How to Play All Fives

By Jaques of London · Est. 1795 · Updated 2026-08-17

All Fives is a scoring domino game played with a standard double-six set. Unlike block dominoes, where the aim is simply to empty your hand, All Fives rewards you every time you place a tile that makes the exposed ends of the chain add up to a multiple of five. That constant arithmetic tension keeps every turn interesting, whether you are building toward a score or trying to deny your opponent one.

The game is popular in pubs, clubs and kitchen tables across Britain and the Caribbean, and it travels well because the equipment is cheap, the rules take about five minutes to learn, and a two-player game fits comfortably into a lunch break. It rewards both mental arithmetic and forward planning, making it satisfying for adults and accessible to children from around age eight upwards once they are comfortable with simple multiples.

A little history

All Fives belongs to a family of games sometimes called Muggins. Dominoes itself arrived in Europe from China in the eighteenth century, and point-scoring variants developed in several countries thereafter. The specific rule that scores on multiples of five is widely documented in American domino literature from the nineteenth century onward, and the game has long been popular in the Caribbean and the American South. Beyond that, its precise origins are unclear.

Setting up

1. Turn all 28 tiles face-down and shuffle them thoroughly.
2. Each player draws their starting hand: 7 tiles each for 2 players; 5 tiles each for 3 or 4 players.
3. Leave the remaining tiles face-down as the boneyard (draw pile).
4. The player holding the highest double leads first. If no player holds a double, the player holding the heaviest single tile leads. On subsequent rounds, the winner of the previous round leads.

How to play

1. The lead player places any tile face-up in the centre. Both ends of that tile are immediately open and their sum is counted for a possible score.
2. Play passes clockwise. On your turn you must place one tile from your hand so that one of its ends matches a pip value on one of the open ends of the layout.
3. The layout grows as a chain. Doubles are placed crossways and both ends of a double count as open ends for scoring purposes, effectively adding the double's value twice (e.g. the 5-5 counts as 10 on the open end).
4. Each time you place a tile, add up all open ends of the layout. If that total is exactly divisible by five, you score that total divided by five points. For example, open ends summing to 15 score 3 points; open ends summing to 20 score 4 points.
5. If you cannot play, you must draw one tile at a time from the boneyard until you can play or the boneyard is exhausted. If the boneyard is empty and you still cannot play, you pass.
6. Play continues until one player plays their last tile (goes out) or until the game is blocked (no player can move and the boneyard is empty).
7. When a player goes out, that player scores points equal to the total pip value of all tiles remaining in opponents' hands, rounded to the nearest five and divided by five. When the game is blocked, the player with the lowest total pip count in hand wins the round and scores accordingly.
8. Record cumulative scores after each round. Shuffle all tiles and redeal for the next round.
9. The first player to reach or exceed 61 points wins the game.

Winning and scoring

The target score is 61 points. Points are earned during play whenever the open ends of the layout total a multiple of five: divide that total by five to get your score for the play (e.g. open ends of 10 score 2 points, open ends of 25 score 5 points). Additional points are awarded at the end of each round when a player goes out: add the pip totals remaining in all other players' hands, round to the nearest five, and divide by five. The first player whose cumulative score reaches 61 wins immediately, even if the point is scored mid-round during a placement.

The fine points

The most common dispute involves the spinner. In many standard All Fives games, only the first double played (the spinner) may branch in four directions; all subsequent doubles are placed crossways but do not branch further. Agree before you start whether you are playing with a spinner or not, as this significantly changes how many open ends exist at any time. If you play without a spinner, the layout is always a straight chain with exactly two open ends (or three briefly when a double is placed at a terminal and before it is joined).

A second frequent argument concerns the rounding rule at round end. The standard ruling is to round the losers' pip total to the nearest five in the conventional way: round down if the remainder is 1 or 2, round up if it is 3 or 4, and on exactly 5 count upward. Some groups always round down to be conservative; agree on your convention before play. Additionally, if you place a tile that would score points but you fail to claim them before the next player takes a turn, those points are lost under strict rules; the next player may call Muggins and claim the points for themselves. This Muggins rule should be agreed in advance.

How to win more often

• Count open ends constantly. Before every turn, know what totals you need to reach the next multiple of five and work backwards from your hand to find tiles that get you there.
• Doubles are powerful but can trap you. A double on an open end doubles the contribution of that value to your running total, which can set up big scores but also restrict your future plays if that number becomes scarce.
• Control the ends. Try to steer both open ends toward values you hold in your hand, so you retain options to score on your next turn while limiting your opponent's scoring chances.
• Watch the boneyard count. When the boneyard is nearly empty and an opponent is low on tiles, consider blocking the board rather than chasing points, forcing a blocked game where your lower pip total wins the round.
• Track what has been played. With only 28 tiles in a double-six set, every tile you see narrows down what is left. Knowing the 6-4 is gone tells you a great deal about what your opponent can and cannot play.

Variations

Muggins (Strict Claiming)

In Muggins, if a player makes a scoring play but fails to announce and claim their points before the next player touches a tile, any other player may call 'Muggins' and take those points for themselves. This rule sharpens attention and speeds up scoring disputes. It is a widely played convention and many players consider it the standard form of All Fives.

All Threes

All Threes replaces the scoring unit of five with three: you score whenever the open ends total a multiple of three, earning one point per three pips in that total. The target is typically 61 points as in All Fives. The change makes scoring opportunities more frequent, which quickens the pace and favours aggressive chain management around threes and sixes.

Fives and Threes

Fives and Threes combines both scoring rules. You score one point for every five in the open-end total and one point for every three in the open-end total, with totals divisible by fifteen scoring on both counts. This produces the richest scoring opportunities of the family and requires tracking two divisors simultaneously, making it the most arithmetically demanding variant.

Partnership All Fives

With four players, partners sit opposite each other and combine their scores. A player going out scores the pip total of both opponents' remaining hands, rounded and divided by five, for the partnership. Partnership play adds a signalling dimension: because you can see the board developing, you can sometimes play defensively to set up your partner's next turn rather than chasing your own immediate score.

All Fives: frequently asked questions