Pick four cards and a starter. You will get the count and, more usefully, the working — every fifteen, every pair, every run listed on its own line, so you can see exactly where a hand's points come from and which one you missed.
Choose a card below to fill the highlighted slot.
This is the real thing, not a simplified copy. The scoring here is held to the same engine that referees live games on Cribbage Den by an automated test that compares the two across thousands of hands plus every awkward shape — the 29, four of a kind, double-double runs, and the crib's stricter flush rule. If they ever disagreed, our build would fail. So whatever this page tells you a hand counts is what the table would give you.
The calculator lists each scoring combination separately rather than handing you a single number, because the number is not the part that teaches you anything. Almost every point a beginner drops falls into one of these lines.
Every distinct group of cards adding to fifteen scores 2 — and groups of three and four cards count exactly the same as pairs of cards. This is where most missed points hide. A hand of 5 5 5 J is famously worth 8 in fifteens alone: the Jack makes fifteen with each of the three 5s (three ways), and the three 5s make fifteen together (one way). Court cards are all worth ten, so a King, a Queen and a Jack are interchangeable for this purpose; an Ace is one, never eleven.
Two points per pair, which is not the same as two points per matching rank. Three of a kind contains three different pairs, so it is 6, not 4 — the old name for it is a pair royal. Four of a kind contains six pairs and is worth 12, which surprises people the first time they see it. Rank has to match exactly: a Ten and a Jack are both worth ten in the count, but they are not a pair.
Three or more consecutive ranks score one point per card. Only the longest run counts — a run of four does not also contain two runs of three — but it counts once for each distinct set of cards that makes it. So a hand holding 3 4 4 5 has two separate runs of three (using either 4) and scores 6, the "double run". Suits are irrelevant to runs, and the cards do not have to be in order in your hand. Ace is always low: Q-K-A is not a run.
All four cards in your hand the same suit scores 4, and 5 if the starter matches as well. The crib is stricter: it scores nothing for four and only counts a full five-card flush. That asymmetry is a real rule and not a house variation, and it is why the calculator has a "score as the crib" switch — the same five cards can be worth four points fewer in the crib.
A Jack in your hand whose suit matches the starter is worth 1, and it is the single most-forgotten point in cribbage. It is not the same thing as his heels (or nibs), which is 2 to the dealer for cutting a Jack as the starter — that is pegged at the cut and is not part of anybody's hand.
The starter counts as part of every hand. It belongs to all players at once, and to the crib. If you are counting four cards and stopping, that is the bug — you are counting the wrong hand. Try any hand above with and without the starter and watch the number move.
A surprising number of five-card combinations score exactly zero, and it is worth seeing one. Try A♣ 2♦ 6♥ K♠ with a Q♣ starter. No two cards make fifteen (the two court cards are 20 together, and nothing pairs with them to reach it), no ranks repeat, the only near-run is broken, the suits are scattered, and there is no Jack. Nineteen is the traditional joke name for a hand like this — nineteen being a score that cannot actually occur — which we get into properly in the 29 hand and other oddities.
Counting speed comes from recognising shapes, not from arithmetic. A useful drill: press Deal me a hand, count it yourself out loud before you look, then check. Do that twenty times and you will notice you are wrong in the same three places every time — nearly always a three-card fifteen, the second half of a double run, or nobs. Those are the ones worth drilling.
The traditional counting order helps too, and it is the order the breakdown uses: fifteens first, then pairs, then runs, then flush, then nobs. Saying it the same way every time is what stops you losing your place — "fifteen two, fifteen four, and a pair for six" — and it is how the count is called at a club table.
Want to practise against a real opponent? Play free against the computer — it counts every hand for you, so you can check yourself as you go.
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