Guandan (掼蛋, 관단) is a four-player partnership card game with two decks. Five steps below take you from the deal to your first win. Everything here matches the app and the tournament rules.
Four players, two teams, partners across the table. Two standard decks plus four jokers make 108 cards, 27 each. The first round starts straight away; later rounds begin with a tribute exchange.
The leader plays a combo. Each next player must play the same shape with a higher rank or pass. When everyone still in has passed, the last player to play leads again. Passing does not remove you from the trick.
Single, pair, triple, full house, straight of exactly five, three consecutive pairs, two consecutive triples. Runs cannot be longer than their fixed length.
Four or more of a kind, or a straight flush, is a bomb that beats any normal hand. The rank card (your team level, starting at 2) outranks an Ace as a single, and its two hearts are wild.
The round ends when one team has both players out, or three players are out. Finish 1st and 2nd to climb three ranks, 1st and 3rd for two, 1st and 4th for one. Losers pay tribute with their best card before the next round; two big jokers cancel it.
Bombs beat any normal hand. Among bombs, more cards wins; the straight flush sits between five and six of a kind.
All four jokers — two big, two small. Nothing beats it. The wild card cannot stand in for a joker, and with two decks there are exactly four, so it appears at most once per round.
Eight of a kind. With wilds a bomb can reach nine or ten cards, and bigger is always stronger — but all of them still lose to the royal bomb.
Seven of a kind. Only an eight-card bomb tops it.
Six of a kind. From this size up, bombs outrank the straight flush.
Five in a row in one suit. A special bomb: above a five-card bomb, below a six-card bomb. 10-J-Q-K-A high, A-2-3-4-5 low.
Five of a kind. Loses to a straight flush, beats a four-card bomb.
Four of a kind. The smallest bomb, yet it still beats every normal combo.
Two consecutive triples (777888). Exactly six cards, never longer; compared by the lower group.
Three consecutive pairs (778899). Exactly six cards, AAKKQQ high and AA2233 low.
Five in a row, suits irrelevant, never longer than five. 10-J-Q-K-A high, A-2-3-4-5 low.
Triple plus pair, five cards. Only the triple counts when comparing, so the attached pair can be anything.
Three of a kind, matched only against other triples. Three jokers do not make one.
Two of a kind. Two big jokers is the strongest pair and two small jokers the next; one of each is not a pair.
One card. Order runs big joker > small joker > rank card > A > K … down to 2.
Guandan (掼蛋) took shape in the 1960s in Nanzha commune, Huai’an county, Jiangsu — hence its other name, “Huai’an Run Fast”. In 2024 the Jiangsu Guandan Association named Sun Zhaocheng its inventor.
One says guanlan and guandan sound alike in the Huai’an dialect, and the name simply drifted. The other reads it literally: guan means to slam down, dan means bomb — a game fought with bombs.
The rules blend two local games, Run Fast (跑得快) and Eighty Points (八十分, also called Upgrade 升级): the race to empty your hand from the first, the win-and-promote structure from the second. After a Huai’an Guandan website launched in 2005 it reached Suqian, Nanjing and Yangzhou; today over 20 million people play in Jiangsu and Anhui alone.
In January 2017 China’s General Administration of Sport issued unified competition rules; a trial competitive ruleset followed in late 2022. In 2023 Guandan appeared as a demonstration event at the 5th National Mind Sports Games.
| Return card | 10 or lower only |
| Promotion | 1+2 → 3 ranks / 1+3 → 2 / 1+4 → 1 |
| Three failed A | Not used |
| End | Time and round limits |
The competition standard issued by the General Administration of Sport. This app defaults to it and most online ranked play follows it.
| Return card | No limit — any card |
| Promotion | 1+2 → 3 ranks / 1+3 → 2 / 1+4 → 1 |
| Three failed A | Common — back to rank 2 |
| End | Until A is cleared |
The folk style of the birthplace. With no limit on the returned card you can hand back a big one to rescue your partner.
| Return card | Strictly 10 or lower |
| Promotion | No gain on 1+4 · demoted one rank if partner is last |
| Three failed A | Used |
| End | Until A is cleared |
The style settled around Nanjing, with the harshest promotion. Finishing first alone is not enough, so partner play matters most.
A single round is about ten minutes. A full set, climbing from rank 2 to Ace, takes several rounds.
No. Guandan is strictly four players in two fixed partnerships. Against AI, the app fills the other seats.
A bigger bomb. More cards always wins; at equal size the higher rank wins. Four jokers beat everything.
Only the two hearts of the current rank are wild. They can stand in for any card except a joker.