Faro
A once-massively popular banking card game (also called Pharaoh) that dominated American and European gambling halls for over two centuries, simplifying Basset's mechanic into a fast, simple bet-on-a-card game.
Coming soon — not yet playable
Rules
Faro is a banking game, streamlined from its ancestor Basset: a banker deals through a shuffled deck two cards at a time from a dealing box, while players bet on which of the thirteen ranks will appear next, placing chips directly on a "layout" showing all thirteen ranks.
For each pair of cards dealt (the first called the "banker's card," the second the "player's card"), any bets placed on the rank matching the banker's card are lost to the bank, and any bets on the rank matching the player's card are paid out by the bank. Players may also bet "against the bank" in various documented side-bet forms, and could change or remove their bet on any rank at any time between draws.
Historical note: Faro (from the French "Pharaon," itself evolved from Basset) was, for much of the 18th and 19th centuries, the most widely played gambling card game in Europe and especially the United States — it was the dominant banking game of the American Old West saloon era, eventually eclipsed in popularity by poker and blackjack through the early 20th century. Faro's central "dealing box" apparatus was also historically notorious for enabling various forms of cheating, which contributed to specialized anti-cheating equipment and, eventually, the game's decline.
Strategy notes: Like its ancestor Basset, Faro involves no bluffing or hand-reading between players — it's purely a game of tracking which ranks remain live in the deck (a "case keeper" board was historically used at casino tables to track this) and managing bet placement against the bank's edge.
Common house rules
Case keeper for tracking dealt ranks
Historical Faro tables used a dedicated 'case keeper' abacus-like board to track how many of each rank had already been dealt, helping players judge remaining odds — a simple tally sheet serves the same purpose at a home table.
Rotate the bank
As with other banking games in this library, home revivals typically rotate who deals as banker every round rather than fixing one player as the house for an entire session.
A historical game, not a modern casino staple
Unlike Pai Gow Poker or Russian Poker, Faro has almost entirely disappeared from modern casinos — it's included here as a major piece of gambling and poker-adjacent history rather than a game you're likely to find spread commercially today.
Related games
Based on shared category, origin, and rules that reference each other.
Basset
A 17th-century Italian banking game, brought to fashionable prominence at the French court, in which players bet on cards turning up from the banker's deck — a direct ancestor of Faro.
Learn the rules →Lansquenet
A German banking game named after 15th-16th century mercenaries, first referenced by Rabelais in 1534 — a direct precursor to Faro and Baccarat, and ancestor of Italian Zecchinetta.
Learn the rules →Naqsh
A banking game from the Ganjifa card tradition, which originated in 15th-century Persia and flourished at the Mughal courts of India — players bet on reaching specific card-total combinations.
Learn the rules →Zecchinetta
An old Italian gambling card game, close cousin to games like Basset and Faro, in which a banker deals cards one at a time and players bet on whether a matching card appears before the banker's own.
Learn the rules →