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Game rules
Six decks, you against the dealer, closest to 21 without going over. These are the rules enforced by the JustPoker game engine; where the table and this page could ever disagree, the engine's published tests are the reference.
Blackjack is played against the dealer, not against other players. Your aim is to finish with a hand closer to 21 than the dealer's without going over. A hand over 21 is a bust and loses immediately, whatever the dealer goes on to draw.
The dealer has no choices to make: the dealer's hand is played by the fixed rules on this page. Your decisions — hit, stand, double down, split and insurance — are the only ones in the game, and they are the only thing that changes the house edge.
Every round is dealt from a 6-deck shoe of 312 cards that is shuffled from scratch for that round alone, from a server seed committed in advance and a client seed you control. Nothing carries over between rounds, so tracking cards gives no advantage, and you can reproduce any shoe after the fact on our Provably Fair page.
Bets are set in whole cents. Doubles, splits and insurance are priced from your bet, so the bet is the only amount you choose directly.
The only stake required to deal.
Exactly half, rounded down to the cent: $125.00 on a $250.00 bet.
At the maximum bet: a split with both hands doubled (4 × the bet) plus insurance.
Any whole-cent amount within limits is accepted.
Extra stakes are charged when you choose them
Choose a bet between $1.00 and $250.00. Only the bet is debited when you deal; anything else is charged when you choose it.
From a freshly shuffled six-deck shoe: one card to you, the dealer's up-card, your second card, then the dealer's hole card face down.
With an Ace showing you are offered insurance first. With an Ace or a ten-value card showing, the dealer then checks for blackjack. A dealer blackjack ends the round at once.
Hit, stand, double down or split until you stand, reach 21 or bust. After a split you play the first hand, then the second.
The hole card is turned over and the dealer draws to 17 or more, standing on every 17 including soft 17. The dealer does not draw if all of your hands have already busted.
Each hand is compared with the dealer's. Winnings and returned stakes are credited to your balance in the same step, and the round is saved to your hand history.
| Card | Counts as |
|---|---|
| 2 to 10 | Face value |
| Jack, Queen, King | 10 |
| Ace | 11, or 1 if 11 would take the hand over 21 |
Suits play no part in blackjack.
A hand is soft while it holds an Ace counted as 11: Ace-6 is a soft 17, and one more card cannot bust it because the Ace can drop to 1. Every other hand is hard: 10-6 is a hard 16. The table shows your running total the same way — “Soft 17”, “Hard 12” — so you always know which one you hold.
A blackjack (a “natural”) is an Ace and a ten-value card as your first two cards. It beats any other 21 and is settled at once. Two cards that make 21 after a split are an ordinary 21, not a blackjack.
The table offers only the decisions the rules allow at that moment. The keyboard shortcuts work while the action panel has focus.
| Decision | When | Extra stake | What happens | Key |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hit | Any time the hand is below 21 | None | Take one more card. Over 21 is a bust and the hand loses. | H |
| Stand | Any time | None | Keep your total; play moves to your next hand or to the dealer. | S |
| Double down | On your first two cards, including after a split | 1 × the hand's bet | The stake on that hand doubles and you receive exactly one more card. | D |
| Split | First two cards of equal value, once per round | 1 × the bet | The pair becomes two hands with a bet each; each receives a second card. | P |
| Insurance | Only when the dealer shows an Ace, before the peek | ½ × the bet | A side bet that the dealer has blackjack. Pays 2 to 1. See below. | Y / N |
When the dealer's up-card is an Ace you are asked, before anything else, whether you want insurance. Insurance is a separate bet of exactly half your bet (rounded down to the cent) that the dealer's hole card is a ten-value card, giving the dealer blackjack. It pays 2 to 1.
Insurance is a bet on the dealer's hole card, not protection for your hand. With six decks roughly 30% of the cards are ten-values, while the bet needs one a third of the time to break even: it carries a house edge of about 7% of the insurance stake (6.8% to 8.7%, depending on your own two cards). Basic strategy never takes it.
Bet $10.00, insurance $5.00, you hold 18.
| Dealer | Staked | Returned | Net |
|---|---|---|---|
| Blackjack | $15.00 | $15.00 | $0.00 |
| No blackjack, you win | $15.00 | $20.00 | +$5.00 |
| No blackjack, you lose | $15.00 | $0.00 | -$15.00 |
Insurance is offered only when the dealer shows an Ace. With a ten-value card showing, the dealer peeks without offering it.
Winnings are paid on top of the returned stake. Examples use a $10.00 bet.
| Result | Pays | Winnings | Returned |
|---|---|---|---|
| Blackjack (first two cards, not after a split) | 3 to 2 | $15.00 | $25.00 |
| Win: higher total than the dealer, or the dealer busts | 1 to 1 | $10.00 | $20.00 |
| Win on a doubled hand ($20.00 staked) | 1 to 1 | $20.00 | $40.00 |
| Insurance, dealer has blackjack ($5.00 staked) | 2 to 1 | $10.00 | $15.00 |
| Push: equal totals, or blackjack against a dealer blackjack | Stake returned | $0.00 | $10.00 |
| Loss: bust, lower total, or dealer blackjack | Stake lost | $0.00 | $0.00 |
Split hands are settled separately against the dealer's final hand. A 3 to 2 payout on an odd number of cents is rounded down to the cent: a $10.01 blackjack wins $15.01.
The mathematically best play for every two-card starting hand against every dealer up-card, for exactly these rules: six decks, dealer stands on soft 17, double after split, one split, no surrender. The chart is rendered from the same tables our engine is tested and simulated with. It lowers the house edge; it does not remove it.
No Ace counted as 11. Columns are the dealer's up-card; T is any ten-value card.
| Your total | Dealer shows 2 | Dealer shows 3 | Dealer shows 4 | Dealer shows 5 | Dealer shows 6 | Dealer shows 7 | Dealer shows 8 | Dealer shows 9 | Dealer shows T | Dealer shows A |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4–8 | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 9 | Hit | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 10 | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit |
| 11 | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit |
| 12 | Hit | Hit | Stand | Stand | Stand | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 13–16 | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 17–21 | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand |
An Ace counted as 11. A two-card A-T is a blackjack and never reaches a decision.
| Your hand | Dealer shows 2 | Dealer shows 3 | Dealer shows 4 | Dealer shows 5 | Dealer shows 6 | Dealer shows 7 | Dealer shows 8 | Dealer shows 9 | Dealer shows T | Dealer shows A |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A-A (no split) | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| A-2, A-3 | Hit | Hit | Hit | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| A-4, A-5 | Hit | Hit | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| A-6 | Hit | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| A-7 | Stand | Double (else stand) | Double (else stand) | Double (else stand) | Double (else stand) | Stand | Stand | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| A-8 to A-10 | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand |
Read only when a split is available: your first two cards, before any split. Any two ten-value cards form T-T.
| Your pair | Dealer shows 2 | Dealer shows 3 | Dealer shows 4 | Dealer shows 5 | Dealer shows 6 | Dealer shows 7 | Dealer shows 8 | Dealer shows 9 | Dealer shows T | Dealer shows A |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2-2, 3-3 | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 4-4 | Hit | Hit | Hit | Split | Split | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 5-5 | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Double (else hit) | Hit | Hit |
| 6-6 | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 7-7 | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Hit | Hit | Hit | Hit |
| 8-8 | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split |
| 9-9 | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Stand | Split | Split | Stand | Stand |
| T-T | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand | Stand |
| A-A | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split | Split |
With perfect basic strategy the house edge at this table is approximately 0.45% of the bet, a return to player of about 99.55%. That is the published figure for these rules, and it is what our own engine measures: 4,000,000 simulated rounds of basic strategy returned 0.45%.
Because doubles and splits add money to the table, the average total staked is about 1.13 bets per round; measured against everything staked, the expected loss (the element of risk) is about 0.40%. A shorter, fixed-seed simulation of 40,000 rounds runs in our test suite on every change to the game and must land between 0.1% and 1.3% of the bet, a window sized for its sampling error.
Any departure from basic strategy — standing on 16 against a 10, not splitting 8s, taking insurance — increases the house edge. These are long-run averages: individual sessions vary widely, and no strategy makes blackjack profitable for the player. Please read our responsible gambling information and set limits before you play.
| Measure | Value |
|---|---|
| House edge, basic strategy (published) | ≈ 0.45% of bet |
| House edge, JustPoker engine simulation | 0.45% of bet |
| Return to player, basic strategy | ≈ 99.55% |
| Element of risk (of all money staked) | ≈ 0.40% |
| Average staked per round | ≈ 1.13 bets |
| Insurance bet | ≈ 7% of stake |
Simulation: 4,000,000 rounds of basic strategy, never taking insurance, on the production game engine.
Each round's 312-card shoe is derived from three inputs: a server seed whose SHA-256 hash is shown to you before you play, your own client seed, and a round counter (the nonce). The same HMAC-SHA256 byte stream and Fisher–Yates shuffle as our poker decks is simply run over six decks.
Cards are dealt strictly in shoe order: the first card to you, the second as the dealer's up-card, the third to you, the fourth as the hole card, and every later card — hits, doubles, split cards and dealer draws — from the next position. The dealer's hole card never leaves our servers until the rules reveal it.
Rotate your seed pair on the Fairness & Seeds page to reveal the server seed, then open any round in your hand history and check every card with the verifier.
The verifier's blackjack mode rebuilds the whole six-deck shoe from the server seed, client seed and nonce, and shows the opening deal and a fingerprint of the shoe.
Bets from $1.00 to $250.00. Your balance, limits and reality checks apply at the table exactly as they do everywhere on JustPoker.
18+ only. Gambling can be harmful; play within limits you set in advance. Help is available through the organisations listed on our responsible gambling page.