Phase 10 Rules — How to Play and Keep Score

Overview

Phase 10 is a commercial contract rummy in which each round asks for one specific combination of cards. Complete the current phase and you move on to the next; fail and you attempt the same one again next round. Two things need recording per player per round: which phase they are on, and the penalty points for whatever they were caught holding. The rounds template covers the numbers, with a phase marker alongside the running total.

Setup

Two to six players and the game's own 110-card deck: number cards from 1 to 12 in four colours, two of each number in each colour, plus four Skip cards and eight Wild cards. Deal ten cards to each player, place the rest face down as the draw pile and turn one card up to start the discard pile. Everyone begins on phase 1.

The standard phases

1. Two sets of three
2. One set of three and one run of four
3. One set of four and one run of four
4. One run of seven
5. One run of eight
6. One run of nine
7. Two sets of four
8. Seven cards of one colour
9. One set of five and one set of two
10. One set of five and one set of three

A set is cards of matching number in any colour. A run is consecutive numbers in any colours. A Wild card stands in for anything; a Skip card can never be part of a phase.

How to play

On your turn draw one card from the draw pile or the discard pile, then discard one. Once you hold the exact combination your current phase asks for, you may lay it down on your turn. After laying down your phase you may add spare cards to any phase already on the table, yours or anyone else's. The round ends when a player gets rid of every card in their hand.

Scoring

Only cards still held count. Cards already laid down are worth nothing.

• Number cards 1 to 9: 5 points each
• Number cards 10 to 12: 10 points each
• Skip cards: 15 points each
• Wild cards: 25 points each

The player who went out scores 0 for that round. Everybody else records the sum of what they were holding. Alongside the number, mark whether each player laid their phase down before the round ended: those who did move on to the next phase, and those who did not stay where they are and try again.

Note that failing a phase does not add any extra penalty of its own beyond the cards in your hand. The cost of failing is the round you lose.

Ending the game

The game ends the moment a player completes the final phase, and that player wins outright regardless of penalty points. If two or more players complete the final phase in the same round, the tie is broken by the lowest penalty total. If that is also level, those players play one further round on phase 10 alone. Under the alternative end condition the game runs until every player has completed the last phase, and the lowest total wins.

Common variations

Some groups let anyone who fails a phase move on anyway, which removes the frustration of being stuck on phase 6 for five rounds. Others allow a Skip card to be discarded but not stockpiled, or forbid a hand containing more than two Wild cards from being laid down.