Teen Patti rules (3 Patti rules)

New to the game? Read how to play Teen Patti first: it walks through one hand move by move. This page is the rulebook to come back to.

The cards, the players and the deal

Teen Patti uses one standard deck of 52 cards with the jokers taken out (some variations add wild cards). Three to six players is the usual table, though two can play and one deck stretches to ten. Cards rank from the ace, high, down to the 2. Suits have no rank at all: hearts are not better than spades.

Before every hand, each player puts the boot into the pot, a fixed amount agreed before the game. The dealer then deals one card at a time to each player, starting with the player next to them, until everyone has three cards face down. That first player also acts first, and play goes round the table in the same direction. Many Indian home tables deal and play anticlockwise; our table goes clockwise. The deal moves one seat along after each hand.

Blind and seen

Every player starts blind. You can stay blind for the whole hand, or look at your cards at any time and play seen (seen players are also called chaal players, the same word as a bet). Looking costs nothing in itself, but it changes the price of everything after it:

• A blind player bets the current stake. A seen player bets twice the stake.
• Only a seen player can ask for a side show, and only a seen player can be asked.
• A seen player cannot ask a blind player for a show.
• Once you have looked, you stay seen until the hand ends.

Chaal and raise: how much to bet

The stake starts at the boot. On your turn you either pack or bet, and you can raise, which doubles the stake for every player after you. A blind bet sets the stake at that amount; a seen bet sets it at half, so a blind 100 and a seen 200 are the same level.

The 4X boot rule

“4X boot” is the biggest bet a seen player can make on the first turn: twice the stake for being seen, doubled again for the raise, so four times the boot. Apps show it on the bet buttons as 1X and 2X for a blind player and 2X and 4X for a seen one. As the stake rises the multiples stay the same, only counted from the new stake. Most tables also cap the stake (the chaal limit): ours stops raises at a stake of 1,600, 32 times the boot, so a seen bet tops out at 3,200.

Pack

To pack is to fold: you give up the hand and take no further part in it. Whatever you have already put in, the boot included, stays in the pot. You can pack on any turn, blind or seen, and it is the only move that never costs anything more.

Show rules

A show ends the hand by turning the last two hands face up. The rules for it are strict:

• Only when exactly two players are left in the hand.
• The player asking pays for it: the stake if blind, twice the stake if seen.
• A seen player cannot ask a blind player for a show. A blind player can ask anyone.
• Both hands are shown and the better hand takes the whole pot.
• On equal hands, the player who asked for the show loses.

A hand can also end without a show: if everyone else packs, the last player in takes the pot and never has to show their cards. And many tables set a pot limit. Ours is 12,800 chips: once the pot reaches it, every remaining hand is shown and the best one wins, with equal best hands splitting the pot.

Side show rules

A side show (also called a compromise) is a private comparison between two players while others are still in the hand. It is the rule most often played wrong, so here it is in full:

• At least three players must still be in the hand. With two left, it is a show instead.
• You must be seen, and you can only ask the player who bet just before you, who must be seen too.
• You pay a seen bet, twice the stake, as you ask.
• The other player may accept or refuse. If they refuse, play simply carries on.
• If they accept, only the two of you see both hands. The lower hand packs; on equal hands the player who asked packs.

A blind player can never take part in a side show, which is one of the hidden advantages of staying blind. Some home tables allow a side show with any seen player rather than the one before you; agree it first.

Teen Patti hand ranking

The hands, best first, with the share of the 22,100 possible three-card hands that are each kind. The Teen Patti sequence chart lists every run in order and more examples of each hand.

Runs rank A-K-Q highest, then A-2-3, then K-Q-J and on down to 4-3-2; runs never wrap round the ace, so K-A-2 is only an ace high. A few home tables put A-2-3 at the bottom instead, so settle that before the first deal.

The high card rule

Almost three hands in four are high card hands, so this rule decides a lot of shows. Compare the highest card of each hand first. If those are equal, compare the second; if those are equal too, the third. The best high card hand is A-K-J in mixed suits (A-K-Q would be a run) and the worst is 5-3-2 (4-3-2 is a run).

Ties and close calls

The same idea settles every other tie: compare the hand first, then the cards that make it, highest first. Equal pairs are decided by the odd card, equal colours card by card, equal runs by their place in the run order. If every rank matches, the hands are equal, whatever the suits.

House rules worth agreeing first

The core rules above are the same everywhere. These details change from table to table:

• The boot, and whether the stake has a limit (ours: boot 50, stake limit 1,600).
• A pot limit, and what happens when it is reached (ours: 12,800, then every hand is shown).
• A blind limit: some tables let a player stay blind for only a set number of turns, often four.
• Whether A-2-3 is the second-highest run or the lowest.
• Which seen players a side show can be asked of.
• Which way round the deal and the betting go.

The Teen Patti variations go further and change which hands win or which cards are wild, as in Muflis, where the lowest hand wins, and AK47, where aces, kings, fours and sevens are jokers. Each one keeps the betting rules on this page.

From rules to play

Knowing the rules is half of it; knowing when to use them is the other half. Our Teen Patti strategy guide covers when to stay blind, when to look and when a side show is worth asking for, with the odds behind each hand.

3 Patti rules: questions people ask