Deck and deal
Use 32 cards, from Seven up to Ace. Each player receives five cards in packets of two and three. The next card is turned face up to establish trumps; the remainder form the stock.
French trick-taking · Exchange · 2 players
Écarté
Ecarte
Propose an exchange, shape a five-card hand, and take the majority of tricks before your opponent reaches five points.
OOpponentDealer · 5 cards
21
Stock
Exchange0proposals accepted
YYouNon-dealer · 5 cards
Deal complete
Point won
You0Opponent0
01 How to play
Improve the hand.
Control the tricks.
Écarté is a two-player French game in which every deal has only five tricks. Before play, the non-dealer may ask to exchange unwanted cards — but the dealer can refuse.
Unusual card order
King is highest, followed by Queen, Jack, Ace, Ten, Nine, Eight and Seven. Suits have no permanent rank.
Stand or propose
The non-dealer may stand and begin play, or propose an exchange. The dealer accepts or refuses. Refusal immediately ends the exchange phase.
Exchange cards
After acceptance, each player discards any number of cards face down and draws back to five, non-dealer first. The non-dealer may propose again while stock remains.
Follow and win
The non-dealer leads. You must follow suit if able and, when you can beat the card led, you must do so. If void in the led suit, you must trump when able. The trick winner leads next.
King of trumps
Turning up the King of trumps gives the dealer one point. Holding it also gives its owner one point when declared before that player’s first card; this version declares it automatically.
Point and vole
Winning three or four tricks scores one point. Winning all five — the vole — scores two. If the non-dealer stands immediately and loses, or the dealer refuses the first proposal and loses, the winner scores two.
Win the game
The first player to reach five points wins. The deal alternates, so both players take turns deciding whether proposals are accepted.
02 History & variants
A salon game of choice and nerve.
From nineteenth-century France
Écarté emerged in Paris during the early nineteenth century and became a fashionable two-player game in French and British salons. Its name comes from the French verb écarter, meaning to set aside or discard — a direct reference to the exchange that gives the game its identity.
French and English customs
Historical tables did not always play in exactly the same way. In French play, spectators who had wagers on the result could sometimes advise by pointing to cards; English practice excluded that custom. Three-person pools and la chouette, where one player opposed two backers, extended the game beyond its normal head-to-head form.