Skip Bo Card Game: Rules, Skip-Bo Junior and the Boxes to Buy

What the Skip Bo card game is

Skip-Bo is a card game about counting up. Up to four shared piles grow in the middle of the table, each one running from 1 to 12. Everybody plays onto the same piles. Your real goal sits in front of you: a face-down stock pile with its top card turned up. Get every card out of that pile and you win.

That's the trick of the game. The middle belongs to everyone, so every card you play also helps the next player. Half of Skip-Bo is deciding when to play a card and when to sit on it so the person to your left doesn't get the 7 they've clearly been waiting for.

Here are the box facts, from Mattel's instruction sheets and the listings in our data:

• Players: 2 to 6
• Ages: 7+
• Cards: 162 on Mattel's sheets (144 numbered 1 to 12, plus 18 wild Skip-Bo cards)
• Play time: none of the listings in our data state one
• Co-op or competitive: competitive, with a partnership option
• Expansion: no; every box is a complete game

Skip-Bo Junior is a separate box for ages 5+ and 2 to 4 players. It has its own section below.

How Skip-Bo plays

The rules below are in my own words, from two Mattel instruction sheets: the standard Skip-Bo sheet (R7311) and the Skip-Bo Deluxe sheet (N7808), which comes with the storage-tin version and adds a score pad and pencil. The two sheets give the same rules.

The four kinds of piles

Skip-Bo has a lot of piles, and new players mix them up. Here's what each one does:

1. Stock pile: one per player, face down, with the top card turned face up. This is the pile you're trying to empty.
2. Draw pile: the rest of the deck, face down in the middle. You refill your hand from here.
3. Building piles: up to four, in the middle, shared by everyone. Each starts with a 1 or a wild Skip-Bo card and goes up in order to 12.
4. Discard piles: up to four per player, in front of you. You can stack any cards on them in any order, but you can only play the top card.

At the start, only the stock piles and the draw pile exist. The building and discard piles appear as people play.

Setting up

1. Remove any blank cards. They aren't part of the game.
2. Shuffle, and everyone draws a card. Highest card deals. Skip-Bo cards don't count for this.
3. With 2 to 4 players, the dealer deals 30 cards to each player. With 5 or more, deal 20 each.
4. Each player turns the top card of their stock pile face up without looking at the rest.
5. The rest of the deck goes face down in the middle as the draw pile.

A turn, start to finish

1. The player to the dealer's left goes first.
2. Draw cards from the draw pile until you hold 5. On your first turn, that's 5 cards.
3. Play cards onto the building piles, always in order. A 1 or a Skip-Bo card starts a new pile. After that, each card must be the next number up.
4. You can play the top card of your stock pile, the top card of any of your discard piles, or any card from your hand.
5. If you play all 5 cards from your hand, draw 5 more and keep going.
6. End your turn by putting one card from your hand onto one of your discard piles.

You can end your turn whenever you can't play, or simply when you don't want to play any more. The sheets say so plainly. It's the most relaxed sentence I've read on a rule sheet, and it hides the real strategy of the game.

Wild cards and full piles

Skip-Bo cards are wild. They can start a building pile or stand in for any number. The sheets mark this as important, and they're right: most turns that empty a stock pile fast have a Skip-Bo card in the middle of them.

When a building pile reaches 12, take it off the table and start a new one in its place. If the draw pile runs out, shuffle the completed building piles to make a new draw pile.

Winning and scoring

The first player to empty their stock pile wins the game.

For a longer match, the sheets give a scoring rule. The winner of each game scores 5 points for every card left in the other players' stock piles, plus 25 points for winning. First to 500 points wins the match. The Deluxe tin includes a score pad and pencil for exactly this.

Short game, partners and a sneaky rule

• Short game: deal 10 cards to each stock pile. Everything else stays the same.
• Partnership: partners work together toward emptying both stock piles. Both partners can keep playing from their remaining discard or stock piles even after one of the stock piles is done.
• Drawing too many cards: shuffle the extras into your own stock pile. That makes your main pile bigger.
• Playing out of turn: if someone catches it before the turn ends, the turn stops and play goes back to the right order, and the person who jumped in plays their next turn without drawing first. If nobody notices before the turn ends, it counts as a legal turn.

That last rule is the only one in my game closet that rewards people for not paying attention. Watch the table.

How to get better at Skip-Bo

None of these are rules, just habits that follow from them.

• Play from your stock pile first. The sheets say this too. Every other card is a means to that end.
• Treat your discard piles like sorted shelves. Put high cards on one, low cards on another, and try to stack them in descending order so they play off in a run later.
• Count what the next player needs. If the building pile is at 6 and their stock card shows a 7, think twice before you play your 6 on a different pile and leave theirs open.
• Save a Skip-Bo card. Holding one in your hand for the moment your stock card is one number off can turn a slow turn into a big one.

Marisol, watching a game from Bay Two: "Four discard piles is four shelves. Label them in your head, and don't let them turn into a floor."

Skip-Bo Junior

Skip-Bo Junior is listed in our data for ages 5+, 2 to 4 players, with 112 cards. The listing also says it's colorblind accessible. The rules below are in my own words from Mattel's Skip-Bo Junior sheet (HHB37).

What changes from the regular game

• Smaller numbers: building piles run from 1 to 10 instead of 1 to 12.
• Shorter stockpile: the dealer gives each player 10 cards. The sheet says to deal more for a longer game or fewer for a shorter one.
• Who goes first: the oldest player deals, and the youngest player goes first.

Level 1: everything face up

On each turn, the dealer deals the active player 3 cards face up, side by side. That's your hand, and everyone can see it. If you have cards left from your last turn, the new cards go on top, making three small stacks. You play from the top of your stockpile or the top of your hand stacks onto the building piles until you can't play. Then the next player goes.

The sheet includes a parent tip: remind younger players to look at the top of their stockpile first, then see whether their hand can set up a play for it. That's the whole strategy of the grown-up game, in one sentence for a 5-year-old.

Level 2: a hidden hand and discard piles

In Level 2 you hold your 3 cards instead of laying them out. At the end of your turn, any cards left in your hand go face up in front of you as your own discard piles, up to 3 of them, in any order. It's a step toward the regular game, with fewer piles to track.

If your kids are between 5 and 7, start with Junior Level 1. Move to Level 2 when they start telling you which card you should have played.

Skip-Bo boxes on Amazon US right now

Our data for this page lists 11 Skip-Bo listings on Amazon US as of October 2026, all from Mattel. Several are the same deck under different listings, so here they are by what you actually get. The table above shows what each listing states; a dash means the listing leaves it out.

The plain Skip-Bo deck

• Skip-Bo 52370: ages 7+, 2 to 6 players
• Skip-Bo (listing that states 168 cards): ages 7+, 2 to 6 players, 168 cards
• Two more listings named Skip-Bo: no specs stated
• Skip-Bo and Skip-Bo Combo Pack of 2: two decks; no specs stated

The 168-card listing is the one card count in our data that differs from the 162 on Mattel's sheets. The listing doesn't explain the extra cards, so check the contents before you buy. A two-deck pack is handy for a big table, or for the house where one deck always loses a 4.

Skip-Bo in a storage tin

• Skip-Bo in Storage Tin (Amazon Exclusive): ages 7+, 2 to 6 players, storage tin, and listed as colorblind accessible

The Deluxe instruction sheet for the tin version lists a score pad and pencil along with the cards. If you plan to play to 500 points, that saves a hunt for paper.

Bundles with other Mattel card games

• Card Game Set (Skip Bo, UNO and Phase 10)
• Phase 10 with Skip-Bo: ages 7+
• Skip Bo Bundled with UNO
• Set of 3 Games: UNO, Skip-Bo and DOS: ages 7+, in a storage tin

These are the picks for a family starting a card shelf from scratch. Each game in a bundle has its own rules, so see our UNO, Phase 10 and DOS pages for those.

Skip-Bo Junior

• Skip-Bo Junior: ages 5+, 2 to 4 players, 112 cards, colorblind accessible

It's the only Skip-Bo box in our data with a starting age under 7.

Skip-Bo vs Phase 10

These two get compared a lot, and a bundle in our data puts them in one order. Here's the table version of the difference, from the listings and the Skip-Bo sheets:

• Goal: Skip-Bo is a race to empty your stock pile. The bundle listings that include Phase 10 call it rummy-style, and its name tells you there are ten phases to complete.
• Shared cards: Skip-Bo's building piles belong to everyone. In a rummy-style game, your progress lives in your own hand.
• Ages: both Mattel listings in our data say 7+.
• Length: a Skip-Bo game ends when one stock pile is empty, and the short-game rule makes it quicker still. Phase 10 keeps going until someone gets through all ten phases.

If your table likes to interfere with each other, Skip-Bo gives more chances to do it. If your table likes working on its own plan, look at Phase 10.

Who should skip it

Skip Skip-Bo if your group wants a two-player game with a lot of decisions per turn. With 30 cards in each stock pile, a two-player game can feel long. Use the short-game rule, or pick a quicker card game. Skip it, too, if someone at your table gets upset when their card helps the next player. In Skip-Bo, that happens every turn.

For kids under 7, skip the regular deck and look at Skip-Bo Junior at 5+. Under 5, wait.

If you like Skip-Bo, look at these

Pages chosen by what they share with Skip-Bo: number cards, quick turns and 2 or more players.

• UNO: matching by number and color, from the same maker
• Phase 10: rummy-style, ten phases, same maker
• DOS: UNO's number-adding cousin
• Five Crowns: rummy with a wild card that changes every round
• Best family card games: short card games for mixed ages

See the Mattel brand page for the rest of the lineup.

Play from the stock first. Everything else is just storage.