How to play Cuckoo

One standard 52-card deck and three to twenty players. Each player needs a few tokens or “lives”—three is typical.

Avoid holding the lowest card at the end of each round. Lose all your lives and you are out; the last player left wins.

1. 1Everyone starts with the same number of lives, often three.
2. 2Deal one card face down to each player. Look at your own card only.
3. 3Kings are high and aces are low; suits do not matter.

1. 1Starting at the dealer’s left, each player in turn either keeps their card or offers to swap it with the player on their left.
2. 2The neighbor must accept the swap—unless they hold a king, which they show, and the swap is refused.
3. 3The dealer goes last and may swap with a card cut from the undealt pack. If that card is a king, the dealer must keep their own card.

• Everyone turns their card face up. The player with the lowest card loses a life; tied players all lose one.
• Players with no lives left are out, and the last player standing wins.

• Some groups play counterclockwise, or pass to the right.
• If the final players all tie on their last life, groups variously share the win, replay the round, or cut cards to decide.

• Keep anything 7 or higher in a big group—the odds favor someone else holding a lower card.
• Watch who refuses swaps: it tells you where the kings are.