Canasta is a melding card game played here as a two-player game with two full decks. You collect cards of the same rank into melds and aim to build a canasta — a meld of seven cards — before your opponent does. Deuces are wild, red threes are bonus cards, and the game runs to 5000 points. Free in your browser, no sign-up.
Goal: meld cards of matching rank, complete at least two canastas, and go out before your opponent to bank the round.
| Card | Points |
|---|---|
| Ace, 2 (wild) | 20 |
| King down to 8 | 10 |
| 7 down to 4, black 3 | 5 |
| Red 3 (bonus) | 100 each |
A red 3 is set aside for a 100-point bonus and replaced from the stock. Going out earns another 100 — but only once you hold two complete canastas.
Three AI difficulty levels (easy, medium, hard) from the menu. This build uses the two-player rules: draw two cards each turn, and going out requires two canastas. The frozen pile, red-three bonuses, and rising initial-meld minimums are all in play. Install it as an app from your browser menu to play offline.
Canasta was invented around 1939 in Montevideo, Uruguay, by attorney Segundo Santos and his partner Alberto Serrato. The name means "basket" in Spanish. It swept the United States in the early 1950s and for a few years rivalled Contract Bridge as the most-played card game in American homes.
For the complete rules, including card values, the frozen pile, the initial meld ladder and going out, read the full Canasta rules guide.