How to Play Skip-Bo: Rules for Beginners

What’s in the box

Skip-Bo® is a family card game sold by Mattel. The deck has 162 cards:

• 144 number cards, twelve each of the numbers 1 to 12.
• 18 wild cards marked “Skip-Bo.” A wild card can stand for any number.

Some decks come with a few blank cards. They are spares; take them out before you start. Suits and colors don’t matter. Only the numbers count.

The goal

Be the first player to play every card in your stock pile. Your stock pile is the stack you are dealt at the start. You can only get rid of those cards one at a time, by playing them onto the shared building piles in the middle of the table.

Setup: how many cards do you deal for Skip-Bo?

1. Pick the dealer. Everyone draws a card. The highest number deals. Wild cards don’t count; draw again. After each game the deal passes to the left.
2. Deal the stock piles. The dealer shuffles and deals each player a face-down stock pile (see the table below).
3. Turn up the top card. Each player turns the top card of their own stock pile face up and leaves it on the pile.
4. Make the draw pile. The rest of the deck goes face down in the middle. Leave space beside it for up to four building piles.

Nobody gets a hand of cards at the deal. You draw five cards when your first turn begins. The player to the dealer’s left goes first.

Short on time? A 10-card stock pile makes a much quicker game. A full 30-card game can easily take half an hour or more.

Work out the deal for your table: how many cards you deal for Skip-Bo.

The four kinds of piles

Stock pile (yours)

Face down, top card face up. Play only the top card, and only onto a building pile. When you play it, turn the next card face up.

Hand (yours)

Up to five cards, kept hidden from the other players.

Discard piles (yours)

Up to four face-up stacks in front of you. Any card, in any order. Only the top card of each can be played.

Building piles (shared)

Up to four piles in the middle that everyone builds on, in order from 1 up to 12.

How a turn works

1. Draw. Take cards from the draw pile until you hold five. On your first turn, draw five.
2. Play. Put cards on the building piles, one at a time, each one number higher than the card below it. A new building pile can only start with a 1 or a wild card. You can play:
   • the face-up top card of your stock pile,
   • any card from your hand,
   • the top card of any of your discard piles.
3. Keep going. Play as many cards as you like. If you play all five cards from your hand, draw five more right away and carry on.
4. Discard to end your turn. When you can’t play, or don’t want to, put one card from your hand onto one of your discard piles. That ends your turn. Play passes to the left.

When a building pile reaches 12, it is finished. Set it aside and the space is free for a new pile that starts with a 1.

A turn always ends with a discard. Even if you could still play, you can stop any time by discarding one card from your hand.

Skip-Bo wild card rules

• A wild card can be played as any number from 1 to 12, wherever a card is needed.
• It can start a building pile (as a 1) or fill a gap in the middle of one.
• A wild card can sit in your hand, on a discard pile, or turn up on your stock pile. From any of those places it plays like any other card.
• Once it is on a building pile, it counts as the number it stood in for. The next card must be one higher.

Skip-Bo discard pile rules

• Each player may have up to four discard piles. You can start a new one any time you discard, until you have four.
• Any card from your hand can go on any of your discard piles, in any order.
• Only the top card of a discard pile can be played, and only onto a building pile.
• You can’t move cards from one discard pile to another.
• Your stock pile card can never go onto a discard pile.
• Only you play from your own discard piles (except in the partners game).

What happens when the draw pile runs out?

Gather up the building piles that were finished at 12 and set aside, shuffle them, and turn them face down as the new draw pile. Play continues as normal.

Winning and how to keep score in Skip-Bo

The first player to play the last card of their stock pile wins the game. You can stop there, or play a longer match with points:

• The winner scores 25 points for winning.
• Plus 5 points for every card left in each opponent’s stock pile.
• The first player to reach 500 points wins the match.

Example: you win, one opponent has 4 cards left and another has 7. You score 25 + 5 × 11 = 80 points. Only the winner of each game scores.

Use our Skip-Bo score sheet: print it, or keep score online and let it do the sums.

Skip-Bo rules for 2 players, 4 players and partners

Two players: the rules are the same, with 30-card stock piles. Two-player games are a duel: watch your opponent’s stock card closely (see the tips below). A turn played out step by step: how to play Skip-Bo with 2 players.

Three or four players: still 30 cards each, each player on their own. Play passes to the left.

Four players in two teams: on your turn you may play from your own stock pile and discard piles and from your partner’s. A team wins when both partners’ stock piles are empty. The instruction sheet doesn’t say where partners sit or whose discard piles you end your turn on; most families seat partners across from each other and discard onto their own piles. Table layout and details: Skip-Bo rules for 4 players and teams.

Five or six players: deal 20 cards each.

How to win at Skip-Bo: tips

1. Play your stock card first. It is the only card that brings you closer to winning. Look for a way to reach it before anything else, even if that means using cards from your hand to build a pile up to it.
2. Save wild cards for your stock card. A wild card is most valuable when it bridges the gap to your stock card. Don’t spend one just to play an extra card from your hand.
3. Build discard piles going down. Put a 9 on a 10, then an 8 on the 9. Later you can play them back up in order, 8, 9, 10, in a single turn.
4. Watch your opponent’s stock card. If their top card is a 7, don’t leave a building pile sitting at 6 for them. Stop at 5 or play on past 7.
5. Empty your hand when you can. If you play all five cards, you draw five fresh ones in the same turn. That is the quickest way to find the card you need.
6. Keep one discard pile free for odd cards you don’t need, so the other piles stay in a neat order.

Try three “best move” puzzles: how to win at Skip-Bo.

Skip-Bo with regular cards

You don’t need the boxed deck. Skip-Bo is based on Spite & Malice, a card game played with two ordinary 52-card decks shuffled together. It plays almost the same way:

• The kings are wild (8 of them in two decks).
• The ace counts as 1, then 2 to 10, jack 11, and queen 12. Building piles go from ace up to queen.
• Each player starts with a 20-card pay-off pile (the same idea as the stock pile) and five cards in hand.
• Suits don’t matter.

Read the full Spite and Malice rules, or play Spite & Malice free online against the computer, with large, easy-to-read cards.

Skip-Bo vs Spite & Malice: what’s different

Skip-Bo is a registered trademark of Mattel, Inc. This site is not affiliated with or endorsed by Mattel.