Garbage Poker is a fun, multi-style card game that can be enjoyed by three or more players.

Build your stack of pennies through four different game plays.

Find the video tutorial and written explanation for how to play garbage poker below.

Garbage Poker Tutorial

Needed

Three to six players; two 52 card decks (add a card deck to add more players); 50-100 pennies per player (poker chips can be used instead of pennies)

Objective

The objective of the game is to win pennies through four different game plays. (Poker, Bingo, In and Out, Count)

Deal

Before the cards are dealt, each player will ante two pennies into the middle. Then, five cards are dealt to each player.

Game Plays

Poker

The player left of the dealer starts the round by betting an amount and adding it to the middle pot, folding his/her hand, or checking. If a bet is made, all other players must at least match the bet to stay in the poker hand. If a player folds, he/she is out for the poker hand.

A check allows a player to stay in the game without adding an additional bet. A player can only check if no other bets have been made yet.

The player with the best poker hand, that did not fold, wins the middle pot. If there is a tie, the tying players split the middle pot.

Poker Hand Ranks

  • 5 of a kind (possible because two decks are used)

  • Straight Flush (5 cards in sequence in the same suit)

  • 4 of a kind

  • Full House (3 of a kind with a pair)

  • Flush (all the same suit)

  • Straight (5 cards in sequence)

  • 3 of a kind

  • 2 pair

  • 1 pair

  • High Card (ace is high)

Bingo

The players will put their cards face up on the table, except for the dealer. The dealer discards his cards for the remainder of the round. The dealer begins flipping up the top card of the remaining deck and announcing the rank of the card.

If a player has a card of similar rank, he/she will put a penny on that card. If a card rank is repeated by the dealer, the players will add an additional penny to the card of similar rank. If a player has multiple cards with the same rank, a penny will be placed on each one when called by the dealer.

Play continues until a player gets a bingo by having at least one penny on each of his/her cards. The winning bingo player gets all the pennies on the other players’ cards. If there is a tie, the tying players split the pennies.

In and Out

The dealer will flip over the top card of the remaining deck, and players will put in one penny for each card of the same rank. The dealer flips over the next top card, and players will put in two pennies for each card of the same rank. This is done three more times with the penny amount going up one each time to five pennies for the fifth card.

The process is repeated only this time players will take out pennies for cards of the same rank. Start with one penny for the first card and the penny amount going up by one again to five pennies for the fifth card.

If the pennies in the middle run out during the take out phase, the payouts will be made from the dealer’s pennies. If there are pennies left over at the end of the take out phase, the remaining pennies go to the dealer.

Count

The dealer will flip over ten cards while counting to ten. If any card matches the count number, every player pays the dealer that amount of pennies. For example, if the dealer flipped a 4 with the 4th card, each player pays the dealer 4 pennies. The aces count for the one, and face cards are not worth anything. The count stage ends the round, and the deal moves to the next player to the left.