card, so the dealer's side may be short of red Jacks, and the seat on the dealer's left will call next on a hand it would pass with in the black suits. Calling a suit of the other colour is "crossing", and it usually needs more.

Stuck as dealer

Our tables play stick the dealer. If the other three pass twice, the dealer has to name a suit, any suit except the one turned down. Name your longest suit, and prefer one where you hold a bower. The other three passed twice too, so their hands are not strong either, and your partner is still there to take a trick.

Going alone or keeping your partner

A lone march pays 4 points; the same five tricks with your partner pay 2. A failed loner costs the same 2 as any other euchre, so the real price is the help you give up.

• Go alone with both bowers plus more trump, or a hand where you can name four winners and see where the fifth comes from.
• When you trail 6 to 9 or worse, lower the bar. You need big hands, not safe ones.
• At 9 to 9, don't go alone. One point wins the same game.

Our Easy bots never go alone. Medium, Hard and Expert bots go alone only when they hold the right bower and a strong trump hand.

Playing the hand

• As the maker, lead trump. Pulling the defenders' trumps keeps your off-suit winners alive.
• As a defender, usually don't. Leading trump does the maker's work. Lead an ace, or a singleton so you can trump that suit next time round.
• The left bower is not its printed suit. If clubs are trump, the Jack of spades is a club. If it is your only club you must play it on a club lead, and it beats every ace.
• Count to seven. Trump has seven cards: six of the suit plus the borrowed Jack. Watch them fall and you know whether your 10 of trump is a winner.
• Leave your partner's trick alone. If your partner is already winning, play low. With five cards each there is no time to get a wasted high card back.

Defending for the euchre

Setting the makers scores your side 2 points without calling anything. Defend for the set: hold your trumps behind the maker, keep your ace in their weakest suit, and when your partner shows a void, lead that suit so they can trump it.

Playing the score

• At 9 points any single point wins, so call thinner hands.
• When the other side is on 8 or 9, a call that gets euchred can hand them the game. Pass more.
• Being euchred costs 2 and making it pays 1. A thin call needs a reason, and the score is the usual one.

Five habits that lose euchre games

1. Forgetting the left bower changed suits, then reneging on a trump lead.
2. Ordering it up on two small trumps.
3. Leading trump as a defender.
4. Going alone at 9 to 9.
5. Ordering the up-card into an opponent's hand with a hand that barely beats it.

Keep reading

• How to Play Euchre: the rules, in the order a hand is played.
• Euchre Variants: stick the dealer, British euchre and other house rules.
• Euchre Terms: bowers, loners and table talk.
• Going Alone in Euchre: loner rules, scoring and defence.
• Euchre for 2 and 3 Players: 3-handed cutthroat rules and 2-handed euchre.