Counting Spades: Keeping Track of the Trump Suit

There are 13 spades in the deck. If you know how many have been played and roughly who still holds the rest, you know who’s going to win the last few books of the hand, and in Spades the last few books decide a lot of games. You don’t need a great memory to do it. You need one number in your head, updated every time a spade hits the table. This guide shows how, and how to build up from there.

Why spades are the cards worth counting

Spades are trump. Late in a hand, when people start running out of side suits, almost every trick gets decided by who still has spades and how high they are. Knowing that is worth more than knowing anything else about the cards.

It also matters for side suits. A king of hearts is a winner only if the ace is gone and nobody who still has a spade is out of hearts. You can’t know the second part without some idea of where the spades are.

Step 1: count how many spades have fallen

Start with one number: 13. Every time someone plays a spade, take one away. Include your own.

That’s it for step one. Most casual players never do even this much, and it already tells you a lot:

• You hold 4 spades and 6 have been played. That leaves 3 among the other three players.
• You hold 2 spades and 11 have been played. Nobody else has any. Your spades are the only trump left, so they’re winners.
• Your partner has played 3 spades and you hold 5. Your team has had at least 8 of the 13. The other team is short.

Step 2: count the top spades

Next, keep track of the high ones: ace, king, queen and jack. These decide who wins a spade-led trick.

The rule to remember: a spade becomes a sure winner once every higher spade has been played.

Step 3: notice who’s out of what

Every time someone can’t follow suit, the table learns something. Write it down in your head as “East is out of hearts.” Then think one step ahead:

• If East is out of hearts and still has spades, any heart led will probably get trumped by East.
• If East is out of hearts and you’ve seen East discard instead of trumping, East might be out of spades too.
• If your partner is out of diamonds and still has spades, leading a diamond lets your partner trump it.

You don’t need to track this for every player and every suit. Start with one: who is out of which suit. That’s often enough to decide your next lead.

A simple way to keep the count

Here’s a method that works for most people without any special memory skill:

1. Before the first lead, count your spades. Say it to yourself once: “I have four.”
2. Each time a spade falls, count down from 13 in your head. Don’t count your own until you play them.
3. Each time a high spade falls (ace, king, queen), note it separately: “Ace gone. King gone.”
4. Each time someone shows out of a suit, note who and which suit.
5. At the halfway point of the hand (around trick 7), do the math: spades left in the deck minus spades in your hand equals spades the other three hold.

After a few games this becomes automatic. After a few dozen, you’ll start tracking the high cards in other suits too, without trying.

Using the count to win books

Pull trump when your team is long

If your team holds most of the spades, lead spades once they’re broken. Every round of spades takes one from each opponent. Once they’re out, your side-suit winners can’t be trumped. This is called pulling trump.

Don’t lead into a void

If you know the player after you is out of clubs and still has spades, don’t lead a club unless your partner can trump higher. You’re handing them a book.

Save your last spade for the right trick

If the count says only one spade is left outside your hand, and it’s lower than yours, your spade wins whenever you decide to play it. Use it on a trick the other team would otherwise win, not on one your partner already has.

Know when your side-suit winners are safe

Your king of diamonds is safe to lead when the ace is gone and nobody still holding spades is out of diamonds. Counting both lets you cash it at the right time.

Counting in no-bid Spades

In no-bid Spades, every book is worth 10 points, so every book the count wins you is 10 points the other team doesn’t get. Counting matters most in two spots:

• The last four or five tricks of a hand. Most players are down to their spades and maybe one side suit. If you’ve counted, you know exactly how many of those books your team can take.
• The last hand of a close game. If you need three books to pass 300, counting tells you whether to play safe or take a chance.

Common counting mistakes

A worked example

Trick 9 of 13. You hold Q♠, 7♠ and two small hearts. You’ve counted 8 spades played, including the A♠ and K♠. So 13 − 8 = 5 spades not played yet. You hold 2 of them, so the other three players have 3 between them. The A♠ and K♠ are gone, so your Q♠ is the highest spade left. It’s a sure book.

Your partner showed out of hearts on trick 4. Earlier, when spades were led, East and West both threw off other suits, so they’re out of spades. That puts all 3 outside spades in your partner’s hand. If you lead a heart, your partner can trump it and nobody can overtrump. That’s two books for your team: the heart your partner trumps, and your queen whenever you want it.

Without the count, you’d be guessing. With it, you know.

Practice makes the count automatic

Counting gets easy with repetition, and it’s easiest to practice in a game that shows you the last trick and only lets you play legal cards, so you can focus on the count instead of the rules. Spades Tourneys does both. It also plays no-bid Spades, where every book you win with a good count is worth exactly 10 points, and it runs a game every half hour.

Counting the other suits

Once counting spades is automatic, the next step is the side suits. You don’t need every card. The high cards and the voids are what matter.

Track the aces and kings

There are four aces and four kings. Each time one falls, note it. When the ace of a suit is gone, the king of that suit becomes the top card. If you hold it, it’s a winner as long as nobody who still has spades is out of that suit.

Track the length of one suit

Pick the suit you hold the most of and count it like you count spades: 13 to start, minus every card that falls. If you hold five diamonds and eight have been played, there are none left outside your hand. Every diamond you lead from here can only be beaten by a spade.

Use the voids you’ve seen

Every time someone shows out of a suit, that suit changes for the rest of the hand. If both opponents are out of clubs, any club you lead is a trick they can trump. If only your partner is out, a club lead is a gift to your team.

Counting spades tells you who can trump. Counting voids tells you who will. Put the two together and most of the hand is in front of you.

Three ways to practice counting

1. Count only spades for a week. Nothing else. Just the number. By the end of the week you won’t have to think about it.
2. Call the last book in your head. At trick 10, decide who wins trick 13 before it’s played. Check yourself when it lands. You’ll be wrong a lot at first and right most of the time within a few weeks.
3. Review one hand after each game. Pick the hand you lost by the most books and ask where the spades went. Most of the time the answer is a trick where someone trumped their partner, or a king that got led into an unplayed ace.