If unable to follow suit, they can play any card. The other players must follow suit if possible, meaning they must play a card of the same suit.

The game proceeds in a series of tricks, with the player to the left of the dealer leading the first trick by playing any card from their hand. The non-trump suits are ranked in descending order, with Aces being the highest and twos being the lowest. The trump suit outranks all other suits, and the cards within that suit follow the standard rank order. Whist is a trump-based game, meaning that certain cards have higher ranks depending on the declared trump suit. Once all the cards have been dealt, the next card is turned face up to determine the trump suit for the game. The dealer distributes the cards clockwise, one at a time, starting with the player to their left. To begin, the deck is shuffled, and each player is dealt 13 cards. The objective of the game is to be the first partnership to reach a predetermined number of points, often set at 5, 7, or 9.

Whist is typically played with a standard deck of 52 playing cards and involves four players divided into two partnerships.

2 player whist rules