Spades
Spades with friends, immediately. One of you makes a table, the rest join with a four-letter code or invite link, and any empty seat is filled by a bot until a person wants it. No account, no ads, no waiting room.
How a game starts
Tap Play, pick your rules, and you have a table. Share the code, or the link next to it, in whatever chat your friends already use. When they open it they are at the table. Anyone who leaves is covered by a bot of the strength you choose, and a person can take that seat over any time. If someone's connection drops mid-hand, a bot plays the seat until they are back, so the table never stalls on one player. The host can fully pause the table at will.
Online games run on a light clock, so nobody sits watching a partner who has wandered off. Between hands there is a short review of the score. Rematch is a vote.
The rules you grew up with, and the ones your table argues about
Classic Spades with partners to 500: nil and blind nil, ten bags cost a hundred. All settings adjustable. Turn blind nil off, change the bag penalty, make bags roll over, score a failed bid by the shortfall instead of the whole bid, break spades only after the third trick, lead from the left of the dealer or with the lowest club. A preset matching cardgames.io and 247 Spades are built in, so a table that moved here from either site plays the way it remembers. Three-handed cutthroat, with no partner and a shorter game, is a preset too. Jokers can join the deck for the tables that play with them. Save your own custom preset.
Bots that play, not bots that fold
Three difficulties. Easy is for beginners generally. Hard is the default, and it bids sensibly, sets nils, and covers its partner. Expert plays like Hard, with better foresight and memory; it should be a challenge even for experienced players. Each bot seat is its own difficulty, and host can change it during or between games.
If you remember Yahoo Spades or Internet Spades
A lot of people learned online Spades in the Yahoo Games rooms, or in the Internet Spades that shipped inside Windows XP, Vista and 7 and you played three strangers through MSN Gaming Zone (The Zone). We want to keep a similarly simple experience: a table, four chairs, and get right into a game. Follow Suit brings that alongside seamless device switching and quick link invites and codes. The table is drawn on green felt, the cards are readable at a glance.
Solo, on a phone, or on a big screen
Playing alone against three bots needs no connection at all and saves itself, so a hand you leave on the train is waiting when you get back. The table fits a phone held sideways or upright, a laptop, or a television. On a phone you can add it to your home screen and it opens like an app. There is also a desktop app for Windows and Linux for people who want the game in their taskbar.
Free, with an account only if you want one
Everything above is free and works without signing up. An account is optional and does two things: it saves your name, rule presets and statistics between devices, and it lets you use friend list and leaderboard features that can't work without an account. An optional membership unlocks card backs, felts and table sounds. It never changes the rules of the game or who gets to play.