Bid Whist is a classic four-player partnership game using one standard deck of 52 cards plus 2 jokers, big and little.

The aim of the game is to be the first partnership to reach the win target of 7, or force the opponents to drop to -7.

At the end of each round, the winning bidders score either 1 point for every book they won over six if they met or bettered their contract, or lose their bid size in points if they failed to make their contract. The game is won when the first team reaches the win target of 7, or forces the opponents to drop to or below -7.

The dealer is initially chosen at random, and then moves clockwise round the table for subsequent rounds.

12 cards are dealt to each player, and the remaining cards make up the kitty.

Before each hand begins, every player can bid how many books their partnership will win above 6, between the minimum bid and 7, or pass. During the bid, you must say whether you want the card ranking to be uptown, downtown, or to make a no trump bid.

A bid must be higher than the current winning bid. A no trump bid will beat an uptown or downtown bid of the same score. If Downtown beats uptown is on, downtown bids beat uptown bids in the auction.

If you are last to bid and the other players have all passed, you must make a bid.

After the bidding, the winning bidder gets to choose the trump suit or the card ranking direction.

Jokers have no value in a no trump bid.

The winning bidder takes the kitty into their hand and decides which cards to discard. The kitty size and whether the kitty is sported, turned face up for the players to see before being collected, are determined in Settings.

The winning bidder then discards the number of cards that were in the kitty.

A book is awarded to the winning bidding team for taking the kitty.

Whoever is left of the dealer leads a card to start. Each player must play one card in clockwise order, following suit where they can.

The winner of each book is the player who plays the highest card matching the suit of the first player to play, unless a trump card is played, in which case the highest trump will win the book.

If you cannot follow suit you may play any other card from your hand.

At the end of each hand, the books the winning bidding team collects are totalled and compared to the bid.

1 point is awarded for every book the winning team bid if they meet or better their contract. The number of bid points are deducted from their score if they fail to make their contract.

A no trump bid is awarded double points for success or failure. This can be turned off in Settings.

Winning all 13 books is called a Boston. If the Boston bonus is on, the scores for the round are quadrupled. This can be turned off in Settings.

The game ends when one team reaches the win target of 7 or higher, or forces the opposition team to fall to -7 or lower.

Choose from the following settings (defaults shown in italics):

Sound — On, off.

Speed — Normal, fast.

Orientation — Portrait, landscape left, landscape right or landscape free.

Hand display — One Row, two rows.

Card sort order — Ascending, descending.

Single click play — Off, on.

Auto play — Last trick, when only one card or off. Automatically plays your cards on the last trick, or whenever you have only one legal move.

Claim tricks — On, off. Allows you to claim the remaining tricks when all of your remaining cards are guaranteed winners.

Show starting hands — From Review, never or always. Shows the starting hands of all players at the end of each round.

AI level — Easy, medium or hard.

Number of jokers — 2, 1 or 0. The big and little jokers are in play when set to 2, only the big joker when 1, and no jokers are in play when 0. The kitty size is four plus the number of jokers in the game.

Sport kitty — 'always', 'when a trump is nominated' or 'never'. This setting determines when the kitty is turned up to show the other players.

Win target — 7 or 14.

No trump bonus — on or off. Determines whether points are doubled for a no trump bid.

Boston bonus — on or off. Determines whether points are quadrupled if a team wins all 13 books.

End hand when set — Off or on. Immediately ends the round if the winning bid cannot be made.

Minimum bid — 3 or 4. The minimum bid a player can make to open the bidding.

Downtown beats uptown — Off or on. Downtown bids beat uptown bids in the auction.

Replays — On, off. This setting determines whether a replay is available to the player at the end of the round.

Cards — Classic, coppercod or modern.

Deck — Choose from 32 different deck designs.

Mobile cards — Off or on. Mobile cards are thinner with larger numbers.

Four color suits — On or off. Uses four colors for card suits for improved readability.

Theme —  Blue, green, merlot, dark red, light blue, black, purple, teal, pink, orange, dark blue, dark green, charcoal, tobacco, stone, indigo, olive or celeste.

Home screen

From the home screen you can access the following options:

• Start new game
• Continue game — if there is a game in progress it can be continued
• Settings (gear icon, bottom left). Once open you can close it by tapping close or tapping > at the top right.
• Information (question mark icon, bottom right). Once open you can close it by tapping close or tapping > at the top right.
• Stats (trophy icon, top left)
• Sound — Tap the speaker icon at the top right of the home screen to toggle between sound on and off

Your cards are displayed face up at the bottom of the screen, your partner's cards are face down at the top of the screen, and your opponents’ cards are face down at the left and right. Your cards are ordered first by suit, then low to high from left to right. Your partner's and opponents’ cards are ordered at random. The kitty is face down in the middle of the screen.

During play, each partnership's score for the game is shown in front of their hand. A green light is displayed next to your score to display when it is your turn to act. A bid panel is shown each round when it is your turn to bid.

When it is your turn to act, tap on a card from your hand that you want to select, and then tap it again to play the card, or tap it just once if the single click play setting is turned on. You can change which cards are selected before playing by tapping on other cards.

At the end of the hand the scores each partnership receives are displayed, as well as the total score for each partnership for the game.

Thank you for playing Bid Whist!