Hello! Beginner here. I was taught to prioritize a 1 NT opening over a 1 major opening. My question is this: I have 5 hearts and all the requirements for a 1 NT opening. I bid 1 NT. My partner has 3 hearts. By not bidding 1 heart we miss the 8 card fit in hearts. Can you help explain the rationale a bit here? Thanks!
I am learning bridge, mainly online via No Fear Bridge lessons, and really struggling in practice with "planning the play" as declarer. E.g. when to count winners versus losers and what to do with that information, drawing trumps first or later, when to discard versus ruff a loser, which order to play the suits (i.e. everything!).
When I do a quiz on any of these topics, I get pretty much everything right, but when I am presented with a hand, it all goes horribly wrong, even at a total beginners' level. After going down, I can always understand the solution given, but the steps/order seem quite different each time. Obviously NT vs suit contract is a fundamental difference, which might be part of my confusion.
Is this just a case of playing 100s of hands and getting it wrong loads to build up experience through learning from mistakes? Or is there any "rule" like a certain type of hand calls for a particular approach? Any good resources to help with this?
Reminder that there is a free Weekly tournament on BBO that runs for redditors -- it's a list of players that I maintain! DM me or leave me your BBO name to be added. It refreshes between Monday and Tuesday, and can be found on the Tournaments (Competitive) -> Free area.
I had some really bad boards this week and had a 55%. Come get me!
Partner has 19 points, 4 hearts, 4 spades, 3 diamonds, 2 clubs opening 1♦️
I have 3HCP with 5 hearts, 5 spades, 1 diamond, 2 clubs
People told me to pass. So we’re missing 22HCP, 9 hearts and spade fit and playing with 4 diamonds together 1♦️
Hey r/bridge,
Growing up, my friends and I played a house-rule version of bridge we called "Casual Bridge" The big twist: instead of the standard 5 contracts (♣ ♦ ♥ ♠ NT), there are 12 different strains — each with its own card-ranking rules.
One example: a strain called Small, where low cards win tricks. A hand full of 2s and 3s — normally a disaster — becomes exactly what you want to bid on.
The result: every deal has something to play for. You're not stuck defending all game just because you drew weak cards.
I built a browser version of it. Sign in with Google, no install needed.
Still beta — happy to answer questions about the strains if standard contract bridge is your background.
I would have bid 3 diamonds instead of 3 clubs. Mr Rigal is a better bridge player than I am so I suspect I'm wrong, but don't see how.
Hey r/bridge,
I'm a software engineer who started playing bridge right before the pandemix and fell hard for the game. Played in person every chance I got — friends' kitchens, a local club, the works. Then the pandemic cut off in-person play and the only mobile option was BBO, and... yeah. (No shade to BBO. The network is real. The interface is from a time before iPhones.)
Recently I finally sat down and started designing the bridge app I wish existed. I'm
not promising it'll be the app YOU wish existed — that's why I'm here.
The MVP I'm aiming at (8 weeks, iOS to start):
- Solo play vs. 3 AI bots (no multiplayer in v1)
- An AI coach that explains, post-hand, what you missed and why — not "you should have
bid 2NT" but a real paragraph that teaches you something
- A table that actually feels good on a phone
Solo dev. No team, no track record in this space. What I have is the time, the love of
the game, and AI tools that finally let one person build something like this.
What I'm looking for: 3 people who play regularly enough to have opinions, willing to:
- Take a TestFlight invite in ~2 weeks
- Play 5–10 hands
- Tell me brutally honestly whether the coach is saying something useful or just
generating plausible-sounding bridge-speak
In exchange: early access for as long as it exists, your name in the credits if you
want it, and the small satisfaction of telling me my coach is dumb (which I might
genuinely need to hear).
SAYC players preferred for v1, but not required. Comment or DM. Doesn't have to be
long — "I play, I'm in" is enough.
Thanks for keeping the game alive.
I've discussed this with a couple people at my local club and I'm trying to figure out what would work best for my regular partnership agreement. I'll definitely need to justify the proposed system. So here are the basics of the two I'm a bit familiar with.
First: 1NT (P) 3H is invitational with 5-5 in the Majors and 1NT (P) 3S is game force and 5-5 in the Majors
Second: 1NT (P) 3H is singleton or void in Hearts, exactly 3 Spades and either 5-4 or 5-5 in the minors. 1NT (P) 3S is singleton or void in Spades, exactly 3 Hearts and again 5-5 or 5-4 in the minors.
I'm quite new to this conventional bid so if I have something wrong let me know. I started reading online and it looks like their are other systems out there. Generally, I like the first system because of it's simplicity, also the second system doesn't seem like it would come up very often. Insights are appreciated, thank you.
Note: we play 1NT as 15-17
Hey everyone,
I’m Nir, a developer and member of the Israel Open Bridge Team.
I built BridgeDummy, a training website that helps you see how good your bidding and opening-lead decisions really are.
You get a bidding or opening-lead problem, make your choice, and then see how it performs across thousands of simulated deals using double-dummy analysis.
You also see what other players chose. One of the most interesting parts is that the popular choice is often not the best one.
BridgeDummy also has a custom simulation tool. You can set constraints for each seat, generate hundreds of matching deals, and run double-dummy analysis on all of them to find the best decision. It is built to be one of the most flexible and advanced bridge simulation tools available.
There are also daily challenges, a weekly league, 1v1 battles against friends and strangers, interactive suit combinations and several other features designed for serious bridge training.
Many national-team players are already using it.
I’d love for you to try it and tell me what you think. You can try it for free.
For 2NT major suit raises in competition (1M X 2NT or 1M 2m 2NT if you also play that), do you like to play something adapted from what you play for Jacoby 2N in an uncontested auction? Or do you keep it natural?
You can build a descriptive picture of your hand shape, but is all this information exchange worth it when slam is less likely to be in the picture?
Hey! Made an app for scoring local rubber games(regular, chicago and russian chicago). There is also a quick one-of scoring calculator, and option for recording teams/pairs events.
Would really appreciate any feedback, if any of you are bored, or might need something like this!
