Buraco rules: how to play

How do you play buraco?

Buraco is a Brazilian relative of canasta, played with two decks. Each player gets 11 cards, and two spare hands of 11 cards, called mortos, wait on the table. On your turn you draw, lay down same-suit runs and discard. Seven cards in a run make a canastra. A player who runs out of cards takes a morto.

Object of the game

In buraco, each team lays down runs of cards of the same suit. Every card on the table scores points, and a run of seven cards or more becomes a canastra, which earns a bonus.

A round ends when a player goes out, that is, runs out of cards after the team has already taken its morto and made a clean canastra. Rounds are played until a team reaches the agreed total, usually 3,000 points.

Setup and deal

• Put the two decks together without the jokers and shuffle well. That makes 104 cards.
• With four players, partners sit across from each other. With two players, each one plays alone.
• Deal 11 cards to each player.
• Deal two more piles of 11 cards, face down. These are the mortos. Set both aside on the table.
• The remaining cards stay face down in the middle: this is the stock. The discard pile starts empty, next to the stock.
• The four 2s of each deck are wild cards. A wild card can stand for any card.
• The player to the dealer's left goes first, and play moves clockwise.

How to play

1. Start your turn by drawing. You choose: take the top card of the stock or take the whole discard pile. In open buraco, you may take the discard pile whenever it has cards.
2. Then, if you wish, lay down melds. A meld is a run of three or more cards in a row of the same suit, such as the 5, 6 and 7 of hearts.
3. The ace works at both ends: before the 2 (ace, 2, 3) or after the king (queen, king, ace).
4. Each meld takes only one wild card. A 2 used as a wild card stands for the missing card, as in 7 of clubs, 2 of diamonds, 9 of clubs.
5. A 2 of the same suit, placed in its own spot (ace, 2, 3 or 2, 3, 4), does not count as a wild card. The meld stays clean.
6. On your turn you may also add cards to melds your team has already laid down. You never touch the other team's melds.
7. A meld with seven cards or more is a canastra. With no wild card, it is a clean canastra. With a wild card, it is a dirty canastra.
8. End your turn by discarding one card face up on the discard pile. The turn passes to the next player.
9. The first time you run out of cards, you take a morto. If you laid down everything without discarding, take the morto and keep playing in the same turn. If your last card was the discard, take the morto and play with it on your next turn.
10. Each team takes only one morto. The partner keeps playing with the cards already in hand.
11. To go out and end the round, your team must have taken its morto and must have at least one clean canastra on the table. Then one player just needs to run out of cards, by laying down everything or discarding the last one.
12. A team with no clean canastra cannot go out. In that case, keep at least one card in your hand.
13. If the stock runs out and a morto is still face down on the table, that morto becomes the new stock. If no morto is left, the round ends there and nobody scores the bonus for going out.
14. At the end of the round, each team counts its points. Then the cards are shuffled and another player deals.

Card values and scoring

• Cards from 3 to 7: 5 points each.
• Cards from 8 to king: 10 points each.
• A 2: 10 points.
• An ace: 15 points.
• Clean canastra (seven cards or more, no wild card): 200 points.
• Dirty canastra (seven cards or more, with a wild card): 100 points.
• Going out: 100 points for the team that did it.
• Cards laid down on the table add points. Cards left in hand subtract their own value.
• A team that did not take its morto loses 100 points.

End of the game

Add up the points of each round on paper. The game ends when a team reaches the total agreed at the start. Common targets are 1,500, 3,000 and 5,000 points.

If both teams pass the target in the same round, the team with more points wins.

Common variations

• Closed buraco: a player may take the discard pile only by using its top card in a meld right away. This form also allows melds of three or more cards of the same rank. Here any canastra, clean or dirty, is enough to go out.
• Buraco with jokers: the four jokers of the two decks are added, for 108 cards. Jokers are wild, along with the 2s. The value of a joker in the count is agreed at the table; 20 points is common.
• Going out with a dirty canastra: some open buraco tables allow going out with any canastra, clean or dirty. Agree on this before you start.
• Special canastras: at some tables, a clean canastra from ace to king and a canastra from ace to ace earn bigger bonuses. 500 and 1,000 points are common, but agree on it first.
• Minimum points to lay down: in a game to 3,000 points, many rule sets ask a team with 1,500 points or more to lay down at least 75 points in cards in its first meld of each round.
• Tranca: a related game, with special rules for the 3s and a locked discard pile.

Tips to play better

• Think about the canastra from the start. One long meld is worth more than several three-card melds.
• Try to keep at least one meld free of wild cards. A clean canastra is worth twice as much as a dirty one.
• Look at the discard pile before you draw. A big pile gives you many cards at once, but all of them count against you if they stay in your hand.
• Watch what the others discard and pick up. Avoid discarding a card that fits the other team's meld.
• Reaching the morto early is a big advantage: it gives your team 11 new cards.
• Near the end of the round, lay down what you can. A card in hand becomes lost points when somebody goes out.

Frequently asked questions