Yatzy rules
What it is
Yatzy is a two-player dice game played against a fixed scorecard. You roll five dice up to three times a turn, keeping the ones you want, and then you must commit the result to one of thirteen categories — each of which can be used only once. The game is not really about lucky rolls; it is about which category you are willing to spend on a mediocre one. This page describes the game as it is played at jpgames.app.
What you roll with
Five ordinary six-sided dice, and a scorecard with thirteen boxes.
Play
A turn is always the same shape:
- Roll all five dice.
- Keep any you like and re-roll the rest.
- Keep and re-roll once more — three rolls in total. You may stop early.
- Choose a category and write the score in. That category is now used up for the rest of the game.
You must fill a box every turn. If nothing fits, you have to take a zero somewhere — and choosing where to take it is the hardest decision in the game.
Thirteen turns each, one per category, and then the game is over.
The scorecard
The card is in two halves.
Upper section — score the total of the matching dice only:
| Category | Scores |
|---|---|
| Ones | 1 point per 1 |
| Twos | 2 points per 2 |
| Threes | 3 points per 3 |
| Fours | 4 points per 4 |
| Fives | 5 points per 5 |
| Sixes | 6 points per 6 |
If your upper section totals 63 or more, you get a 35-point bonus. Sixty-three is exactly three of each face, so the bonus is a running target: every turn where you bank four sixes puts you ahead of it, and every turn where you dump two ones puts you behind.
Lower section — fixed and variable awards:
| Category | Requirement | Scores |
|---|---|---|
| Three of a kind | three dice the same | total of all five dice |
| Four of a kind | four dice the same | total of all five dice |
| Full house | three of one, two of another | 25 |
| Small straight | four in a row | 30 |
| Large straight | five in a row | 40 |
| Yatzy | all five the same | 50 |
| Chance | anything at all | total of all five dice |
Two of those are worth reading twice. Three and four of a kind score the whole roll, not just the matching dice — so four 2s and a 6 in Four of a Kind is 14, not 8. And Chance always scores, which makes it the usual home for a wasted turn.
Small straight means four consecutive faces: 1-2-3-4, 2-3-4-5 or 3-4-5-6. Large straight means all five: 1-2-3-4-5 or 2-3-4-5-6.
Scoring
Your final score is the upper section, plus the 35-point bonus if you earned it, plus the lower section. A typical game lands somewhere in the 200s.
Both players fill the same thirteen categories, so the game is a direct comparison — there is no interaction between the two scorecards at all beyond who ends up higher.
Ending the game
The game ends when both players have filled all thirteen categories. Highest total wins, and an equal total is a draw.
Variants we implement
- Standard Yatzy, which is what this page describes: thirteen categories, three rolls a turn, 63 for the upper bonus.
There are no table settings for Yatzy — the scorecard is the game, and there is nothing to configure.
Where we differ from the common rules
- Two players only. A bot fills the other seat.
- This is Yatzy, not Yahtzee. The two differ in their category lists in some editions; ours is the thirteen-box card above.
- No Yatzy bonus for a second one. Rolling five of a kind a second time scores 50 in the Yatzy box only if that box is still empty; there is no additional bonus and no joker rule letting it stand in for another category.
- No forced joker placement. With the Yatzy box already filled, a second five of a kind is scored like any other roll.
- Full house is a flat 25 and straights are flat 30 and 40, rather than being scored by pip total as some Scandinavian editions do.
Ready to play? Start a Yatzy table — a bot fills the other seat, so a game starts whenever you do.
For the wider game, including the regional editions above that we do not implement, see Yatzy on Wikipedia.
Common questions
How many rolls do you get in Yatzy?
Three per turn. You roll all five dice, then choose which to keep and re-roll the rest, twice. You may stop early, but you must fill a category at the end of the turn.
What is the upper section bonus in Yatzy?
Thirty-five points, awarded if your six upper-section boxes total 63 or more. That is the equivalent of three of each face, so it is a target you track all game.
How much is a Yatzy worth?
Fifty points — five dice showing the same face. It is the single biggest box on the card.
Do three of a kind and four of a kind score only the matching dice?
No. Both score the total of all five dice. Four 2s and a 6 scores 14 in Four of a Kind.
What happens if you cannot score anything in Yatzy?
You must still fill a box, so you take a zero in one of them. Choosing which category to sacrifice is a real part of the game — Ones and Chance are the usual candidates.