How to Play Cheerio

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

Cheerio is a five-dice game for two to six players in which each turn you roll, set aside keepers, and reroll up to twice more to hit one of a set list of combinations. Each combination can only be claimed once per player, so every decision carries weight: do you take a safe low score now or gamble for a higher one later?

Its appeal is the constant tension between greed and pragmatism. It plays quickly, needs no special surface, and travels well, making it a staple at kitchen tables, on campsites, and during long journeys. Children from around age six can grasp the basics, while adults find genuine strategic depth in the scoring decisions.

A little history

The origins of Cheerio are unclear. Games using five dice and a fixed combination scoresheet were circulating in North America and parts of Europe through the early-to-mid twentieth century, and Cheerio appears to be one of several regional names for this family of dice games. It shares its core structure with other combination-scoring dice games that became popular in the mid-1900s, but no single documented inventor or first publication has been firmly established for the Cheerio name specifically.

Setting up

1. Seat all players around a flat playing surface.
2. Give each player one blank scoresheet listing all scoring categories.
3. Provide a single cup or surface for rolling the dice, shared by all players.
4. Decide who goes first, typically by each player rolling one die and the highest roller starting. Reroll any tie.
5. Play proceeds clockwise from the first player.

How to play

1. On your turn, take all five dice and roll them.
2. After the first roll, set aside any dice you wish to keep. You may keep as many or as few as you like, including none.
3. Roll all non-kept dice a second time. Again, set aside any keepers.
4. Roll all non-kept dice a third and final time. You must now score the result.
5. Look at your scoresheet and choose one unfilled category that matches your dice. Write the appropriate score in that box.
6. If no unfilled category fits, you must still score: enter a zero in any one unfilled category of your choice. This is called a scratch.
7. Once a category is filled, it cannot be changed or reused for the rest of the game.
8. You do not have to keep dice between rolls. You may pick up previously set-aside dice and reroll them.
9. Play passes to the left. Continue until every player has filled every category on the scoresheet.
10. Total each player's scores. The player with the highest total wins.

Winning and scoring

The game ends when every player has filled every box on the scoresheet. Each player totals all their scores, and the player with the highest grand total wins. In the event of a tie, tied players each roll all five dice once; the higher roll wins. If still tied, repeat until the tie breaks. The scoring categories and their standard point values are as follows: Ones through Sixes (sum of the relevant face only); Three of a Kind (sum of all five dice); Four of a Kind (sum of all five dice); Full House, which is three of one number and two of another (25 points); Low Straight, which is 1-2-3-4-5 (30 points); High Straight, which is 2-3-4-5-6 (30 points); Cheerio, which is five of a kind (50 points); and Chance, which is any combination scored as the sum of all five dice. Some scoresheets include a bonus of 35 points if the sum of your Ones through Sixes scores reaches 63 or more, equivalent to scoring three of each number on average.

The fine points

The most common dispute concerns whether a player must declare kept dice before the next roll. The standard ruling is yes: once you pick up a die to reroll it, it is in play and cannot be put back without rolling it. If a player accidentally picks up a keeper, they must reroll it. This keeps the game honest and prevents second-guessing between rolls.

A second frequent question is whether Cheerio (five of a kind) can be scored in another category if the Cheerio box is already filled. The answer is yes: you may score any result in any open category, so five sixes could go in the Sixes box, Three of a Kind, Four of a Kind, or Chance. You are never forced to waste a roll just because the Cheerio box is gone. Similarly, a valid Full House may be scored as Three of a Kind, and a straight may be scored as Chance, whenever the primary box is already taken.

How to win more often

• Fill the Ones and Twos boxes early in the game if your rolls are poor, banking the scratch in a low-value category rather than wasting a zero on something like Four of a Kind.
• Target the upper-section bonus actively. Scoring 63 or more in the Ones-through-Sixes boxes adds 35 points, which is often the margin between winning and losing.
• Keep Chance and Three of a Kind open as flexible safety categories. Both accept any combination, giving you somewhere to bank a decent but category-less result late in the game.
• If you have a pair after the first roll, decide quickly whether you are chasing Three of a Kind, Four of a Kind, or Cheerio. Splitting your rerolls between two different hopes usually produces neither.
• Track what your opponents still need. If a rival clearly needs a High Straight to stay competitive, knowing that lets you take safe, consistent scores rather than gambling unnecessarily.

Variations

Team Cheerio

Players pair up into teams of two. Each team shares a single scoresheet, and partners alternate turns contributing scores to it. A team of two therefore completes the sheet in the same number of rounds as a solo player would, but each individual takes half as many turns. The team with the highest combined total wins. This works well with four or six players and adds a light cooperative element to the scoring decisions.

Cutthroat Cheerio

In this competitive variant, once per game each player may steal a category from a rival's scoresheet rather than scoring on their own. The stealing player replaces the rival's entry with the current roll's value, and the rival must re-enter a zero in any open box of their choice. This single rule dramatically raises the stakes and is best reserved for players already familiar with the standard game.

Speed Cheerio

All players roll simultaneously rather than taking turns. Each player uses their own set of five dice, completes their own three rolls as fast as they like, records their score, and immediately begins their next turn. The first player to fill every category on their scoresheet calls time; all other players finish the current turn they are on and then score totals. Highest total wins. A sand timer of 60-90 seconds per turn can add further pressure if simultaneous rolling feels too chaotic.

Extended Cheerio

Two additional categories are added to the scoresheet: Small Straight (any four consecutive numbers among the five dice, worth 20 points) and Large Straight (five consecutive numbers, worth 40 points), replacing or supplementing the Low and High Straight categories. This brings the scoring structure closer to other well-known combination-dice games and gives players two extra decision points per game, increasing the length by roughly five to ten minutes.

Cheerio: frequently asked questions