How to play Yatzy

Roll five dice three times a turn, keep the ones you want, and fill fifteen scoring boxes before your opponent does.

Yatzy is a Scandinavian dice game and the direct ancestor of the commercial versions most people have played. Its charm is that it looks like pure luck and is not: with fifteen boxes and thirteen — sometimes fifteen — decisions, the difference between careless and careful play is worth a large number of points.

The structure of a game

Each turn you roll five dice, may keep any subset and reroll the rest up to twice more, then must write the result into an unused box. Every box is used exactly once, so the game lasts as many turns as there are boxes and every score is a commitment. When all boxes are filled the totals are added and the higher score wins.

The upper section and the bonus

The six upper boxes score the sum of a single face: three fours in the Fours box scores 12. The bonus is the reason the upper section matters. Score 63 or more across the six boxes and you gain 50 points — and 63 is exactly three of each face. So the useful way to track the upper section is *relative to three*: four fives is +5, two sixes is −6. Stay at or above zero and the bonus arrives on its own.

The lower section

One pair scores the sum of the highest pair. Two pairs scores the sum of both. Three alike and four alike score the sum of those dice only, not all five. A full house scores the sum of all five dice. A small straight (1-2-3-4-5) scores a flat 15 and a large straight (2-3-4-5-6) scores a flat 20 — the sums, which is why they are fixed. Chance takes the plain total of all five dice. Yatzy, five of a kind, scores 50.

The zero

If nothing fits, you must still write into a box and take whatever it scores, including nothing. Choosing *where* to take a zero is one of the real skills in the game: Ones costs at most 5 points against the bonus track, while zeroing Yatzy or a straight throws away 50 or 20 outright. Good players sacrifice Ones early and keep Chance in reserve as a landing pad for a bad final roll.

Where games are won

Two things dominate the score distribution: the 50-point upper bonus and the 50-point Yatzy. The bonus is the more reliable of the two, and playing the upper section deliberately from turn one — rather than filling it with leftovers — is worth more than chasing five of a kind.

Controls

Tap Roll to throw the dice, tap any die to keep it, then tap a box on the scorecard to score there.

Keyboard

1-5 keep a die.
R rolls.

Strategy tips

Track the upper section as plus-or-minus against three of each face. As long as you are not below zero, the 50-point bonus is on course.
Sacrifice Ones for your zero when you need one. It costs at most 5 against the bonus; zeroing a straight or Yatzy costs 20 or 50.
Keep Chance unused for as long as you can. It is the box that rescues a wasted final roll.
With three of a kind after the first roll, reroll the other two — the chance of improving to four alike or a full house is well worth it.
Do not break a four-dice straight draw to protect a mediocre pair; the flat 15 and 20 are among the easiest reliable scores on the card.
Early in a game, prefer filling the upper section on high faces. Sixes and Fives carry the bonus; Ones and Twos rarely do.
Late in a game, count what is still open before you commit. Filling Three-of-a-Kind with a weak roll when Chance is still free is a common few-point leak.