How to Play the Seven up Card Game

The Seven Up card game is a short trick-taking game played by two players. The goal of the game is to accumulate points based on taking certain tricks in the game. Each hand is only played with six cards and the point total that a player has to reach is seven points in the Seven Up Card Game. Hands go relatively quickly; games usually take 20 minutes or less.

Find a friend to play against. The Seven Up card game is designed for exactly two players, and has similarities to the trick-taking game of Euchre.

Shuffle the deck of cards and deal six cards to each player. Flip the top card of the deck face up. If it is a Jack, the dealer scores one point immediately.

Let the non-dealer decide whether the suit on the face-up card will be trump. She can accept that suit as trump or she can“beg,” forcing the dealer to change the trump suit by dealing three more cards to each player and flipping over the next card face up. If the suit does not change, the dealer must continue dealing three cards to each player and flipping over the top suit until the trump suit is different than the first suit flipped over.

Discard any additional cards in each player’s hand to reach a total of six cards. A player can choose which cards he keeps.

Lead any card from the hand of the non-dealer. The player who did not lead must either follow suit or trump if she has a card in her hand of the suit that was led. She can not pitch a non-trump card of a suit different from what was led, unless her hand includes no trump and no cards of the suit led. She is not required to follow suit if she wishes to trump, even if she has a card in her hand of the suit led. The winner of the trick is the player who plays the highest trump card, or, if no trump is played, the highest card in the suit led. Players keep any cards they win in a face-down pile in front of them.

Score the hand. One point is awarded to the player who has captured the highest trump card and one point to the player who captured the lowest trump card in play. There is also a point awarded for capturing the Jack of trumps. The fourth and final point is awarded to the player with the highest face value total in his or her hand of captured cards. For face value Aces count as 4, Kings as 3, Queens as 2, Jacks as one. All other cards count as their face value.

Collect the cards and deal another hand, switching roles of dealer and non-dealer. The first player to score seven points wins the game. If two players go over seven points on the same hand, the higher score wins. If there is still a tie, play additional hands until the tie is broken.