How to Play Golf Card Game
Standard rules
This walkthrough follows 6-card Golf (Pagat's Hara Kiri layout): a 2×3 grid, two opening flips, and a hole that ends when one player's last card is face-up. That is how Classic works here.
Source: Pagat — Golf
You want the lowest score over nine holes. Each hole is one fresh deal. You draw, swap cards in your grid, and try to cut points before the hole ends.
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Draw
Take the top card from the draw pile or the discard pile.
Swap or discard
Swap a stock draw into your grid, or discard it. A discard-pile draw must be swapped in.
Lowest score wins
After 9 holes, the smallest total wins the round.
What do you need?
For 6-card Golf, Pagat says two, three, or four players use one 52-card deck. With more than four players, add a second pack. With more than eight, add a third pack.
Our free game pits you against one computer opponent with the same six-card grid and nine holes.
How do you set up a hole?
- Deal six cards face-down to each player in a 2×3 grid.
- Turn the top draw-pile card face-up to start the discard pile.
- Each player flips two face-down cards face-up. Those spots stay visible.
What happens on your turn?
Draw the top draw-pile card or the top discard. Then:
- From the draw pile: swap with any grid card, or discard the draw. Your turn ends. You do not flip another card.
- From the discard pile: you must swap with one grid card. You cannot put it back on the discard pile.
Common variant
Some home tables make you flip a face-down card after you discard a stock draw. Pagat lists that under six-card variations. Our Classic game does not use that rule.
Play your first hole, turn by turn
The steps below come from one real hole on our site (seed golf-daily-2026-10-26). We flipped the Queen and Two in the top row, then played six of our turns on this deal. The opponent moved between each of ours.
Turn 1
Drew 7 of hearts. Swapped it onto the face-down card in the top-left slot.
Turn 2
Drew 4 of spades. Swapped it onto the Queen of diamonds in the top middle.
Turn 3
Drew Queen of hearts. It would not beat our face-up cards, so we discarded it from the draw pile.
Turn 4
Drew 4 of hearts. Swapped it onto the face-down card in the bottom-left slot.
Turn 5
Drew Jack of clubs. We discarded it rather than bury a 10-point card in a hidden slot.
Turn 6
Drew 4 of clubs. Swapped it onto the face-down card in the bottom middle slot.
A hole ends when your last face-down card becomes face-up. Then your opponent takes one more turn, both grids score, and you deal the next hole.
How do you score a hole?
Ace = 1, Two = −2, Three through Ten = face value, Jack or Queen = 10, King = 0. Score each column of two cards, then add the three columns.
If two cards of the same rank sit in one column, that column scores 0. Two twos in a column also score 0, not −4.
Full tables and a worked example live in the complete rulebook.
Five beginner mistakes
- Keeping a 7 hoping to pair it while a visible Queen sits in the same column. Pairing helps, but high cards hurt until they match.
- Taking a discard you cannot use. You must swap it in. You cannot put it back.
- Turning your last card too early when your grid still looks worse than your opponent's face-up cards.
- Ignoring what your opponent picks up. The discard pile shows what they want.
- Scoring two twos as −4. A vertical pair zeros the column, even for twos.
Prefer video?
This clip is a quick overview. Knocking to end a hole belongs to 4-card Golf or our separate Knock format. Six-card Classic on this site does not use knock.
Frequently asked questions
Do you knock to end a hole in 6-card Classic on this site?
No. Classic ends when one player turns their last card face-up. Everyone else gets one more turn. The Knock button appears only in the Knock format.
Where can I read every scoring edge case?
See the complete 6-card rulebook at /rules-complete for pair rules, empty draw piles, two-player notes, and variants.