The standard blackjack variants are using 52-card decks, which means that you have thirteen cards, each with its own suit. the suits are devided into four "symbols" that are printed on the cards.

There are 16 cards valued as 10 (Four 10s, Four Jacks, Four Queens and Four Kings) which means that 30.7% of the cards in each deck can cause to bust with a hand value bigger than 11, put it under consideration when you play online blackjack, this is a vital part of the blackjack basic strategy.

Card Values

The card value of Jacks, Queens and Kings is 10.
The card value of 2s-10s is according to their number, meaning a 4 card is valued as 4.
The card value of Aces can be either 1 or 11, it's up to the player to decide which value to give to his Aces every time.

Suits

- Clubs

- Hearts

- Spades

- Diamonds

The suits have no importance today except in some blackjack variants such as Triple 7s or Blackjack Bonus. These offer special payoffs for suited hands in some cases.

Notes About Blackjack Payouts

The name Blackjack came from an old feature the game used to have. Once, if a player had a hand with a black jack of spades and a black ace of spades, he would get an additional bonus, a higher payout amount which depended on each casino to decide.

Brought to you by Andrew Whitley - 5/12/05