UNOULTIMATE

The goal

Be the first to play the last card from your hand — that wins the round. Under the official rules the round winner scores points for the cards everyone else is still holding, and the first player to reach 500 points wins the match.

Each turn you play a card onto the shared discard pile, matching the card on top. If you cannot, or would rather not, you draw from the draw pile instead. Action cards make opponents miss turns, turn the direction round or draw cards, so slowing down whoever is close to going out is half the game.

The game seats 2 to 4 players. Each seat is a person or the computer; with two or more people you pass one device around (see “Using the app”).

The deck

One deck has 108 cards: four colours — red, yellow, green and blue — and the black wild cards.

That is 25 cards in each colour plus 8 wilds. House rules can shuffle in a second deck (216 cards) or add Shuffle Hands wilds — see “Deal & deck” in the house rules.

Starting a round

1. A dealer is picked at random for the first round. After that, the deal moves on one seat every round.
2. The cards are shuffled and everyone is dealt 7 cards, one at a time, starting with the player after the dealer.
3. The rest of the cards are the face-down draw pile. Its top card is turned over to start the discard pile.
4. The player after the dealer goes first. The ring around the discard pile shows the colour in play and the direction of play.

If the first card turned up is an action card or a wild, the official rules apply it straight away:

A Shuffle Hands wild is buried the same way. The house rule “First card: Numbers only” keeps turning until a number card comes up.

Your turn

On your turn, play one card from your hand onto the discard pile. It must match the top card in at least one way:

• Colour — on , or on .
• Number — on .
• Symbol — on , or on .
• Wild — and go on anything. You then name the colour to be followed next.

After a wild, the next card must be of the named colour (or another wild). The named colour is shown beside the discard pile.

Cards you are allowed to play light up. Tap one to play it; for a wild, choose a colour.

The top card is and you hold , , and . You may play (colour), (number) or — but not , which is neither green nor a 5.

Drawing and passing

If you cannot play — or choose not to — tap Draw (or the draw pile) and take one card.

• If the card you drew can be played, you may play it straight away. Only that card: you cannot play a different card from your hand instead.
• You may also keep it and tap Pass.
• If it cannot be played, your turn ends by itself.

You may draw even when you hold a playable card — keeping cards back is part of the strategy. (The house rule “Forced play” takes that choice away.)

When the draw pile runs out, the discard pile — all but its top card — is shuffled to make a new draw pile.

Action cards in short

The “Cards” chapter explains each card in full, with all the edge cases.

Saying UNO

When you go down to one card, you must say UNO. In this game you tap the red UNO! button, either:

• while you still hold two cards, before you play — the button shows on your turn once you are down to two; or
• straight after playing your second-to-last card, before anyone else acts.

If you forget, any other player can catch you: they see a Catch! button on your seat. A caught player draws 2 cards.

The chance to catch you ends as soon as somebody else acts — the next player plays, draws or passes, someone challenges or jumps in — or when you tap UNO! yourself before anyone catches you.

Drawing cancels your call: if you tapped UNO! with two cards and then drew instead of playing, you have to say it again next time.

The computer gives a person about a second to remember before it catches them. When a computer player forgets, you only have until the next player moves — a slower AI speed gives you more time.

Wild Draw Four and the challenge

A Wild Draw Four is only legal when you hold no card of the colour in play. Only the colour counts: cards that match by number or symbol, and other wilds, do not.

The game does not stop you from bluffing. Instead, the player who has to draw 4 may tap Challenge instead of taking the cards. The game then checks the hand of the player who played the Wild Draw Four:

Only the player facing the Wild Draw Four can challenge, and only instead of drawing. If no colour was in play — a Wild was the very first card of the round — a Wild Draw Four can never be a bluff.

The top card is . Marco plays and names red while still holding . You challenge: it was a bluff, so Marco draws 4 and you play a red card (or draw) as usual. Had Marco held no blue card, you would have drawn 6 and lost your turn.

When stacking is on, a challenge is about the whole stack: a bluffer draws the whole total, a failed challenger draws the total plus 2. See “Draw cards” in the house rules.

The end of a round

The round ends the moment a player plays their last card. Under the official rules that player scores the value of every card left in the other players’ hands.

If the last card was a Draw Two or a Wild Draw Four, the next player still draws those cards first, and they count towards the score.

The deal then moves on and a new round begins. The first player to reach 500 wins the match. Card values and the other match formats are in “Scoring and winning”.

Two players

With two players a Reverse works like a Skip: your opponent misses their turn and you play again. Skips, Draw Twos and Wild Draw Fours also give you another turn, because the only other player loses theirs.

The house rule “Reverse with 2 players” can make a Reverse just turn round instead — which, with two players, means your opponent simply plays next.

The same goes whenever only two players are left in a round, for example late in a “Play to the last” round.

Number cards

Number cards have no effect of their own. Play one on the same colour or the same number. Each colour has one 0 and two of every number from 1 to 9.

Left in your hand at the end of a round, a number card is worth its face value: a 9 costs 9 points, a 0 nothing.

With the 7-0 house rules, 7s and 0s gain an effect — see “The special 7 and 0” below.

Skip

The next player loses their turn and play moves on to the player after them. Play it on its own colour or on another Skip.

• With two players (or two left in the round) you simply play again.
• With the multiple-cards house rule, every extra Skip skips one more player. In a three-player game two Skips bring the turn straight back to you.
• With the deflect house rule, a Skip of the colour in play passes a waiting Draw Two or Wild Draw Four on to the next player.

Reverse

Play changes direction: the player who played just before you plays next, and so on round the table.

• With two players (or two left in the round) a Reverse works like a Skip and you play again. A house rule can switch this off.
• Two Reverses played together cancel each other out (multiple-cards house rule).
• With the deflect house rule, a Reverse of the colour in play sends a waiting draw penalty back to the player who played it.

Draw Two

The next player draws 2 cards and loses their turn. Under the official rules they cannot play anything to avoid it — they tap Take +2.

• House rules can let them stack another Draw Two (passing on +4), deflect it with a Reverse or Skip, or keep their turn after drawing.
• Two Draw Twos played together make +4 (multiple-cards house rule).
• If a Draw Two is the card that wins a round, the next player still draws 2 before the scores are counted (in the points formats).

Wild

Play it on any card — even when you hold a card that matches. Then name one of the four colours; the next player must follow it or play another wild.

Worth 50 points, so it is an expensive card to be caught holding at the end of a round.

The one exception: while a Draw Two or Wild Draw Four is waiting for you, a Wild cannot be played — it does not stop a draw penalty.

Wild Draw Four

Name a colour; the next player draws 4 cards and loses their turn.

Officially you may only play it when you hold no card of the colour in play — number and symbol matches do not matter. The next player may challenge it; the outcome and card counts are in “Wild Draw Four and the challenge” in the basics.

• The house rule “Wild Draw Four: Play anytime” drops the restriction and the challenge.
• “Only without the colour” has the game enforce the restriction instead: the card does not light up while you hold the colour in play, so there is nothing to challenge.
• It never starts a round: turned up as the first card, it goes back into the pile.
• Worth 50 points.

Shuffle Hands wild

Only in the deck when the Shuffle Hands wilds house rule adds it (1 or 2 per deck). It is a wild: play it on any card and name a colour. Then:

1. Every player still in the round hands in all their cards — including the rest of yours.
2. The cards are shuffled together.
3. They are dealt out again one at a time, starting with the next player in the direction of play. You are dealt to last.
4. Play continues with the next player as usual, on the colour you named.

The total number of cards stays the same, and the new hands differ by one card at most. Because you are dealt to last, you never get one of the bigger hands — so it is at its best when you hold more cards than anyone else.

• Anyone left with a single card after the deal counts as having said UNO.
• It cannot answer a Draw Two or Wild Draw Four penalty.
• If it is your last card you go out — and the other players’ hands are still shuffled and dealt out among them.
• Like the Wild Draw Four, it is buried if turned up as the first card of a round. Worth 40 points.

The special 7 and 0

With the house rules 7: swap hands and 0: pass hands, these number cards gain an effect on top of being normal numbers:

• 7 — choose another player still in the round and swap hands with them. With only one opponent left, it happens automatically.
• 0 — every player still in the round passes their whole hand to the next player in the direction of play.

Neither happens when the 7 or 0 is your last card — you simply go out. Full details and examples are under “Special rules” in the house rules.

Card values

Points only ever come from cards left in hands at the end of a round. The match formats differ in who receives them.

The four match formats

The Target score setting (100, 200, 300 or 500) only matters for the two points formats, and Rounds (1, 3 or 5) only for the other two. The setup screen greys out whichever does not apply.

Points (official)

The round winner scores the total value of the cards in every other hand; nobody else scores. When the winner’s running total reaches the target score, the match ends and the highest total wins.

Three players. Luna goes out. Marco holds (9 + 20 = 29) and Iris holds (50 + 5 = 55). Luna scores 84.

Penalty points

Every player except the round winner adds the value of their own remaining cards to their total; the winner adds nothing. As soon as anyone’s total reaches the target score the match ends, and the lowest total wins.

The same round: Luna adds 0, Marco 29, Iris 55. If that takes Iris to the target, the match ends — and whoever has the lowest total wins, not necessarily Luna.

First out

The round ends as soon as one player goes out, and that player wins it. Everyone else is placed by the value of the cards they still hold, lowest first; ties go to the player with fewer cards, then by seat order.

With 1 round, the first player out simply wins the match. With 3 or 5 rounds, each round hands out placement points — first place gets one point fewer than the number of players, each place after that one point less, and last place 0 — and the most points after the last round wins.

In this format a Draw Two or Wild Draw Four played as the winning card is never drawn — the round is already over.

Play to the last

When a player goes out, the round carries on without them until only one player still has cards. Players are placed in the order they went out, and the last one holding cards comes last. Players who are out watch the rest of the round; their turns are passed over.

Placement points work as in First out, added up over 1, 3 or 5 rounds. With two players this format plays exactly like First out.

A draw card played as somebody’s last card still hits the next player, because the round goes on.

Ties

If players finish the match level, the one with more round wins ranks higher. If that is level too, the better place in the last round decides.

When the draw pile runs out

What happens depends on the house rule “When the deck runs out”:

• Reshuffle discards (official) — every card of the discard pile except the top one is shuffled into a new draw pile, and play goes on. The top card and the colour in play stay as they are.
• End the round — the round ends the moment someone needs a card and the draw pile is empty, even part-way through drawing a penalty. Players who have not gone out are placed by the value of their hand, lowest first, and the lowest hand wins the round.

An ended round is scored as usual for the format: in Points the round winner collects everyone else’s hand values, in Penalty points everyone else scores their own, and in the placement formats the order gives the placement points. A waiting draw penalty is not drawn.

Even with reshuffling, a round can run dry when nearly every card is in someone’s hand. If nobody can play or draw for several laps of the table, the round ends as if the deck had run out.

Knock-outs (hand limit)

With the “Hand limit” house rule, a player whose hand reaches the limit is knocked out of the round. Their cards are shuffled back into the draw pile, but the value of that hand is remembered for scoring:

If knock-outs leave only one player holding cards, the round ends. In Points, Penalty points and First out that player wins the round; in Play to the last they take the next free place.

Fine points of timing

• A final draw card still counts. In the two points formats, if the winning card is a Draw Two or Wild Draw Four — or adds to or deflects a stack — the player next in line draws the waiting total before the hands are scored. That last draw never knocks anyone out.
• Going out ends the round at once in every format except Play to the last. A 7 or 0 played as your last card does not swap or pass any hands.
• Single-round games show no running score. In First out and Play to the last with 1 round, the result simply lists the order and the cards left in each hand.

Winning & scoring

How a round is won and when the match ends. These three settings shape the whole game — see also “Scoring and winning”.

Deal & deck

How many cards, which cards, how a round starts and what happens when the draw pile is empty.

Playing cards

What you may play and when: several cards at once, out of turn, whether you must play, and which cards you may go out on.

Drawing

What happens when you draw instead of playing.

Draw cards

Draw Twos and Wild Draw Fours: stacking them, deflecting them, challenging them and what taking them costs you.

Special rules

Hand swaps and knock-outs — the rules that can turn a round upside down.

UNO call & time

Calling UNO, and a clock for human players.

Three screens

1. Title — choose your rules from the six presets: tap one, then Next (or tap it twice). Here you can also Continue an unfinished game, open Records or this guide, sign in, and change the language.
2. Setup — choose 2, 3 or 4 players. Make each seat Human or AI, type names, tap a portrait to change it, and pick each AI’s level and the AI speed. Below that, every rule of the preset can be changed. Then tap Start game.
3. Game — the table. When the match is over you see the final standings, with Play again (same seats and rules), Records and Back to title.

On the setup screen the rules are grouped into seven sections. Rules changed from the official ones are marked, and rules that do not apply to the chosen match format are greyed out. Change a preset and it becomes “Customised (based on …)”; a reset button takes you back.

Controls

The menu also sorts your hand by colour or by number, switches sound effects, and has Save and return to title and Abandon this game. Cards you have just drawn are marked until your turn ends.

Playing several cards at once

With the “Multiple cards” house rule, tapping a card that has partners in your hand selects it rather than playing it.

1. Tap the first card. It must match the pile.
2. Tap the cards to add, in the order you want them played. Only cards that fit light up.
3. Tap Play N (or press Enter). The last card selected sets the colour.

• To play the first card on its own, tap it again.
• Tap a selected card to take it out again; tapping the first card clears the whole selection.
• Tapping a playable card that does not fit starts again from that card — or plays it, if nothing else could go with it.

Pass-and-play

Make two or more seats Human and take turns on one device. Whenever the turn passes to a different person, a hand-over screen covers the table: hand the device over, and the next player taps I am … — start to see their cards. The table turns so that the person playing always sits at the bottom.

• A resumed game always starts from the hand-over screen.
• The turn clock does not run while the hand-over screen is up.
• Only the person whose hand is on screen can jump in, so nobody ever sees someone else’s cards. Computer players can jump in and catch at any time.
• Mix in computer seats as you like.

Computer players

Each AI seat has its own level: Easy, Normal or Hard. The computer never peeks. It uses only what a player at a real table would know: the discard pile, its own hand, how many cards everyone holds, and which colours each player has had to draw on.

• It weighs every play it could make, multi-card plays included, and picks the best. Easy adds a lot of randomness.
• It holds wilds back while its hand is big, and saves Skips, Draw Twos and Reverses for players close to going out.
• It names the colour it holds most of; Hard also favours colours the next player is known to lack.
• Under 7-0 it swaps with whoever has the fewest cards (Easy picks at random), and likes a 0 or Shuffle Hands when its own hand is big.
• It challenges a Wild Draw Four when a bluff looks likely; Easy challenges on a whim.

The AI speed on the setup screen (Slow, Normal, Fast) sets how long the computer takes over each move. Once every person is out of the round, the computer plays the rest faster.

Saving and Continue

The game saves after every move. Close the tab whenever you like: next time, Continue on the title screen picks up exactly where you left off — even the order of the draw pile is the same. Save and return to title in the menu does the same on purpose.

• Only one unfinished game is kept: starting a new one replaces it.
• Delete this game under Continue, or Abandon this game in the menu, throws it away. Abandoned games are not recorded.
• The save lives in this browser, on this device.

Records

Every finished match is recorded automatically. Open Records from the title screen or from the end-of-match screen.

• Totals: matches played, matches won by people, average turns and the biggest stack.
• Win rates by player — people by name, the computer by level.
• Cards played versus drawn per match, results by rules, and your most recent matches.
• Export JSON downloads everything; Clear all deletes it, and cannot be undone.

This device keeps your latest 60 matches, or 200 while you are signed in.

Account and sync

Signing in is optional — the whole game works without it. With an account, every finished match is also saved to it, so your records appear on your other devices too. Use Sign in on the title screen.

• One account for two games. It is the same account as Catan Ultimate: sign in with the same email and password. An account created here works there as well.
• Creating an account needs an invite code.
• Records are kept on your device first and sent to your account in the background. When you are offline they wait on the device and go up at the next sync — when the game starts, when you sign in, or when you tap Sync now in the account window.
• Matches you played before signing in are added to your account when you sign in.
• Each account’s records are kept apart on the device, so people sharing a device do not mix them up.
• Password, icon and account deletion are managed in Catan Ultimate — the account window has a link. An icon set there shows here too.

Passkeys

Instead of typing a password you can sign in with a passkey — Face ID, Touch ID, a fingerprint or your device PIN. Passkeys are shared with Catan Ultimate: one created there works here, and one added here works there. Your password manager lists them under catan-ultimate.pages.dev.

• After signing in with your password, add one from the account window with Add a passkey on this device.
• Passkeys work in recent versions of Chrome, Edge and Safari. In other browsers, sign in with your password.

Playing online with friends

Signed-in players can play one game together, each on their own device. Tap Play online on the title screen (it appears once you sign in).

1. Become friends. Tell a friend the 8-digit friend code shown in the online lobby; they enter it and tap Send request, then you tap Accept. Only names are shown to each other, never email addresses. Friends are shared with Catan Ultimate.
2. Create a game. Choose the rules (any preset, or your custom rules), 2–4 players, and for each seat either a friend to invite or an AI and its level. Then tap Send invitations.
3. Answer. Invited friends see the invitation in their online lobby, and a notice pops up on any screen within about 20 seconds; the title button shows how many are waiting.
4. Start. The host taps Start the game once at least one friend has joined. Seats that have not answered are filled by AI.

• You only control your own seat — there is no hand-over screen. Interruptions work as usual: Catch!, jump-ins and challenges from any player are taken in the order they reach the server.
• After each round anyone can tap Next round; if nobody does, the game moves on by itself after a short while.
• Going back to the title does not end the game. Open Play online → Continue to return, even after reloading the page.
• A player who stays disconnected for about 45 seconds is shown as away and an AI plays their seat until they come back. Leave this online game in the menu hands your seat to the AI for good.
• When the game ends, it is saved in each player’s records (marked as online) and counted in your record against each friend.

Every device holds the whole table, so friends play on trust: the screen never shows other hands, but a developer tool could. The draw pile is reshuffled with a fresh server seed before every move, so peeking at it does not reveal the next card.

Language, sound and full screen

• Language — English, 日本語 or ไทย, on the title screen or in the menu. It switches instantly, even in the middle of a game, and the game log is translated too.
• Music — a relaxed bossa-nova track the game plays by itself. Switch it with ♪ or M. Sound effects can be turned on and off separately in the menu.
• Full screen — the button at the top right, or F.

Installing as an app

Where the browser supports it, an Install app button appears on the title screen. Once installed, the game opens in its own window and works offline. On an iPhone or iPad, tap Share → Add to Home Screen in Safari.

When a new version is ready, a bar at the bottom offers to Reload.

Opening this guide

• How to play on the title screen.
• On the setup screen: the ? next to each rule opens that rule’s explanation, and About this preset next to the preset name opens its page.
• During a game: How each rule works (guide) in the rules panel (the ? button), or How to play in the menu.