A draw or 'push' as it is normally called is when the player and dealer both have the same total. Hard vs Soft Hands. The concept of a hard and soft hand is relatively simple. An ace can have a value of either 1 or 11 depending on which is more preferential. Blackjack hands can be soft or hard, though some hands aren't classed as either. When it comes to playing blackjack, soft hands are less of a risk. This is because you can hit, or have an extra card dealt to you, without going over 21.
One of the most confusing aspects blackjack novices tend to struggle with is the quirky lingo at the tables. Inexperienced players often get perplexed when they hear others talking about 'breaking hands', 'bust cards', 'five-card Charlies', 'soft hands', 'stiffies', and such. And indeed, many players who are just wading into the vast universe of 21 struggle to understand the difference between soft hands and hard hands (i.e. the above-mentioned 'stiffies').
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A soft total is one in which you can count the ace as 1 or 11 without busting. A hard total is a hand with no ace, or a hand with an ace that has to be counted as 1 to avoid busting. You can find plenty of sites which offer strategy charts you can memorize. These are great for visual learners. Blackjack Rule 1 – Player vs. Dealer: Each player at the blackjack table is matched against the dealer. You don't compete against other blackjack players. The player goes first, meaning you can bust first, which provides the house edge. Blackjack Rule 2 – Closest to 21 Wins: The hand which is closest to 21 without going over wins.
You will encounter these two terms across a vast range of books and strategy articles but reading all the blackjack literature in the world amounts to nothing if you fail to make a proper distinction between the two main types of hands in this beautiful game of probabilities.
The thing is optimal playing decisions vary vastly for soft and hard hands even if their total is identical. In the following article, we shall be looking at the key differences between soft and hard hands in blackjack, explain which of the two are more valuable to players, and expound the logic behind several important playing decisions.
Soft Hands vs. Hard Hands – What's the Difference?
So what is the distinction between soft and hard hands? Hard hands in blackjack either do not contain an Ace or when they do, the Ace is assigned a value of 1 and cannot be counted as 11. An example of an Aceless hard hand is K-6 which makes for a hard total of 16. A hand like A-4-10-3 with a total of 18 is also hard despite the presence of the Ace because here, it counts as 1. Otherwise, the player would exceed 21 and lose the round.
In contrast, soft hands are those that contain an Ace that counts as 1 or 11 depending on the player's preferences. While at the blackjack table, you will face multiple situations where you start with a soft hand which transforms into a hard one after you take one or more hits. Suppose, for instance, you start with a two-card hand consisting of A-2 whose total is either 3 or 13, it is up to you to decide.
You follow basic strategy and hit your soft 13 but draw a Jack. Your hand is now hard 13 and the Ace is counted as 1 because otherwise, you will bust. Basic strategy tells you to take another hit and you end up drawing a second Ace which also counts as 1 for a total of hard 14. You hit again, draw a 3, and what started as a soft 13 is now A-2-J-A-3 for a hard total of 17. Here are a few more examples of soft hands turning into stiffs after one or more hits:
- A-3-8 equals hard 12
- A-5-6 is again hard 12
- A-4-K-A-3 is a hard 19
Soft Hands vs. Hard Hands Additional TipsIt is worth noting that A-A also counts as a soft hand whose value can be either 2 or 12. However, soft 12 is a special case and as such, is not treated like the other soft totals. The only right decision you can make in this scenario is to split the pair of Aces, in which case you normally get only one extra card per Ace.
It is of utmost importance for a blackjack player to be able to make a distinction between soft and hard totals because the optimal playing decisions for the two types of hands are often different, regardless of the fact the two hands may have the same sum total. For instance, you will approach A-6 differently than 8-9 or Q-7, right? Indeed you will, provided that you stick to basic strategy, which is something all blackjack players, professional or not, should do.
Which Hand Type is Better?
It makes sense that soft hands are good for the players because they give them more flexibility, enabling them to change the total of their cards back and forth until they obtain a strong enough hand against the dealer's upcard. These valuable hands give you a chance to improve your total without risking a bust on the very next hit.
In fact, it is impossible for a player to bust with a soft hand by drawing a third card from the shoe or deck as becomes obvious from the following example. You start the round with A-3 but count the Ace as 11 because a value of 1 will be no good in this case. No third card can bust you because you can easily revert the value of your Ace back to 1 if you catch anything higher than a 7, in which case, your soft hand will turn into a hard one and you continue playing in accordance with basic strategy.
Suppose you hit and pull a 7 indeed – this gives you the highest possible total of 21, which is unbeatable. Here you can only lose if the dealer has a blackjack. In the worst-case scenario, the two of you will push.
What if your third card is something else, though? If you catch a 5, for example, your A-4 becomes A-4-5 for a soft 20. This hand remains susceptible to hitting as the Ace can still be counted as 1 or 11 but you refrain from further hits. You are already in the safe zone with a total of 20 and there is no point in risking ruining your hand by drawing more cards. Do not forget the average winning total in the game of blackjack is 18.5!
Soft hands are better than hard ones for yet another reason. They give you the opportunity to execute some very useful doubling down decisions and increase your betting action during a round, particularly when your dealer is in a disadvantageous position with upcards 3 through 6. This enables you to increase your value by playing more aggressively when the dealer is weak.
The H17 Rule for Dealers
Let us not forget dealers can also end up with soft totals. Casinos have found a way to exploit these advantageous hands by tweaking the dealer's drawing and standing rules for one specific soft total. Sooner or later, blackjack players are bound to come across tables where the H17 rule applies, which means the dealer is required to draw more cards with a holding of soft 17.
This is generally considered bad for the player because it gives the dealer a chance to improve their soft 17 to a higher total, which, in turn, increases the house edge by 0.22% even if all other rules remain unchanged.
Another key thing to consider before taking a seat at the H17 table are the differences in the correct plays for certain hands. In one such game, you should always double on hard totals of 11 against all possible dealer upcards, including the Ace, which is not the case when you play S17 blackjack where you hit your 11 against an Ace.
The same goes for some soft doubling decisions, particularly the soft 18 (A-7) and soft 19 (A-8). You should double on soft 18 when playing against an H17 dealer with small upcards 2 through 6. Soft 19 calls for doubling in H17 games only when the dealer is at their most vulnerable with a 6. Without these strategy adjustments, you will fail to reduce the house edge.
The Frequency of Occurrence of Hard and Soft Hands
Gambling expert Henry Tamburin tells us there are 34 hands you can receive at the start of a betting round. As many as 14 of those will be hard totals (5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, and 19). Respectively, 8 of those will be soft totals A-2, A-3, A-4, A-5, A-6, A-7, A-8, and A-9 and the remaining 10 hands will consist of paired cards (A-A, 2-2, 3-3, 4-4, 5-5, 6-6, 7-7, 8-8, 9-9, and 10-10). We treat blackjacks consisting of an Ace and ten-value cards as special cases since the Aces in them always count as 11.
But what is the frequency of occurrence of those hands after a reshuffle? Since ten-value cards outnumber all other card denominations, it is only natural for paired tens, Kings, Queens, and Jacks to occur the most frequently. These appear a little over 9% of the time and are followed by stiff hands 12 through 16. The reason why hard hands have such high occurrence frequency is similar – there are more card denominations that can combine to form these stiff totals.
Next in line are naturals. They also have a relatively high frequency of occurrence (4.7%) because of the large number of cards that give you this combination. Paired cards (with the exception of paired ten-value cards) and soft hands tend to occur the least frequently, under 1% and 1.1%, respectively.
The Frequency of Occurrence of Hard and Soft Hands Additional TipsWhat about the advantage each of these hands can give the players? Not surprisingly, the most advantageous hand is the blackjack itself, followed by paired ten-value cards and soft 20 (these yield around 60% advantage), with hard 19 and 11 in tow (with an advantage of around 23%). Hard hands 12 through 17 are last in line since they hold you at a massive disadvantage that ranges between 30% and 40%. These are considered breaking hands because the player can easily bust with them on the next hit.
The starting hands that hold you at the biggest disadvantage logically yield the biggest loss rates in the long run. So it turns out the biggest 'losers' in blackjack are hard 12 through hard 16, small hard totals 5 through 7, pairs of 2s through 8s, and soft totals 13 through 17.
Despite the assumptions of some less experienced players, pat 17 and pat 18 are not very good hands in blackjack, the reason being the average winning total in the game is 18.5. It follows that blackjack's biggest moneymakers are the starting hands with the highest occurrence frequency and the biggest win rates, namely the naturals, the pairs of ten-value cards, 11, hard 19, soft 19 and soft 20.
The Reasoning Behind Some Soft Doubling Decisions
You are probably wondering why soft hands are considered so important when they rank among the most frequently losing hands in the game. This is a very good question to ask, indeed. Moreover, why would you double on them when most soft totals have low win rates? Another good question. Let's consider several soft doubling moves to try and provide an answer.
Suppose you are dealt a soft 13 against a dealer exposing a 4 and intend to double on it. There are 5 cards out of 13 denominations that can help you improve your total to at least 17 or higher. These are the 4, the 5, the 6, the 7, and the 8. The remaining 8 cards out of the 13 denominations will convert your soft 13 into bad hard totals.
Therefore, the odds of improving the hand are not in your favor since there are 8 cards that leave you with a hard total as opposed to 5 cards that help you. The same goes for soft 16 where you are again facing odds of 8 to 5 against you, with 5 helpful cards (2 through 5 plus the Ace) and 8 cards that transform your soft hand into a stiff.
Things are a bit different when your starting hand is soft 18 where there are 8 cards that can help you get into the safe zone against the dealer's weak card, namely the Ace, the 2, the 3, the 9, the 10, and the three face cards). The odds of 5 to 8 are in your favor this time around.
With soft doubling decisions, there are several things you need to take into consideration. The 5 and the 6 are the worst for the dealer which is why you should always double against those with soft 13 through soft 18.
Soft Doubling Decisions Additional TipsCards with pip value 3 and 4 are also bad for the dealer but not as bad as the 5 and the 6. Finally, we have the dealer's 2 which is not as weak and does not call for doubling on any totals but 10 and 11 in S17 games and soft 18 in H17 games.
You may have noticed basic strategy recommends you to double on soft 16 against a dealer 4 but tells you to hit a soft 13 instead of doubling despite the fact that in both cases, you are facing the same odds (8 to 5) against the same dealer upcard. Why is that?
It depends on the number of hit cards that would leave you wishing you can draw again. When you double on soft 16, the only card that would leave you wanting to take another hit is the Ace. In the case of soft 13, you are facing four hit cards that would cause you to want to hit again, the 2, the 3, the 4, and the Ace but you will not be allowed to draw because you receive only one additional card after you double down. In conclusion, the lower the value of the soft total, the bigger your disadvantage when you restrict yourself to a single hit.
So you want to learn how to count cards in blackjack?
I've put together a blog post explaining in 7 steps how to become a card counter.
The first thing to understand is that learning how to count cards in blackjack is easier than you think. You don't have to memorize which cards have been played. (If you've seen Rain Man, you might think that's the point. But it's not.)
Blackjack is one of the only games in the casino where a smart player can win consistently. Counting cards is the way most people are able to beat the casino consistently.
Here's how you can get started.
1- Learn how to play blackjack first.
This might seem obvious, but it's not. Before learning how to count cards in blackjack, you need to be an expert in the basics of how to play. This means understanding all the options you have when playing your hand.
It's not enough to just know how to hit or stand.
The players and the dealer each get 2 cards to start. The players play their hands first. Also, one of the dealer's cards is face-up.
You're playing against the dealer, not the other players. It doesn't matter what the other players' totals are.
The cards are worth between 1 and 11 points each. The aces are worth 1 or 11, depending on what's better for you. The face cards are all worth 10 points each. All the other cards are worth their face value.
You score your hand based on its total. If you get a hard total of 22 or higher, you bust–automatically losing.
Based on your total and the dealer face-up card, you can decide whether to take more cards or not.
If your final total is higher than the dealer's (without going over 21), you win. You also win if the dealer busts.
The dealer must play her hand in a prescribed way. She doesn't get to make choices based on your situation. Usually this means she must hit any hard total of 16 or less, and stand on any hard total of 17 or more. The rules for soft 17 vary by casino.
Since the dealer plays last, you have an opportunity to bust before the dealer has to play her hand. This is a big part of how the casino gets its mathematical edge over the player.
Besides hitting (taking an additional card) and standing (not taking an additional card), you have the following options when playing a blackjack hand:
- Splitting – If you have 2 cards of the same value, you can put up another bet and start 2 new hands. Each of the new hands uses one card from your existing hand as its first card. The dealer gives you another card for each hand. You play both hands independently.
- Doubling down – This is when you opt to double the size of your bet and take exactly one additional card. For example, if you have a total of 11, it's common to double down. You're hoping to catch a 10 and wind up with a total of 21.
- Taking insurance – This is a side bet that the dealer will have a blackjack. You only get this option when the dealer's face-up card is an ace. It's an even-money bet. Unless you're counting cards, this is always the wrong play.
- Surrendering – If you hate your first 2 cards, especially compared to the dealer's face-up card, you have the option to bow out of the hand and only lose half your bet. Not all casinos allow this, and the rules for when you can surrender (before or after the dealer checks for blackjack), vary too.
Once you understand the basic game-play, you can move on.
But this is the foundation for winning at blackjack via card counting.
I recommend practicing at an online casino for a while before hitting a traditional casino and trying to play blackjack there.
2- Then master basic strategy.
Based on your total and the dealer's face-up card, there's one correct mathematical way to play any particular hand of blackjack. Memorizing the correct play in every situation is called 'learning basic strategy'.
Luckily, mastering basic strategy is easier than you think.
The first step is recognizing the difference between soft totals and hard totals. A soft total is one in which you can count the ace as 1 or 11 without busting. A hard total is a hand with no ace, or a hand with an ace that has to be counted as 1 to avoid busting.
You can find plenty of sites which offer strategy charts you can memorize. These are great for visual learners.
I prefer to learn a set of rules for playing particular types of hands. Here's a quick (and simple) overview of basic strategy that's good for most games:
Surrendering
Your first decisions is whether to surrender. The only time you'll surrender is when you have a hard total of 15 or 16.
You'll surrender with a total of 15 if the dealer has a 10 showing as her up-card.
You can find plenty of sites which offer strategy charts you can memorize. These are great for visual learners.
I prefer to learn a set of rules for playing particular types of hands. Here's a quick (and simple) overview of basic strategy that's good for most games:
Surrendering
Your first decisions is whether to surrender. The only time you'll surrender is when you have a hard total of 15 or 16.
You'll surrender with a total of 15 if the dealer has a 10 showing as her up-card.
You'll surrender with a total of 16 if the dealer has a 9, 10, or ace showing.
Splitting
If you've decided to not surrender, the next decision is whether to split or not. You can only split hands where you have 2 cards of the same value.
Here's how you'll know whether or not to split:
- Always split aces or 8s.
- Never split 4s, 5s, or 10s.
- Split 9s if the dealer has a 6 or lower showing. You'll also split if the dealer has an 8 or 9.
- Split 7s if the dealer has a 7 or lower showing.
- Split 6s, 3s, or 2s if the dealer has a 6 or lower showing.
Doubling
Hard Total Vs Soft Total Blackjack Game
You'll only double down on the following totals in the following situations:
- If you have a soft 13 or 14, double down if the dealer has a 5 or 6 showing.
- With a soft 15 or 16, double down if the dealer has a 4, 5, or 6 showing.
- If you have a soft 17, double down if the dealer has a 3, 4, 5, or 6 showing.
- With a soft 18, double down if the dealer has a 6 or less showing.
- If you have a soft 19, double down only if the dealer has a 6 showing.
- Always double down if you have a hard total of 11.
- Double down if you have a hard total of 10 UNLESS the dealer has an ace showing.
- Double down if you have a hard total of 9 if the dealer has a 6 or less showing.
Hitting
You should hit your hand in the following situations:
- If you have a soft 17 or lower, always hit unless you're doubling down.
- If you have a soft 18, hit versus a dealer 9, 10, or ace.
- Always hit a hard total of of 11 or less, unless you're doubling down.
- Hit a hard total of 12 if the dealer has a 4, 5, or 6.
- Hit a hard total of 13, 14, 15, or 16 if the dealer has a 7 or higher.
Standing
You should stand in the following situations:
- Always stand on a soft 20.
- Stand on soft 19 unless you're doubling down.
- Stand on soft 18 if the dealer has a 7 or 8 showing.
- Always stand on any hard total of 17 or higher.
- Stand on hard 13, 14, 15, or 16 if the dealer has a 6 or lower showing.
- Stand on hard 12 if the dealer has a 4, 5, or 6.
That's a summary of basic strategy. If you play your hands according to those guidelines, you'll face one of the lowest edges in the casino–about 0.5%.
If you ignore basic strategy, you're facing an edge of between 2% and 4%, depending on how far and how often you deviate from basic strategy.
You can learn more about basic strategy at Blackjack Apprenticeship, too. They offer a great basic strategy table to study, too.
3- Understand how blackjack probabilities work.
The reason counting cards works is because the composition of the deck affects your edge. In casinos where the dealer shuffles the deck after every hand, you can't get an edge by counting cards. In those casinos, blackjack is like roulette–every hand is an independent event.
But in casinos which don't shuffle every hand, the composition of the deck changes as the cards are dealt. A deck with a disproportionately high ratio of 10s and aces as compared to low cards, for example, offers you a better probability of being dealt a blackjack.
A blackjack is a 2-card hand that totals 21. It's also called a natural. Since this hand pays off at 3 to 2 instead of even money, the house edge falls in situations where you're more likely to get this bigger payoff.
If you raise your bets in this situation, you maximize your advantage. If you bet less when the opposite is true, you take advantage of the discrepancy in ratios.
Think of it as being like poker. When you have a good hand in poker, you bet and raise with it. You want more money in the pot when your odds of winning are better.
That's how and why card counting works. It tracks the ratio of high cards to low cards so you can raise your bets when the odds are in your favor.
4- Start with a simple system like the Hi-Lo.
I mentioned it earlier, but I'll repeat it here:
You don't have to memorize which cards have been played to learn how to count cards in blackjack.
Instead, you'll assign a value to each card. You'll increase or decrease a running total as the cards get dealt.
The simplest system for doing this is the Hi-Lo system, which assigns a value of -1, 0, or +1 to every card in the deck, as follows:
- 2-6 are counted as +1.
- 7, 8, and 9 are counted as 0.
- 10s and aces are counted as -1.
If you're playing in a game with multiple decks, you also have to divide this count by the number of decks left in the shoe. (This is called converting to a true count.)
When the count is positive, raise the size of your bets. The higher the count, the more you bet.
When the count is 0 or negative, bet the minimum.
By doing this, you get an edge over the casino of at least 0.5%. If you're good at counting cards,the game rules are generous, and your betting spread is wide, you can increase that to 1% or 2%.
5- Practice a lot.
Start by counting through a single deck at your kitchen table, one card at a time. If you finish with a count of 0, you got it right.
Hard Total Vs Soft Total Blackjack
Then get a stopwatch and time yourself. See how fast you can go through the deck. Try to improve your time over previous results while maintaining accuracy.
Once you've hit a plateau, start dealing the cards 2 at a time. Look for patterns. This should make you faster still. Keep using the stopwatch.
When you're fast and accurate, start adding distractions. Turn up the radio. Play the television at the same time. Practice when the kids are playing in the kitchen.
Casinos are full of distractions. If you want to win when counting at cards, you need to practice until it's effortless.
You also need to be able to count cards without LOOKING like you're counting cards.
6- Put together a bankroll.
You can't play blackjack or count cards without money to bet. Not only that, but counting cards is a long-term play. In the short run, it's possible to go broke before your edge over the house kicks in.
So not only do you need significant skill to succeed as a card counter, you need significant money, too.
When blackjack experts make recommendations for the size of your bankroll, they define your bankroll by a multiple of your betting unit.
For example, when you read that you should have at least 400 betting units, it means you should have 400 times the amount of your flat bet.
If you only have $2000 to get started with, you're stuck playing the $5 minimum games.
Here's another thing to keep in mind:
The lower your bankroll, the more likely you are to go broke during a short-term losing streak. At 400 betting units, you still have a 40% or so chance of going broke.
Increase your bankroll to 1000 betting units, and you're probability of going broke drops to less than 10%.
The probability that you'll go broke before your long-term edge kicks in is called 'risk of ruin'.
7- Hit the casinos and put your skills to the test.
I want to cover 2 main things about counting cards in the casino:
- How much money you can expect to earn per hour in the long run.
- How hard it is to avoid detection.
The formula for how much money you can earn is easy enough to calculate. You multiply your average bet by your edge. Then you multiply that by the number of bets you place per hour.
Let's say you have a bankroll of $5000, so you're starting off at the $5 tables. Do casinos report gambling winnings. You estimate that you have a 0.5% edge over the casino.
You're betting $5 average per hand, and you're getting in 70 hands per hour. You're putting $350 per hour into action.
You expect to win an average of 0.5% of that, which amounts to just $1.75 per hour.
Clearly, you can't expect to get rich at this rate.
Your goal needs to be to improve your edge and to play for higher stakes. That means having a larger bankroll.
If you get your edge up to 1%, and you average $100 wagers per hand, you're looking at earning $70/hour instead.
But you need to be able to do this without attracting attention. Casinos consider card counting cheating, even though it's not illegal.
So you need to be able to count cards without looking like you're counting.
You should also limit yourself to no more than an hour at any given casino on any given day. Try to play with different dealers during different shifts, too.
Spend too much time at any one table at any one casino, and you'll eventually be 86'ed.
Finally
Learning how to count cards in blackjack isn't as hard as you think. You don't have to memorize all the cards that have been played. In fact, if you can add and subtract 1 in your head, you can count cards.
Master counting cards and you can earn significant amounts of money from your gambling hobby.
