Pig
Roll again or hold? A 1 wipes your turn. First to 50.
Pig is a push-your-luck dice game in which two players take turns rolling and adding up their turn total. Tap Hold to bank it, but roll a 1 and you lose the turn's total. First to 50 points wins.
Keep rolling to build your turn total, then tap Hold to bank it before a 1 wipes it out. One question over and over, in front of the other player: one more roll?
Also known as Pig dice game, Push-your-luck dice game.
- How you hold it
- Face-off
- Match
- First to 50
- Length
- About 1.5 to 3 minutes
- Play
- Friend or bot
How to play Pig: quick rules
About 1.5 to 3 minutes for a race to 50. Full rules, options and bot levels are further down.
- 1Tap Roll. A 2 to 6 adds to your turn total.
- 2Roll a 1 and you lose this turn's total, and the turn passes.
- 3Tap Hold to bank your turn total.
- 4First to 50 wins.
Play Pig here
Two of you on this screen, or you against the bot. The full game is in the app.
Pig rules
Setup
- Both banks start at 0. The race is to 50 points (30 or 100 with the Race to option).
- A new match picks the first player with a coin toss. The loser of a game starts the next one, and a rematch starts with the player who lost.
A turn
- Your turn total starts at 0. Tap Roll: a 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6 adds that number to your turn total and you choose again.
- Roll a 1 and you bust: the whole turn total is lost and the turn passes. Your bank is safe.
- Tap Hold to add your turn total to your bank and pass the die. You can't hold on 0.
- The moment your bank plus your turn total reaches the target, it banks by itself.
Winning
- Last chance (on by default): if the player who started reaches the target, the other player gets one final turn to beat that bank. Hold is off; pass the bank and you win at once, roll a 1 and you lose. If the second player reaches the target first, they win straight away. So both players always get the same number of turns.
- With Last chance off, the first player to reach the target wins.
- A game of Pig can't end in a draw. In best of 3, the first to win 2 games takes the match.
- Every roll, the bot's included, comes from fair dice that are never adjusted.
Hints against the bot
- Playing the bot outside a tournament, once your turn total is above 0, you can spend 20 coins on a hint. It rings Roll or Hold, whichever the strongest play is, for two seconds and never presses it for you.
- One hint per turn, none on a Last chance turn, and none with a friend, online or in a tournament.
Extras
- Last chance
- On by default. The second player gets one final turn to beat the starter's winning bank, so turns are equal.
- Streak flame
- On by default. A flame burns behind your turn total from the 4th scoring roll in a turn, and roars from the 6th. It is just for show.
- Shield
- Off by default. Each player's first 1 in a game is blocked: it scores nothing but the turn goes on.
- Snake eyes
- Off by default. Roll two dice and add both. Any 1 busts the turn, and two 1s empty your whole bank.
Tips to win at Pig
- 1Set a stopping number before you roll. Holding once your turn total reaches about 20 is a well-known rule of thumb for a race to 100; in a race to 50, aim a little lower.
- 2Push harder when you're behind and play safer when you're ahead, the way the Hard bot does.
- 3When your opponent is close to the target, keep rolling: a small safe bank won't save you if they win next turn.
- 4Remember every roll has a 1 in 6 chance of a 1, however well the turn is going. A long streak doesn't make the next roll safer.
Where Pig comes from
Pig is a traditional folk dice game, and the earliest printed rules are usually traced to John Scarne's 1945 book on dice games. It is often used to teach probability, because the question of when to stop rolling has a clear best answer that is surprisingly hard to work out.
Controls
Phone flat between you. Each player owns a half, and the far half faces the far player.
- Each player has a Roll button and a Hold button in their own dock at their own end. Only the mover's buttons are lit.
- Roll shows your dice; Hold shows a lock and the points it would bank.
- You can also tap the dice in the tray in front of you to roll.
- On your friend's turn the scoreboard turns to face them, so nobody reads upside down.
Options
Every option is free. Defaults are marked.
| Option | Choices | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Race to | 3050 (default)100 | The bank that wins a game. |
| Games | Single (default)Best of 3 | |
| Last chance | On (default)Off | Extra: equal turns for both players. |
| Streak flame | On (default)Off | Extra: a flame behind long turns, no effect on points. |
| Shield | Off (default)On | Extra: blocks your first 1 each game. |
| Dice | One die (default)Snake eyes | Extra: Snake eyes rolls two dice, and double 1 empties your bank. |
Play Pig against the bot
The bot plays Blue, rolls the same fair dice and presses Roll and Hold where you can see them. It never sees a future roll, and it takes the same time to decide whether it rolls or holds, so its pause gives nothing away.
Easy
Holds too early at random, or pushes on far too long.
Normal
Holds once it has a steady turn total, but sometimes makes the wrong call.
Hard
Never slips. It pushes harder when it is behind, plays safer when it is ahead, and keeps rolling when you are close to winning.
Online, tournaments and hints
- Online
- PlannedPig is turn-based and online play for it is planned, but not available yet. Today you play a friend on one phone or the bot.
- Tournament
- Can be drawn in a tournamentIn a tournament it is a single race to 50 with Last chance and Streak flame on, Shield and Snake eyes off, and no hints.
- Hints
- Stuck against the bot? A hint lights up the strongest move for a few coins. Never with a friend, online or in a tournament.
Coming soon
- Online play. Play Pig against a friend on another phone, with a clock on each decision.
How it feels
- A rattle and a clack on every roll, with a "+N" burst as your turn total grows.
- On Hold, the number lifts off the scoreboard and flies into your glass tube with a soft clink.
- On a 1, a low thud: the painted number cracks and drops and your turn total drains away.
- A drum roll for Last chance, and a fanfare at the goal star.
Accessibility
- Turn total, banks and points still needed are numbers, never colour alone.
- The scoreboard turns to face whoever is rolling, so nobody reads upside down.
- Big buttons, every one labelled for a screen reader, and the roll is announced.
- With reduced motion on, numbers fade instead of flying or cracking.
Pig questions
On your turn, roll as often as you like and add each roll to your turn total. Roll a 1 and you lose that turn's total; tap Hold to bank it instead. The first player to bank 50 wins.
The dice are luck, but deciding when to stop is a real skill. A good stopping plan beats a reckless one over time.
In plain Pig it does. With Last chance on, which is the default, the second player always gets a final turn to catch up, so turns are equal.
Pick a turn total to stop at and stick to it, then adjust: push on when you're behind or your opponent is close to winning, and bank sooner when you're ahead.
Yes. Pig in Duo Clash is built for two players on the same phone. Phone flat between you. Each player owns a half, and the far half faces the far player.
Yes. The bot plays Blue, rolls the same fair dice and presses Roll and Hold where you can see them. Choose Easy, Normal or Hard.
Play Pig on one phone
Free on Android. Sit face to face, or take on the bot on Easy, Normal or Hard.
