Slam Bidding In Bridge

Points Needed To Bid A Slam In Bridge

All the bidding gadgets are great but bridge lessons that focus on simple concepts are going to be your biggest help in judging your overall strength on a hand and giving you the confidence to bid slam.

Points For 6NT

With 2 balanced hands and 33 points between you and your partner you've got a pretty good chance of making 6NT.

Why 33 points? Well, 33 points is enough not to guarantee that we make 6NT, but it's enough to make 6NT likely to make more often than not.

Is that good enough for slam bidding? I think it is. You can spend a bit of time on Google and you can check what percentage of the time top players make their slam, and you'll find it's going to be around about 70%. I'll save you Googling it, but have a look if you like.

So a 70% slam is reasonable, and with 33 points between the two hands, we have a reasonable chance of making a slam. It's going to make more often than not.

Points For 6 Of A Suit

30-32 points with a good trump fit and distribution will often be enough for slam in a suit contract and sometimes you can make with less than that. But it's still good to have these basic numbers to work with.

Finding Out About Strength

Simple bidding is often going to give you all the information you need about your combined strength but one useful way of getting more information from partner is to bid fourth suit forcing before setting trumps.

Slam Bidding Conventions

Asking For Aces

Many players want to leap off to ask for aces using some version of Blackwood but aces alone aren't enough to make a slam. The trouble is that it's not always easy to know how to get the information needed at a lower level.

Splinter Bids

Splinter bids are another way you can show strength and distribution, inviting to slam before having to bid past game.

Cue Bids

Cue bidding is another option to show precisely where your aces and kings are rather than just how many you have.

Slam Bidding Practice

When I played this hand in a recent tournament I was playing Standard. If you play Acol, you'll need to adjust your point count thinking just a little bit, but the concepts are still exactly the same. You can play this hand using the link above.

Responding to 1NT

North opens 1NT showing 15-17 points and a balanced hand. East overcalls 2♦, and this 2♦ doesn't necessarily show Diamonds. It simply says that East has a 5 or 6 card suit somewhere, but we don't know what suit it is yet. You might think that's a strange system, but that's what they were doing.

Strong Enough

On this hand I've got 18, North has shown 15 to 17, so that's 33 to 35 points between the two hands.

This one's a little bit better because I do have that 5 card club suit. Of course it's a little bit scary because maybe the opposition have got the ♥A and ♥K.

I did not know what to do but sometimes you just have to guess so I crossed my fingers and bid 6NT.

Slam Makes!

6NT Made 7.

You can't make them all

In 2025 I was playing in the World Championship of Bridge, and on the last day before our team before got knocked out, we were having a tough time. On one hand my partner and I bid to a Grand Slam. It wasn't really much to do with me, it was my partner who made that final decision. He bid 7♠, and unfortunately we were missing the Ace of Trumps.

That got doubled. Not only did we lose that Ace of Trumps, we lost another trick as well, and we ended up going down 2. If you were me in that situation, how do you think you would feel at that moment?

Of course I didn't want to be in 7♠ doubled going down 2, playing for our country, having to bring this back to our teammates, to our captain. Not pretty.

On the other hand, I had a sneaking admiration for my partner, who bid that 7♠ contract. He was in a difficult position, and he was brave enough to make the bid that he thought was the right bid. It didn't work out but he was brave enough to make the decision.

So when you're playing bridge and you're worried that if you do the wrong thing maybe your partner will be upset, well, maybe your partner won't be upset. Maybe your partner will be saying, wow! - you were brave enough to do something you thought was right at the time, even if it didn't work out.