Soft hands, hard hands, and why 17 is not always 17.
This is the only piece of blackjack vocabulary you actually need, and it exists because of one card. An ace counts as eleven until that would bust you, then quietly becomes a one. A hand where the ace is still an eleven is soft; everything else is hard. Same total, completely different hand — and the game punishes you for not knowing which one you are holding.
What makes a hand soft.
Every card in blackjack has one value except the ace, which has two. That single exception is where the whole soft-and-hard idea comes from.
An ace counts as eleven whenever that leaves you at 21 or under, and as one the moment eleven would push you over. You do not choose — the table simply counts your hand the best way it can. A hand where the ace is still being counted as eleven is a soft hand. A hand with no ace, or one whose ace has already had to drop to a one, is a hard hand.
The practical difference is the only one that matters: a soft hand cannot be busted by the next card. Whatever comes, the ace absorbs it by becoming a one. A hard total of twelve or more can be broken by the next card, and the higher the total, the more often it will be.
The ace is an eleven. Take a card and the worst case is it drops to a one — A,6,9 is hard 16, not a bust.
No ace to fall back on. Any card of five or higher busts it, which is why you never take one here.
The soft 17 above after one hit. The ace has been forced down to a one, and from here the hand plays as an ordinary hard 16.
The third hand is the one to remember. A soft hand does not stay soft: hit it and take a big card, and the ace drops to a one to keep you under 21. The hand has gone hard, and from that point every decision is a hard-hand decision. Beginners who learned “you cannot bust a soft hand” sometimes keep hitting long after the hand stopped being soft.
Soft 17 and hard 17 are not the same hand.
Take two hands that both add up to 17 and play each one correctly against every card the dealer can show. The table below is worked out when the page loads, for a six-deck game where the dealer stands on soft 17.
The comparison needs JavaScript, because it is solved here rather than stored. The result, in short: hard 17 stands against every upcard, because a five or higher busts it. Soft 17 never stands — it doubles against a dealer 3 through 6 and hits against everything else. Averaged across all ten upcards, soft 17 returns about +1% of your bet and hard 17 loses about 22%. Same number on the table, twenty-three points apart.
How to read it
Hard 17 is a finished hand. It is not a good one — it loses more often than it wins — but every card from a five up breaks it, so you take what you have. Soft 17 is an unfinished hand. Nothing can break it, and a four, three or two would improve it to 21, 20 or 19, so you keep going. Against a weak dealer you go further and double, because the hand is safe to draw on and the dealer is likely to bust anyway.
Switch the table to 18 and the lesson repeats. Hard 18 stands everywhere. Soft 18 stands against a 2, 7 or 8, doubles against 3 through 6, and hits against a 9, 10 or ace — seven of the ten upcards call for a different play from the hard hand with the identical total. The mistake beginners make is seeing an 18, thinking “that is a good hand”, and standing against a ten. It is not a good hand against a ten. It is a soft hand, and soft hands get played.
Every cell is solved for the standard six-deck game. Sitting at a table with different rules? Our strategy calculator solves any hand for the exact rules in front of you.
The card that cannot break you.
Here is what taking exactly one more card does to each hand, counted straight from a six-deck shoe. The soft row is the whole argument.
| You hold | Busts on one card | |
|---|---|---|
| Any soft hand | 0% | |
| Hard 12 | 30.8% | |
| Hard 13 | 38.5% | |
| Hard 14 | 46.2% | |
| Hard 15 | 53.8% | |
| Hard 16 | 61.5% | |
| Hard 17 | 69.2% | |
| Hard 18 | 76.9% | |
| Hard 19 | 84.6% | |
| Hard 20 | 92.3% |
This is why the two hands are played so differently. A hard 16 that takes a card is broken more often than not. A soft 16 that takes a card is broken never. The soft hand can afford to reach for a better total; the hard hand mostly cannot, and has to hope the dealer breaks instead.
The figures count cards from a full shoe. Once you are holding an ace the exact chance shifts by a fraction, but not by enough to change any decision on this page.
How to play every soft hand.
Your soft total down the side, the dealer’s card across the top. Solved when this page loads for six decks, dealer stands on soft 17, double on any two cards.
The grid needs JavaScript, because it is solved here rather than stored. The three rules below cover it.
There is no upcard against which standing on A,6 or lower is right. Either the hand is safe to hit, or the dealer is weak enough to double against. Standing throws away a free card.
Against a 5 or 6 you double every soft hand from 13 to 18. Against a 4, soft 15 through 18. Against a 3, soft 17 and 18. The hand cannot bust, the dealer probably will, and you get to put twice as much money on that.
Stand against a 2, 7 or 8. Double against 3 through 6. Hit against a 9, 10 or ace — the dealer is likely to make 19 or better, and 18 is not enough. Soft 19 and 20 stand everywhere.
Two rules move a handful of these cells. Where the dealer hits soft 17, soft 18 also doubles against a 2 and soft 19 doubles against a 6. Where doubling is restricted to hard totals, every soft double becomes a hit. The house edge calculator prices both rules for the table you are at.
Where soft hands go wrong.
Most of these come from a sensible instinct — protect a good-looking total — applied to a hand that is not what it looks like.
Seventeen is seventeen. I stand.
Against a dealer ten, standing on soft 17 returns about −42% of your bet; hitting returns about −20%. That is twenty-two points of a bet given away for the comfort of a number. Hard 17 stands because it has to. Soft 17 has no such excuse.
Eighteen is a good hand, I am not touching it.
Against a 2, 7 or 8 it is, and you stand. Against a 9, 10 or ace the dealer makes 19 or better too often for 18 to hold up, and because the hand is soft you can try to improve it for free. Hit. And against a 3 through 6 you should be doubling, not standing.
It is soft, so I cannot bust — keep hitting.
You cannot bust on the next card. Take a big one and the ace drops to a one, the hand goes hard, and now you can. A,6 that draws a nine is a hard 16, and hitting a hard 16 against a dealer 6 is the wrong play. Re-count after every card.
Soft 19 might improve, I will take one.
A soft 19 or 20 is a made hand. The only cards that improve it are a two or an ace on 19, and nothing at all on 20; everything else makes it worse or turns it hard. Stand, against everything. The one exception is soft 19 against a 6 where the dealer hits soft 17, and it is a double, not a hit.
Ace and a ten is soft 21.
On your first two cards it is a blackjack, paid immediately at 3 to 2 and never played. Calling it soft 21 is harmless until the dealer shows an ace and offers you “even money” for it — which is insurance under a friendlier name, and a losing bet. Decline it.
The whole page in five lines
If you remember nothing else from this, remember these.