Pontoon Card Game Rules: How to Play Pontoon vs Blackjack

If you typed "pontoon" into a search box, check which game you meant before reading any rules. The two games look alike on the surface, since both chase 21 against a dealer. They differ in the deck, in what a tie does and in which hands win automatically. You will also see "pontoon" used as nothing more than another name for blackjack, which adds to the confusion.

Here is how the two compare, using only what we could document.

These Pontoon rules follow the approved rules for The Star Sydney, issued through the NSW Independent Casino Commission. Where the Victorian and Canberra documents differ, the last part of this section says so.

The deck and the card values#

The pontoon card game starts with its unusual deck. Each deck has 48 cards, because the four tens are taken out. Jacks, queens and kings stay in and count ten. Cards from 2 to 9 count their face value. An ace counts 11 unless that would push the hand over 21, and then it counts 1. In a doubled hand the ace always counts 1. The Star document allows six or eight decks.

Only the jack, queen and king count ten. The documents do not say why the tens are removed, and we do not guess.

The deal: the dealer starts with one card#

The dealer gives each player one card and takes one card, then gives each player a second card. The dealer holds a single card at this point. The second dealer card comes later, after every player has acted. That is why a dealer pontoon can turn up after you have already doubled.

When several people bet on one playing area, one of them is the controlling player and calls the decisions for that area. At a one-player spot, that is simply you.

Pontoon and 21 are paid at once#

A pontoon is an ace and a ten-value card as your first two cards. The dealer pays it 3 to 2 straight away, before anyone draws, and the dealer's hand is irrelevant. A pair of split aces or tens cannot make a pontoon.

Any other 21 is also paid at once, and "regardless of the point total of the dealer", in the document's words. You cannot draw on a 21. An ordinary 21 pays 1 to 1. Certain 21s and certain three-card hands pay more, and the bonus section below lists them.

The dealer's play#

After the players finish, the dealer draws until reaching a hard 17 or better, or a soft 18 or better. So the dealer hits a soft 17. If every decision on the table is already made and another dealer card could change nothing, no more cards are drawn.

How hands are settled#

When the dealer has a pontoon, a doubled or split hand loses only the original wager, and the extra stake is a stand off.

Where Star, Crown and Canberra differ#

Crown also has a 6 to 5 Pontoon version, where the pontoon pays 6 to 5 instead of 3 to 2. Where documents differ, the rules printed at the table decide.

Here is how to play Pontoon under the Star rules. Every example uses a bet of 10.

1. Place your bet before any card is dealt.
2. You get two cards. The dealer shows one.
3. If you hold a pontoon, it is paid at once and your round is over.
4. If the dealer's first card is an ace, you may place an insurance wager of up to half your bet. It pays 2 to 1 if the dealer's second card is worth ten.
5. If the dealer's first card is a jack, queen, king or ace, you may surrender half your bet.
6. The dealer announces your total. You stand, take an additional card, double or split.
7. The dealer takes the second card and plays by the fixed rule.
8. Hands are settled against the dealer.

Worked hand: a pontoon#

You hold the ace of spades and the king of hearts, and the dealer shows a six. That is a pontoon. The dealer pays 15 at once and takes your cards away.

Worked hand: a 21 that pays at once#

You hold the nine of diamonds and the five of clubs, 14, against a dealer eight. You take an additional card and it is the seven of hearts. Nine, five and seven make 21, which is not a bonus combination. The dealer pays 10 immediately, 1 to 1.

Worked hand: double and rescue#

You hold the six of diamonds and the five of clubs, 11, against a dealer nine. You double, putting a second bet of 10 beside the first, and you receive exactly one card: the four of spades. Your total is 15, and you have not busted, so you may rescue the hand. Rescuing means forfeiting your original 10 and keeping the doubled 10. You lose 10 instead of risking 20 on a 15 against a nine.

If you decline, the hand plays out and a win pays 1 to 1, with no bonus.

Worked hand: a dealer pontoon after a double#

Take the same double again, but this time the dealer's first card is an ace. Insurance and surrender come first, and you ignore both. You double your 11 and draw a nine, for 20. The dealer's second card is a king. That is a pontoon. A dealer pontoon beats a hand of 20 or less, so you lose the original 10. The doubled 10 is a stand off and comes back to you.

Had you placed 5 on insurance, it would pay 10 and cancel the 10 lost on the main hand.

Worked hand: surrender#

You hold the ten of hearts and the six of clubs, a hard 16, and the dealer's first card is a king. You surrender, giving up half your bet, 5, and keeping the other 5. There is a catch, and it is written into the rules. If the dealer's second card makes a pontoon, the surrender is void and you lose the full 10. If the dealer does not make a pontoon, the dealer simply collects the surrendered half.

Worked hand: a split#

You hold two eights against a dealer seven. Splitting needs a second bet equal to the first, and each eight becomes its own hand. The dealer finishes the first hand before dealing to the second. Say the first eight gets a three for 11. Doubling after a split is allowed, so you may double it.

Cards only need to be identical in value to split, so a king and a queen qualify as a pair. A pair of aces is a special case: each ace gets one card and only one. If that card is a king, the hand is 21, but it counts as an ordinary 21 and not a pontoon.

The Star document prints a payout table that puts bonus odds on long hands and some three-card hands. None of these bonus odds applies to a doubled hand.

On a bet of 10, the two, three, four, five and seven make a five-card 21 and pay 15. The six of hearts, seven of clubs and eight of diamonds also pay 15. The six, seven and eight of spades pay 30. The documents pay the five-card bonus only on a 21. They describe no automatic win for five cards of a lower total.

The Super Bonus#

There is also a fixed cash Super Bonus for three sevens of one suit when the dealer's first card is any seven. It is a prize set by bet size, not an odds payout. The Star document states that it does not apply where hands have been split or doubled.

What the documents do not say#

The documents do not say whether the ordinary bonus hands in the table pay on split hands. The Star text rules out the Super Bonus on split hands and is silent on the rest, so we treat that as open. The rules also do not describe a dealer total of exactly 22 as a special result. They say a dealer total over 21 pays every hand of 20 or less, and nothing more. Nor do they offer a redouble, nor describe an automatic five-card win.

Australian Pontoon is closest to Spanish 21, which is also dealt from 48-card decks. Against regular blackjack, these are the differences that change how a round feels.

• The deck. Regular blackjack uses 52-card decks. Australian Pontoon removes the four tens of each deck, so only jacks, queens and kings count ten.
• The dealer's cards. The dealer starts with one card and takes the second after the players act. There is no hole card to check against.
• A 21 always wins. A player 21 is paid at once and cannot lose to a dealer 21. In blackjack, a 21 can push or lose depending on the dealer.
• The natural is a pontoon. It pays 3 to 2, at once, and a split ace or ten never makes one.
• Doubling is wide open. You may double on your first two cards, on a split pair's first two cards or on a hand of three or more cards that totals less than 21. You always get one card. An ace in a doubled hand counts as one, not eleven.
• Rescue. After a double you may forfeit the original bet and keep the doubled stake, provided you have not busted.
• Surrender. Half your bet, offered when the dealer's first card is a jack, queen, king or ace, and void if the dealer makes a pontoon.

Which costs a player less? We cannot say, and this page does not guess. The rules give to the player in some places and take back in others, and a house edge needs every rule fixed and every hand computed. See the section on why no edge is shown. For a blackjack game with its own rules, compare European Blackjack or Free Bet Blackjack.

British Pontoon is the traditional game. We have found no regulator document and no casino rules sheet for it. The only material is one casino-published guide. So everything in this section is a description, not a verified rule set, and you should treat it that way.

What that guide says:

• Hit and stand are called twist and stick.
• A player cannot stick on a total under 15.
• A hand of five cards that does not go over 21 wins automatically. This is the five-card trick.
• When the player and dealer tie, the dealer wins.
• Pontoons and five-card tricks are paid double.
• The dealer hits a soft 17 and any hard 16 or less.
• The game uses 4 to 8 decks.

That is all we state. You may see a "buy" mentioned for the traditional game. We hold no document that explains it, so we say nothing about how it works. We also show no house edge for this game, for the reason below.

If you only know one of these games, expect the other to surprise you: a tie loses in one and is a stand off in the other.

The Australian documents use a small vocabulary. These are the words as they use them, with the full list in the glossary.

• Pontoon: an ace and a card worth ten, as the first two cards. A split hand that makes an ace and a ten does not count.
• Point total: the number a hand adds up to, compared with the dealer's.
• Hard total and soft total: a hard total has no ace counted as 11. A soft total has one.
• Stand off: a tie. Nobody wins, nobody loses.
• Controlling player: the player who calls the decisions for a playing area that several people share.
• Interim settlement and final settlement: pay-outs made before the dealer finishes, and the settling of hands against the dealer's finished hand.
• Double, split, surrender, insurance: as explained above.

Most game pages on this site print a computed house edge. This one does not, for two reasons.

For Australian Pontoon, the rules are sourced but not all of them. The bonuses on split hands are unconfirmed. A dealer 22, a redouble, the five-card win and even money are all silent in the documents. A figure built on a guess about any of these could be wrong without anyone noticing.

For British Pontoon, there are no documents at all, only a guide that is not a rules sheet. Any number would be invented.

So we print none, and we do not borrow figures from other sites. If a document settles the open points, a figure can be added.

You can play Pontoon here with play money. The table below deals the Australian rules from this page: eight 48-card decks, a dealer who hits soft 17, a pontoon paying 3 to 2, and the bonus hands. The Star document allows six or eight decks, and eight is the count we chose. Nothing is wagered and nothing can be won.

A few rounds of this pontoon card game show how a 21 ends a hand at once and how rescue feels after a double. Real-money Pontoon is licensed where it is allowed, which varies by place. We name no venues and no operators. If you want to know what is offered near you, ask your local gaming regulator. If play ever stops being fun, the responsible play page lists where to find help.

The Australian rules come from three sets of published rules: the NSW Independent Casino Commission's approval of the Pontoon rules for The Star Sydney, the approved rules for Crown Melbourne from the Victorian Gambling and Casino Control Commission, and the Casino Control (Pontoon) Approval from the Australian Capital Territory for Casino Canberra. The British description comes from one casino-published guide, and it is labelled as such. The methodology page explains how we read sources, and the sources page lists them all.