Bridge Conventions: The Ones Worth Learning and Why

A bridge convention is a bid with an agreed meaning other than the natural one. When you bid 2♣ over partner's 1NT to ask for a four-card major, that is a convention (Stayman): the bid says nothing about clubs. Conventions let a partnership describe hands that natural bidding handles badly.

You do not need many to play well. A small set of well-known conventions, played the same way by both partners, beats a long list that one of you half remembers. This guide groups the common ones by job and ends with the order to learn them in. It assumes 2/1 Game Force: five-card majors, a 15-17 1NT, a strong 2♣ and weak twos. Where a convention belongs to another system, the text says so.

A natural bid shows the suit it names. A conventional (artificial) bid shows something else: a different suit, a strength, a number of aces, a request. Most artificial calls must be alerted or announced to the opponents, and both partners must list them on the convention card. In tournaments the governing body (ACBL in North America, EBU in England, the WBF at world events) decides which conventions are allowed at each level.

How to choose:

• Agree with your partner first. A convention you play and partner forgets is worse than none.
• Pick tools for common hands. Responding to 1NT and finding a major fit comes up every session. A convention for a 7-5 freak comes up once a year.
• Learn the follow-ups. Each convention brings rebids, interference rules and defenses. Know them before you play it.
• Match your system. Some conventions belong to a system: Jacoby 2NT and Drury go with five-card majors (Standard American, 2/1), while Acol players use their own set.

These are the first conventions most players learn, because 1NT openings are frequent.

The pair you need first is Stayman plus Jacoby transfers. Together they handle nearly every major-suit hand opposite 1NT. Over interference, many players add Lebensohl.

Slam conventions ask for controls (aces, kings, voids) so you do not bid six missing two aces.

• Blackwood: 4NT asks how many aces partner holds.
• Roman Key Card Blackwood (RKCB): 4NT asks for five key cards, the four aces plus the king of trumps, and the trump queen. The most common version is 1430. Read Roman Key Card Blackwood before you play it.
• Gerber: 4♣ directly over partner's 1NT or 2NT opening asks for aces, so you do not have to go past 4NT.
• Exclusion Blackwood: a jump to the five level in a suit where you hold a void asks for key cards outside that suit.
• Splinter bids: an unusual double jump in a new suit shows a fit and a singleton or void in that suit, the key fact for slam.
• Control bids (cue bids): after the trump suit is agreed, show aces and kings (or shortness) suit by suit.
• DOPI and ROPI: how to answer Blackwood after the opponents interfere.

In the auction above, South's 2NT is Jacoby 2NT: four-card spade support and game values (see what South's 2NT means in 2/1). North's 3♦ shows a singleton or void in diamonds. South, with no wasted diamond honors, asks for key cards with 4NT, and 5♠ shows two key cards plus the trump queen. South bids the small slam. Every North-South call between 1♠ and 6♠ was conventional.

After a one-level opening, these help you show fit and strength precisely. The first two are the core of 2/1 Game Force itself:

• 2/1 game force: over 1♥ or 1♠, a new suit at the two level by an unpassed hand (1♠ - 2♣, 1♥ - 2♦) is forcing to game. After a passed hand, the same response is not forcing to game.
• Forcing 1NT: 1♥ - 1NT or 1♠ - 1NT by an unpassed hand shows about 6 to 12 points and is forcing for one round (see what 1♠ - 1NT means in 2/1). Many pairs play it semi-forcing instead: opener may pass with a balanced minimum.
• Limit raise: a jump raise (1♥ - 3♥) showing about 10 to 12 points and support, usually four cards.
• Jacoby 2NT: 1♥ - 2NT or 1♠ - 2NT by an unpassed hand, a game-forcing raise with four-card support.
• Bergen raises: 3♣ and 3♦ responses to 1♥ or 1♠ that show four-card support with different strengths. Pairs who play Bergen use the jump raise (1♥ - 3♥) as a preempt.
• Inverted minors: 1♦ - 2♦ is strong (forcing, about 10 or more points), 1♦ - 3♦ is weak.
• Drury: a passed hand's 2♣ shows support and about 10 to 12 points opposite a third or fourth seat major opening.
• Help suit game try: after a single raise (1♠ - 2♠ - 3♣), opener names a suit where he needs help for game.
• New minor forcing, fourth suit forcing and XYZ: responder's tools to create a forcing auction after opener's rebid.
• Splinters belong here too, as fit-showing raises: 1♠ - 4♦ shows four-card spade support, game values and at most one diamond.

When both sides bid, doubles do most of the work:

• Takeout double: shows an opening hand short in the opponents' suit and support for the others.
• Negative double: responder's double of a suit overcall, showing the unbid major(s).
• Responsive double: advancer's double after partner's takeout double and a raise by the opponents (1♥ - X - 2♥ - X), showing values and two places to play, usually the unbid minors.
• Support double: after a one-level response in a major and an overcall (1♣ - Pass - 1♥ - 1♠ - X), opener's double shows exactly three-card support.
• Maximal double: a game try when the opponents take away the room for one (1♥ - 2♦ - 2♥ - 3♦ - X).

Two-suited overcalls show shape in one bid: Michaels cue bid (1♥ - 2♥ shows spades and a minor) and the unusual 2NT (both minors, or the two lowest unbid suits). Lebensohl helps after the opponents interfere over your 1NT, or after partner doubles a weak two.

When the opponents open 1NT, natural overcalls waste many hands. The common defenses:

Pick one with partner. Landy is the simplest. Cappelletti and DONT are widely played in North America, and Meckwell is popular with stronger pairs.

• Strong 2♣: an artificial opening for all very strong hands, about 22 or more points or a game in hand.
• Weak twos: 2♦, 2♥ and 2♠ with a six-card suit and about 5 to 10 points.
• Ogust and feature asks: 2NT responses that ask a weak two opener about strength and suit quality.
• Flannery: 2♦ shows a minimum opening (about 11 to 15 points) with four spades and five hearts. Pairs who play it give up the weak 2♦.
• Multi 2♦: common in Europe: a weak two in either major, with strong options.

Leads and signals are also agreements, and you must disclose them: MUD leads, attitude and count signals, suit preference. The Rule of 11 is not a convention but a counting tool that goes with fourth-best leads. In the auction, you will also meet the Rule of 20 and the law of total tricks, which are judgment rules rather than conventions: they need no alert.

Learn them in about this order. Each step builds on the one before.

1. Stayman and Jacoby transfers over 1NT.
2. Takeout doubles and negative doubles.
3. Strong 2♣ and weak twos, with a simple 2NT ask.
4. Blackwood, then Roman Key Card Blackwood.
5. Limit raises and Jacoby 2NT for major-suit fits.
6. Michaels and the unusual 2NT.
7. A defense to 1NT and new minor forcing or fourth suit forcing.

That set covers most auctions at club level. Add more only when both of you are fluent in these.