Blackjack Surrender: Give Up Half Your Bet and Keep the Other Half

Surrender lets you give up your hand right after you see your first two cards: you lose half your bet and get the other half back. In late surrender – the version this page covers – you can surrender only after the dealer checks for blackjack, and with correct play it lowers the house edge by about 0.09 percentage points.

• What Surrender Means
• Late Surrender vs Early Surrender
• When to Surrender: The Chart Moves
• Why Giving Up Half Beats Playing On
• How Much Late Surrender Is Worth
• How to Find Online Tables That Offer Surrender

01What Surrender Means

Surrender means you give up your hand before you play it. The dealer takes half your bet and returns the other half to you.

You can surrender only as your first move, while you still hold your first two cards.

Here you have hard 16, and the dealer's up card, the face-up card, is a 10.

An ace counts as 11 unless that would bust the hand, then it counts as 1. A hard hand is a hand with no ace counted as 11.

• You press the Surrender button.
• Your hand ends right away.
• Half your bet comes back to you.
• The other half of your bet is lost.

After you hit, stand, double or split, the Surrender button is gone for that hand.

02Late Surrender vs Early Surrender

There are two versions of the rule. The difference is when you may surrender: before or after the dealer checks for blackjack.

When the dealer's up card is an ace or a 10-value card, the dealer looks at the hole card, the face-down card, to see if it makes blackjack. This check is called the peek.

Victoria's tip

If a game's rules say only "surrender", read the full rules to see which version it is. The chart on this page is for late surrender.

03When to Surrender: The Chart Moves

Under late surrender, the chart surrenders only a few hands. These moves are for 6 decks with double after split.

Some cells depend on the soft 17 rule, and the table marks them. A pair is two cards of the same value.

When the dealer stands on soft 17, you hit hard 15 against an ace, split a pair of 8s against an ace and stand on hard 17. Every other hand follows the normal basic strategy chart.

This row is hard 16 on the standard chart without surrender: stand against 2–6, hit against 7–A. With late surrender, the cells for 9, 10 and A change to surrender.

This row is hard 15 without surrender: stand against 2–6, hit against 7–A. With late surrender, the 10 cell changes to surrender, and the ace cell changes too only when the dealer hits soft 17.

This row is a pair of 8s without surrender: split against 2–A. With late surrender, only the ace cell can change, and only when the dealer hits soft 17 – against 9 and 10 you still split.

This row is hard 17 without surrender: stand against 2–A. You surrender it against an ace only when the table says the dealer hits soft 17.

Victoria's tip

Learn the surrender hands as a short list: 16 against 9, 10, A; 15 against 10. When the dealer hits soft 17, also 15 against A, 17 against A and a pair of 8s against A.

04Why Giving Up Half Beats Playing On

Take hard 16 against a dealer 10. Every choice loses money on average, so the question is which choice loses the least.

A negative number means you lose that share of your bet on average over many hands. Hitting and standing both lose a little more than half the bet.

Surrender always loses exactly half the bet. That is a smaller loss, so surrender is the better move here.

• Use the hit or stand calculator to compare moves for other hands.
• The gap is small on one hand. It adds up over many hands.

05How Much Late Surrender Is Worth

The house edge is the share of each bet the game keeps on average. Late surrender lowers it a little when you use it on the right hands.

Surrender helps only if you use it on the hands from the chart. Surrendering other hands raises the house edge.

• Basic strategy lowers the house edge. It does not remove it.
• You can compare rule sets in the house edge calculator.

06How to Find Online Tables That Offer Surrender

Some online blackjack games offer surrender and some do not. Check the game's rules before you play.

1. Open the game's rules or help panel.
2. Look for the words "surrender", "late surrender" or "early surrender".
3. Check if the dealer hits or stands on soft 17. This decides three cells: 15, 17 and a pair of 8s against an ace.
4. Deal a hand and look for a Surrender button next to Hit and Stand.

The blackjack rules page explains the other rule names you will see in the panel.

Victoria's tip

Practice the surrender hands in the trainer before you play a table that offers them.

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