Baccarat Rules

A popular table game played in casinos worldwide, Baccarat offers a fast-paced, thrilling experience and comes in a number of variants. Baccarat Punto Banco is a game of pure chance that offers relatively good odds for the betting individual. Here we shall explain the rules and gameplay according to this variant, seeing as it’s the most popular one with the majority of western casinos as well as online.

The basics and gameplay

Baccarat is played in rounds referred to as ‘coups’. Prior to the dealing of any cards, each betting individual is asked to place one of three bets; the punto (or player) bet, the banco (or banker) bet or a stand-off (or tie) bet. Following the placing of bets, the dealer will initially deal two hands of two cards each, with one being the player (punto) hand and the other the banker (banco) hand. These hands do not correspond to the betting individuals and house respectively, as each betting individual will be given the choice to bet on either of the two hands. Baccarat is played using 4, 6 or 8 shuffled and combined decks of cards – this depends on the casino – dealt from what is known as a ‘shoe’. The first card of the punto hand is dealt first and the dealer will then alternate between the two hands, dealing one card at a time until each hand consists of two cards. Here, both the punto and banco hands may be dealt a third card prior to the counting of points. This depends on a stringent set of rules, followed by all casinos, which we will come to shortly. Once both hands are dealt, the hand with the highest point value is declared the winning hand. The casino will first collect losses from those who, prior to dealing, would have bet on the losing hand and then dish out the winnings.

Baccarat Rules — You can find the Baccarat rules in each table

How to calculate the value of a hand in Baccarat

Each hand in Baccarat carries a point value. Number cards 2-9 are worth their face (or pip) value in points, while 10s and face cards (J, Q, K) have no point value (are worth 0 points). Face cards are considered as 10 cards. Aces are worth a single point and Jokers are not made use of. The best possible point value for a hand in Baccarat is 9. Once the combined value of the cards in a hand enters the double digit range, the hand value is determined by the rightmost digit of the two, meaning that the leftmost digit is disregarded (e.g. 10 = 0 / 13 = 3 / 17 = 7 / 20 = 0 / 23 = 3, etc).

What determines whether a third card is drawn for either hand?

Once the punto and banco hands are dealt two cards each, a point total of either 8 or 9 for either hand would render what is called a ‘natural’ and the coup is brought to an end with a win for the hand with the highest point total. If a natural is not reached, then each hand may be dealt a third card, depending on the following:

The punto hand stands on a 6 or 7, meaning that a third card is drawn for the punto hand if its two-card point total is 5 or less. This rule also applies for the banco hand, but only when the punto hand stands with two cards. If the punto hand draws a third card, the following set of rules determines the third-card draw for the banco hand:

A point total of 2 or less for the banco hand would draw a third card for banco, regardless of the punto hand’s third card value.
A point total of 3 for the banco hand would draw a third card for banco, unless the punto hand’s third card value was that of 8.
A point total of 4 for the banco hand would draw a third card for banco, unless the punto hand’s third card value was that of 0, 1, 8 or 9.
A point total of 5 for the banco hand would draw a third card for banco, unless the punto hand’s third card value was that of 0, 1, 2, 3, 8 or 9.
A point total of 6 for the banco hand would draw a third card for banco, only if the punto hand’s third card value was that of 6 or 7.
The Banco hand stands on a two-card point total of 7.

At what rates are bets paid out in Baccarat?

The pay-out ratio for a win on both the punto and banco hands is an even 1:1. However, because it has been established that the banco hand tends to win around 3 to 4 coups more than the punto hand over an 8-deck play, a 5% house tax is levied on banco wins, making the net odds on a banco bet 0.95:1. Stand-offs are paid out at 8:1 or even 9:1, depending on the casino. Baccarat offers the betting individual as close to an even break as he/she is going to get in a casino game. The house edge stands at a mere 1.06% for a bet on banco and 1.24% for a bet on punto. By contrast, the stand-off favours the house considerably, with a 14.4% edge.

Many casino lovers tend to be put off by the complex rules associated with Baccarat, especially when it comes to the determination of the third-card draw. What people must keep in mind is that one doesn’t have to know the rules to play the game and that Baccarat is one of the simplest table games to play out there.