How to play Kings in the Corner

Objective

Be the first player to play every card from your hand onto a shared layout. This page teaches the common version for 2–4 players: seven-card hands, a draw at the start of each turn, and kings that go only in the corners.

Setup

Use a standard 52-card deck without jokers. Deal seven cards each, one at a time. Put the rest face down in the middle as the stock.

Turn four cards face up from the stock, one on each side of it: north, east, south and west. Each starts a pile. If a king turns up, put it in a corner of the layout (between two piles) and turn another card in its place. The four corners otherwise start empty.

The player to the dealer’s left goes first; play passes clockwise. Kings rank highest and aces lowest.

Turns

Start your turn by drawing one card from the stock. Then make as many of these plays as you like, in any order:

• Build: play a card from your hand on the last card of any pile, if it is one rank lower and the opposite colour. A red 6 goes on a black 7; a black queen goes on a red king. Suits do not matter, only colour. An ace goes on a 2, and nothing goes on an ace.
• Kings: put a king from your hand in an empty corner. That corner becomes a pile, and you can build a queen of the opposite colour on it. Nothing outranks a king, so it never goes on top of another card.
• Move a pile: pick up a whole pile and put it on another pile if its first card (the highest) could be played on the other pile’s last card. You cannot move part of a pile.
• Fill an empty side: once a pile has moved, play any card from your hand into the empty north, east, south or west spot to start a new pile there.

A card or pile you have placed stays there for the rest of the game. Your turn ends when you stop playing. A pile that begins with a king cannot move, because nothing outranks it.

Worked turn

The layout shows 7♠ north, 5♥ east, 9♣ south and J♦ west. After drawing, you hold 6♦, 4♠, K♥, Q♠, 10♣, 8♥, 2♥ and 5♦.

You play 6♦ on 7♠, 4♠ on 5♥, 10♣ on J♦ and 8♥ on 9♣. You put K♥ in a corner and build Q♠ on it.

North is now 7♠ and 6♦. Its first card, the black 7, can go on the red 8♥ at the end of the south pile, so you move the whole north pile there. North is empty, and you play 2♥ to start a new pile.

That leaves one card, 5♦. It needs a black 6, and none is showing, so your turn ends with one card in hand.

When the stock is empty

Do not reshuffle. Players simply skip the draw and keep playing.

The sources do not say how to settle a layout where nobody can play and the stock is empty. Agree a convention before the game, such as ending the round and counting cards.

Winning

The first player to play their last card wins the round. For a single round that is the game.

To play several rounds, the winner scores nothing and everyone else adds the cards left in their hand:

Card left in hand	Points
King	10
Any other card	1

Scoring example: one player holds K♠, 5♦ and 9♣: 12 points. Another holds 3♥ and Q♥: 2 points. The winner adds 0, and the other two add 12 and 2.

Agree a target before dealing, such as 25 or 50. When a player reaches it, the player with the lowest total wins. Sources differ on how to end a long game, so this page does not fix one beyond that.

Common mistakes

• Building a red card on a red card, or a black card on a black one.
• Putting a non-king in an empty corner, or a king on top of another card.
• Moving part of a pile instead of the whole pile.
• Drawing after your turn instead of before it, if your group plays with the draw at the start.
• Taking back a card or pile after placing it.

Variants

Some groups draw at the end of the turn, after all plays. Others draw until a playable card appears, play it, then draw once more. Some require you to play whenever you can, while this page lets you stop when you like. Another scoring method counts jacks and queens as 2 points, or awards a point for each corner a player completes.

These change the game; they are not part of the rules above. A commercial edition that uses chips and a pot is a different game and is not described here.

If you want another game about emptying your hand, try Crazy Eights, which uses a single discard pile, or Go Fish, which collects sets by asking other players.

Common questions

How many cards do you deal in Kings in the Corner?

Seven each, for two to four players. The rest of the deck is the stock, and four cards from it start the layout.

Where can you put a king?

In an empty corner. A king can also start a new pile in an emptied side spot, but corners are the usual place. A king never goes on top of another card.

Are aces high or low?

Low. An ace goes on a 2 of the opposite colour, and nothing can be built on an ace.

Can you move part of a pile?

No. You move a whole pile, and only if its first card fits on the last card of another pile.

Do you have to play a card if you can?

Not in this version: you may stop whenever you like. Some groups require it, so agree before the first deal.

When do you draw a card?

At the start of your turn here. Some groups draw at the end of the turn instead; that is a variant, so keep it consistent within a game.