What Is a Soft Hand in Blackjack?

A soft hand in blackjack is any hand with an ace that is still being counted as 11. It is called soft because one more card cannot bust it: if the next card would take you over 21, the ace simply drops to 1 and the hand plays on.

Ace and 6 is a soft 17, because it can also be read as 7. Draw a 9 and the ace has to count as 1, which leaves you with a hard 16. A hand is hard when it has no ace, or when every ace in it must count as 1 to stay under 22. With two aces, only one of them can ever be 11: ace, ace and 5 is a soft 17. The number under each card is what it counts as:

Build a hand and watch the ace

Add cards one at a time, or deal a random one. While the hand is soft, the ace shows 11. As soon as 11 would take the hand over 21, it drops to 1 and the hand turns hard.

What is a soft 17?

A soft 17 is any hand that totals 17 with an ace counted as 11: ace and 6, or a hand of three or more cards such as ace, 2, 4. It is not the same hand as a hard 17 like 10 and 7.

Soft 17 is also the dealer rule printed on the felt. H17 means the dealer must hit soft 17; S17 means the dealer stands on all 17s.

Other soft totals

Soft totals run from soft 12 (two aces) to soft 21. Soft 18 is ace and 7, soft 19 is ace and 8, and so on: any total where one ace still counts as 11. Strategy charts give the soft hands their own section, listed as A,2 to A,9.

Related pages

• The strategy chart for H17 games or for S17 games, with every soft total.
• Blackjack rules: how the dealer plays, including the soft 17 rule.
• Blackjack double down probabilities, soft doubles included.
• Blackjack dealer outcome probabilities under H17 and S17.
• Blackjack Hand Calculator: the total and the best play for any hand you build.
• Blackjack Strategy Drills, including a soft hands drill, and the Blackjack Strategy Trainer.
• What does R mean in blackjack? and the full glossary of blackjack terms.