Spades vs Bid Whist: Key Differences

Walk into a family reunion and you might find a spades table and a bid whist table side by side, with half the players drifting between them. They're cousins from the old whist family, and both carry deep roots in Black American card culture. They share a lot, but a few rules make them feel very different. For the full rules of our game, see the spades rules.

Bid whist rules vary more than spades rules do, so treat the details below as the common version; your family's table may do it differently.

The short version

Trump: fixed vs named

In spades, spades are trump every hand, no discussion. At Spades Night's House Rules the order is Big Joker, Little Joker, 2♦ (two of diamonds), 2♠, then A♠ down to 3♠. See spades with jokers.

In bid whist, the player who wins the auction names trump after seeing the kitty. They can also call no trump, where the jokers are usually worthless and the highest card of the led suit wins.

Bidding: everyone vs one winner

Spades: all four players bid how many books they expect to take. Partners' bids add up to a team contract. Both teams have a contract every hand. At Spades Night the bids are secret and simultaneous by default.

Bid whist: players take turns bidding in a single auction, each bid higher than the last. A bid of 4 means "we'll take the book (six tricks) plus four more," so ten tricks. Bids also say uptown or downtown, and some tables add no trump as a higher-ranked bid. Only the winning team has a contract; the other team just tries to stop them.

What "book" means

This trips up players who switch games.

• In spades, a book is simply a trick. "I've got four books" means four tricks.
• In bid whist, the book is the first six tricks a team takes. They don't score. Bids and points count tricks beyond that.

Uptown and downtown

Bid whist lets the bidder flip the card ranks:

• Uptown: high cards win, ace high.
• Downtown: low cards win. The ace usually counts as the lowest, so it's the best card in a downtown hand.

Spades has no such switch. High always wins, and the top trump is always the top trump.

The kitty

In bid whist, six cards are dealt face down as the kitty. The auction winner picks them up, then discards six. The discard often counts as the team's first trick.

Spades has no kitty. You play the 13 cards you're dealt.

Scoring

Spades: a team that makes its contract scores 10 per book bid, plus 1 per overtrick; overtricks are also bags, and 10 bags cost 100. Missing the contract costs 10 per book bid. Nil is +100 or −100. Games often go to 500. See spades scoring.

Bid whist: the bidding team scores one point for each trick over the book if it makes its bid, and loses the bid amount if it doesn't. Many tables play to 7 points, and a team that takes all 13 tricks may win outright. No bags, no nil.

How a hand feels

A spades hand has two contracts racing each other. Both teams are defending their own number and attacking the other team's.

A bid whist hand is one team on offense and one on defense, and the whole hand turns on the bidder's choice of trump and direction.

Jokers in both games

Jokers are one of the clearest family resemblances. In bid whist, the Big Joker and Little Joker are usually the two highest trump whenever a suit is named, and in no trump they're typically worthless, so players try to dump them.

In spades played with jokers, the Big Joker and Little Joker are always the top two trump because spades are always trump. At Spades Night the 2♦ and 2♠ follow them, then the A♠. The jokers count as spades for following suit and for breaking spades, so you can't lead one until a spade has been played on an earlier trick. To keep the deck at 52 cards, we take out the 2♥ and 2♣.

If your family's bid whist table uses jokers, you already know how satisfying it is to drop the Big Joker on a trick. Spades gives you that feeling every hand you hold it.

What carries over

• Partnership play: returning your partner's suit, not trumping their winner.
• Trump counting: both games reward knowing how many trump are left.
• Jokers: if you're used to jokers as top trump in bid whist, our House Rules spades will feel natural.

What's new going from bid whist to spades: every player bids, trump never changes, and you have to watch bags.

Want to try spades online?

Spades Night plays four-seat partnership spades, free in your browser with no sign-up, or inside a Discord voice call. Jokers and deuces are on by default. Start with our beginner's guide or read a little of the history of spades and its whist roots.