Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG
Yu-Gi-Oh! is a two-player card game. Each duelist starts with 8000 Life Points, and you win by taking your opponent's to 0. This page covers the standard TCG rules as of September 2026, in the order you meet them at the table.
Each player starts a duel with 8000 Life Points (LP). You lower your opponent's LP mostly by attacking with monsters, and sometimes with card effects. When a player's LP reaches 0, that player loses.
This page follows the standard Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG rules as of September 2026. Konami publishes the official rulebook and updates it, so check it for anything that has changed since. For the LP details, including damage, costs and halving, see the Yu-Gi-Oh! Life Point Calculator page.
Each player brings their own deck, and a deck has up to three parts:
Most Yu-Gi-Oh! decks are built at exactly 40 cards in the Main Deck, because a smaller deck finds its key cards more often. You can have up to three copies of a card across all three parts of your deck combined, and the Forbidden & Limited List can lower that to two, one or zero for individual cards. The deck-building guide covers this in full.
You also need a way to count Life Points, plus a coin and a die if your deck has cards that call for them. Yu-Gi-Oh! has no resource like mana or energy. A card costs nothing to play beyond any cost printed on it, so what limits a turn is your one Normal Summon, the cards in your hand and the conditions written on each card.
Each player has their own side of the field, and cards go in specific zones. In the standard layout you get:
Monster Zones: five zones in a row for your monsters.
Spell & Trap Zones: five zones in a row for Spells and Traps. The leftmost and rightmost double as Pendulum Zones for Pendulum cards.
Field Zone: one zone for Field Spells.
Extra Monster Zones: two shared zones in the center of the field. Link Monsters, and Pendulum Monsters summoned from the Extra Deck, go here or to a zone a Link Monster points to. Fusion, Synchro and Xyz Monsters can go here or in your Main Monster Zones.
Main Deck, Extra Deck and Graveyard: your deck, your Extra Deck, and the pile where destroyed and used cards go, face up.
Cards that leave the field usually go to the Graveyard, and many cards work from there or bring cards back from it. Cards that are banished are removed from play and set aside face up, or face down if the card says so.
Monsters come in several kinds. Normal Monsters have no effect. Effect Monsters do. Ritual, Fusion, Synchro, Xyz and Link Monsters use special summoning methods, and Pendulum Monsters can also be used as Spells in the Pendulum Zones. To read every part of a card, see how to read a Yu-Gi-Oh! card.
Players take turns, and each turn has six phases in a fixed order:
The player who goes first cannot attack on their first turn, so that opening turn is spent building a board and Setting cards. After that, most decisions happen in Main Phase 1, because what you summon or remove there decides which attacks are worth making in the Battle Phase.
You get one Normal Summon or Set each turn. Setting a monster face down uses the same allowance. A monster of Level 4 or lower is summoned without a cost. A Level 5 or 6 monster needs one Tribute, meaning you send a monster you control to the Graveyard. A Level 7 or higher monster needs two Tributes.
Special Summons are separate from your Normal Summon, and there is no limit on how many you make in a turn. Each Special Summon happens through a card effect or a summoning method, and it is the reason a well-built deck can fill the field quickly:
Where an Extra Deck monster can go depends on the rules for the Extra Monster Zones and the arrows on Link Monsters. That is the part most likely to confuse a new player, so learn the Normal Summon first and add one method at a time.
In the Battle Phase, you choose one of your monsters in Attack Position and attack one of your opponent's monsters. If they have no monsters, the attack is a direct attack on their Life Points. Each of your monsters can attack once per Battle Phase, unless a card says otherwise.
A monster in Defense Position is turned sideways, and it protects your Life Points because your opponent must get past it before a direct attack is possible. It cannot attack while in that position.
When a card or effect is activated, your opponent gets the chance to respond with another, and then you can respond to that. The responses form a chain, which resolves in reverse, so the last card added resolves first. Every effect has a Spell Speed from 1 to 3. A response must be Spell Speed 2 or higher, and no lower than the effect it answers. Normal and Continuous Traps, Quick-Play Spells and monsters' Quick Effects are Spell Speed 2, so you can use them on your opponent's turn. Counter Traps are Spell Speed 3, which only another Counter Trap can answer.
For a first game, you do not need to memorize this. Work out what is on the chain and resolve it from the last card back to the first. If a timing question comes up that you cannot settle, the Konami rulebook and card rulings are the source.
A duel ends when one of these happens:
Life Points reach 0: that player loses. If both reach 0 at the same time, the duel is a draw.
Deck out: a player who must draw a card with none left in their Deck loses.
A card's own win condition: a few cards win outright, such as Exodia the Forbidden One when all five pieces are in your hand.
Concession: a player can surrender at any time.
To keep score during a duel, the Yu-Gi-Oh! Life Point Calculator explains how to run a game in TurnZero HQ, with each player starting at 8000 and the result recorded when the duel ends. Formal play is often a best-of-three match rather than a single game, and TurnZero HQ saves each game on its own.
The rules above are the standard Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG game, which is what most local stores and events run. It is played with the Forbidden & Limited List, which restricts how many copies of certain cards a deck can hold. Other formats exist, and they change the rules:
Check Konami's current rules before you assume any of these numbers for an event, because formats and lists change.
With the rules down, the next step is a deck. The Yu-Gi-Oh! deck building guide covers copy limits, the Forbidden & Limited List, and how TurnZero HQ's Deck Lab checks a deck. If you already own cards, the Yu-Gi-Oh! collection tracker is where you log them, and the Yu-Gi-Oh! hub lists everything TurnZero HQ does for the game, including the public deck gallery at /yugioh/decks.
Reduce your opponent's Life Points from 8000 to 0. You also win if your opponent has to draw a card and has none left in their Deck, or if a card's own effect says you win, such as collecting all five pieces of Exodia the Forbidden One in your hand.
A Main Deck of 40 to 60 cards. You may also have an Extra Deck of up to 15 cards and a Side Deck of up to 15 cards. Most players build at exactly 40, because a smaller deck finds its best cards more often.
The players decide by a coin toss, die roll or rock-paper-scissors, and the winner chooses who goes first. The player who goes first skips their first Draw Phase and cannot attack on that first turn.
A monster in Attack Position sits face up and upright, and it uses its ATK to battle. A monster in Defense Position is turned sideways, either face up or face down, and it uses its DEF when attacked. A monster in Defense Position does not attack.
No. This page covers the standard game the Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG is played with, with 8000 Life Points and a 40 to 60 card Main Deck. Speed Duel is a smaller format with 4000 Life Points, a 20 to 30 card Deck and a starting hand of four. Rush Duel is a separate game with its own cards and rules. Check Konami's current rules for either one.
No. You duel at a real table with real cards. TurnZero HQ keeps Life Points and saves the result of a Yu-Gi-Oh! game, and its Deck Lab builds and checks your deck against the Forbidden & Limited List.
Build a deck checked against the Forbidden & Limited List, keep Life Points at the table, and log your collection. Free on iPhone, Android and the web.
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