A dirty or mixed canasta (with at least 1 wildcard) is worth 300 points. A natural canasta (no wildcards) is worth 500 points. The goal of the game is to make as many canastas as you can before the game ends. As the game continues, players can add to their own existing melds on the table and to their partner's existing melds, too. End each turn by getting rid of one of your cards and placing it face up on the discard pile. After the first meld, you can play any combinations you want. Jokers are worth 50 points, aces and 2s are worth 20 points, any card from an 8 to a King is worth 10 points, cards from 4 to 7 are worth 5 points, and black 3s are worth 5 points. Your first meld must be worth at least 50 points before you can play it. Wild cards can be any rank you want, so use those to make melds if you have them. Each meld must have at least 2 natural cards in it. To make melds, search your hand for at least 3 cards of the same rank and lay them face up in front of you. If they draw a red 3, they place it face up on the table to score an automatic 100 points, then pick another card from the draw pile. If the player doesn’t want to pick up the discard pile, they pick up the top card from the draw pile, add it their hand, and look for possible scoring opportunities. You also have to take the entire discard pile (not just the top card). To pull from the discard pile, you have to use the top card right away to form a meld. Every player’s turn begins by picking a card from either the draw pile or the discard pile. Gameplay starts with the player on the dealer’s left and goes clockwise around the table.

If you turn over a bonus card (a joker, 2, or a red 3), keep pulling from the stack until the discard pile starts with a “natural” card (any non-bonus card). Stack the remaining cards in the middle of the table to form the draw pile and turn the top card in the stack over to create the discard pile. Then, everyone can pick up their cards and look at them. Pick 1 player to be the dealer and, starting with the person to their left, deal each player 11 cards facedown. To set up the game, pair into partners and shuffle 2 decks of cards together (jokers included). Canasta is a fun card game for 4 people where players try to make melds out of cards of the same rank until they 'go out' by playing all the cards in their hand.

Canasta free online game