Estimation (استميشن in Arabic) is a trick-taking card game that is hugely popular across the Gulf and the wider Arab world. It belongs to the same family as Oh Hell, Spades and Wizard: before each hand is played, every player predicts how many tricks they will win. You score points for hitting your prediction exactly and lose points for missing it in either direction. Because winning too many tricks is just as bad as winning too few, a hand of Estimation is as much about reading the table and sabotaging over-confident opponents as it is about holding strong cards.

There is no single official rulebook. Families and friend groups play slightly different versions, and the exact point values vary from table to table. This guide describes the most common form of the game and uses the default scoring that Bola Estimation Calc ships with. Every number mentioned below can be changed in the app’s Settings screen to match the way your group plays.

Estimation is played by four people with a standard 52-card deck and no jokers. The whole deck is dealt out, so each player holds 13 cards and there are exactly 13 tricks to be won in every hand. Cards rank in the usual order with the Ace high. Play goes clockwise, the deal rotates one seat each hand, and a game is normally a fixed number of hands agreed before you start. Many tables play 13 or 18 rounds; the app does not force a count, so you can play as many rounds as you like and lock the game when it is over.

A trick is won by the highest card of the suit that was led unless a trump card is played, in which case the highest trump wins. Players must follow suit if they can. If you cannot follow suit you may play any card, including a trump.

Once the cards are dealt, each player in turn calls the number of tricks they expect to win, from 0 up to 13. The player with the highest call becomes the caller for the hand and usually names the trump suit, or declares that the hand will be played with no trump. The remaining players then confirm their calls. At most tables the last player to call may not pick a number that brings the total to exactly 13, so every hand is either over (the calls add up to more than 13) or under (they add up to less). This matters because several scores depend on whether the round was over or under, and the app shows an over/under indicator while you enter the calls.

In the app the highest call is marked C automatically; that player is the caller. Another player who thinks they can ride along with the caller can tick the With box, and their call is marked W. The caller and anyone playing With are rewarded for the extra responsibility: they receive 10 bonus points on top of the normal result when they make their call, and lose an extra 10 points if they miss it.

Calling zero means you intend to win no tricks at all. With the default scores, making a zero call is worth 23 points in an under round and 13 points in an over round. If you are forced to take tricks you lose one point per trick taken, and a further 10 points if the round was over.

A Dash Call (shown as DC in the app) is a bolder, declared version of zero. The player commits to winning nothing before the normal bidding is settled, and the stakes are higher: a successful Dash Call scores 32 points in an under round or 20 in an over round, while a failed one costs one point per trick taken plus a 10-point penalty when under or a 30-point penalty when over. Most groups only allow a limited number of Dash Calls per player per game.

A call of 8 or more tricks is a Super Call, and the app highlights it in orange. Super Calls do not use the normal “call plus bonus” arithmetic; they pay a fixed amount for success and carry a heavy fixed penalty for failure. With the default settings an 8 pays 64 points, a 9 pays 74, a 10 pays 84, an 11 pays 94, a 12 pays 104 and a 13, every single trick, pays 114. Miss a Super Call and you lose the difference between tricks called and tricks taken plus a penalty of 20 points for an 8, rising by 10 for each extra trick up to 70 points for a failed 13.

For an ordinary call of 1 to 7 tricks, making the call scores the number called plus a flat 13-point bonus: call 4 and take exactly 4 tricks and you score 17. Missing a call costs the difference between what you called and what you took, whichever side you missed on: call 4 and take 6, or call 4 and take 2, and you lose 2 points. The bonuses and penalties above are then layered on top. The table below summarises the default values.

Scores accumulate from round to round, and the player with the highest total when the agreed number of rounds has been played wins the game. In the app the leader of a game is shown as the King, the runner-up as the Sub-King, and the bottom two places as the Sub-Kooz and the Kooz.

Bola Estimation Calc replaces the pen-and-paper score sheet. It works in the browser at bolaat.com and as a native app on iPhone and Android, and everything is stored on your own device. A typical game looks like this:

The free version keeps 1 active game and 1 completed game at a time and shows ads. Bola Estimation Calc Pro removes the ads and all of the limits.

They are close relatives. All three reward predicting your tricks exactly. Estimation is distinctive for its fixed 13-card deal every hand, the caller who names trump, the With option, Dash Calls, Super Calls and the double and strike rules described above.

A round is over when the calls add up to more than 13 tricks and under when they add up to fewer. Zero calls and Dash Calls are worth more in an under round, because tricks are harder to avoid when nobody wants them.

Yes. Open Settings to change the win bonus, the only-winner and only-loser amounts, every zero, Dash and Super Call value, and how many matching calls trigger a double round. Games in progress pick up the new values immediately.

No. Bola Estimation Calc is a score keeper. The cards, the bidding and the choice of trump all happen at the table; the app records the calls and results and does the arithmetic for you.

No. Players, games and settings are saved on the device you are using, so you can score a game anywhere. In the browser they are kept in that browser’s local storage.