Joker 21

How to play

Joker 21 is blackjack as it’s played in California card rooms, with a joker added to every deck. The aim is the same as in Blackjack: finish closer to 21 than the dealer. But the joker, a special top hand called Natural 22, and a softer rule for busts change how you play.

The shoe holds six decks and six jokers, 318 cards in all. It’s shuffled when a quarter is left.

The joker is wild. It makes any hand 21. A joker with a 2 is 21, and so is a joker on top of a 15. The hand ends there.

A round:

1. Tap chips to build a bet of 10 to 500, then press Deal. You get two cards face up, the dealer gets one up and one down.
2. The dealer checks the hole card, whatever the up card: a joker underneath makes 21 with anything. A dealer two-card 21 ends the round at once, and you lose only your bet.
3. Hit, Stand, Double (first two cards, after a split too), Split (pairs, up to three hands) or Surrender (first two cards, half your bet back).
4. The dealer draws to 17 and hits soft 17.

Hands and payouts

• Natural 22 is the best hand. It beats everything, the dealer’s two-card 21 included. If you both have one, it’s a push.
• Two-card 21 beats a 21 made with three or more cards, the way blackjack does. Two-card 21s push against each other. In split hands a joker still makes 21, but it’s an ordinary 21, paid 1 to 1.
• If the dealer’s up card is a joker, nobody draws: the dealer has at least a two-card 21. Your two-card 21 pushes it and your Natural 22 beats it. With an ace or a second joker underneath, the dealer has a Natural 22, and only your own Natural 22 pushes.

A bust can push

Going over 21 doesn’t lose straight away. Your hand waits for the dealer:

• If the dealer stays at 21 or under, your bust loses.
• If the dealer busts with a higher total than yours, it’s a push and you get your bet back.
• If the dealer busts with the same total or lower, you lose.

So a bust on 22 or 23 is often saved when the dealer busts too. A bust on 26 never is: the dealer can’t go past 26.

Strategy

The Hint button suggests the best play for this table: same solver as the other blackjack games, with jokers in the deck and the bust rule counted. It plays quite differently from regular blackjack:

Hit your 12s and 13s. Every card is now a chance at a joker, and a bust isn’t always a loss. The hint hits 12 and 13 against every dealer card, where blackjack strategy stands against a weak dealer. A 14 stands only against a dealer 3 to 6.

Surrender almost never. With a 16 against a 9, 10 or ace, the hint hits instead of giving up half the bet. The only surrender it suggests is hard 17 against an ace.

Split more pairs. Split 8s against everything, ace included. Split 9s against a 7 and against an ace, and 2s, 3s and 7s against an 8 as well.

Don’t double 11 against an ace. The hint hits it instead. Against every other dealer card, 11 doubles as usual.

Ace-ace is never a pair here. Two aces are a Natural 22, paid 2 to 1 on the spot.

The odds

With the hint’s play in 4 million simulated hands, the house edge was 0.53% (±0.06%) of the bet.

The payouts were set by measurement. With a two-card 21 paying 3 to 2, as blackjack does, the player came out 3.2% ahead: with a joker in every deck, two-card 21s come far more often than in blackjack. At 6 to 5 the player was still 0.7% ahead, so here a two-card 21 pays even money.

How this differs from a California card room

California card rooms can’t bank games themselves, so the bank passes between players (the “player/dealer”), and every player pays a fixed collection fee per hand. Here the house is the dealer and there’s no fee. Rule sheets also differ between rooms: some count only joker-joker or ace-joker as the top hand, some pay two-card 21s 6 to 5, and some “no bust” tables let a busted hand push more often. This table uses one consistent set taken from those rule sheets.

If you enjoy Joker 21, try Joker Deuces Stud or Joker Poker next.