How to Play Rock, Paper, Scissors: A Simple Guide

• Rock beats scissors, scissors beat paper, and paper beats rock.
• Agree ahead of time whether you’ll count off “rock, paper, scissors, shoot” or just “rock, paper, scissors.”
• Use rock, paper, scissors to settle minor decisions or simply play to pass the time.

Hand Signals and Rules

Rock beats scissors and loses to paper. Make a closed fist to throw a rock out. This powerful play is strong enough to break the fragile scissors, but can’t fight its way past the paper, which wraps itself around the rock to suffocate it. Don’t tuck your thumb when you throw rock. You may telegraph your move, and a loose fist with the thumb inside can be mistaken for paper.

Paper beats rock, but loses to scissors. Lay your fingers flat and keep them together to play paper. The slick and flexible paper wraps around the rock to lock it down, but it can’t fight back against the sharp scissors. Keep your fingers touching when you play paper. If you spread them out, people might accuse you of playing scissors. You can remember all of this with the phrase, rock breaks scissors, scissors cuts paper, paper covers rock.

Scissors beat paper but loses to rock. Play scissors by making a peace sign with your index and middle finger. The sharp scissors carve through paper with ease, but they’re too weak to stand up to a rock slamming into them. Keep your scissors vertical. Laying your fingers flat looks too much like paper.

Playing a Round

Face the other player and hold your hands up at your stomach. Stand a few paces apart from your opponent. Place your nondominant hand flat out in front of you with the palm up (imagine you’re making a platform for your other hand). Set your dominant hand on top. Rock, paper, scissors is normally only played with two people, but you can play with up to 3 people if you’d like.

Count “rock, paper, scissors” by tapping your hands together. Each player throws their choices out on the count of three by calling out “rock, paper, scissors.” With each word, tap your nondominant hand with your dominant fist. Each player should synchronize the count and make eye contact while they do this. The tapping on your nondominant hand helps you and your opponent stay synchronized. Many players will include a fourth count, “shoot,” where players throw their choice out at the same time. This is totally optional, but discuss whether you’re going on “shoot” or “scissors” ahead of time. You can also say “ro, sham, bo” or count to three if you want.

Play rock, paper, or scissors on the final count and at the same time. When it’s time to play, you and your opponent will each form one of the three objects—either rock, paper or scissors. Throw out your plays at the same time on the final count of “scissors” or “shoot,” depending on what you and your opponent agreed upon. Both players must throw at the same time. If one player delays, the result isn’t trustworthy, restart the game.

Determine the winner. After you’ve both played an object, look to see who’s won. Each object wins against one shape and loses to another. For instance, rock “crushes” scissors but is “covered” by paper, paper “covers” rock but is “cut” by scissors, and scissors is “crushed” by rock but “cuts” paper. The player who picks the stronger of the two objects is the winner. If both players throw the same object, it’s a tie. In this situation, simply play again. Continue doing this until there is a clear winner. Many people choose to do “best of 3” or “best of 5” since rock paper scissors is such a quick and easy game to play. If you play with more than 2 players, continue playing rounds until there’s one player left standing.

Reasons to Play

Use a quick game to settle unimportant disputes. Play Rock, Paper, Scissors the next time you need to resolve some disagreement in a flash. For instance, you could compete for the privilege of getting the window seat. And, of course, you can always play a series of games to give each player a fighting chance. Rock, Paper, Scissors is better than other games of chance, like drawing straws or flipping a coin, because there’s an element of control involved. Both players must be willing to accept whatever the outcome may be!

Play for fun or to kill the time when you’re bored. Even if there’s nothing riding on the game, you can still play rock, paper, scissors for your own enjoyment. Keep a running tally of wins and losses and play until one of you reaches a predetermined number, or just play to fill some empty time.

Play competitively at an organized tournament if you’re passionate. Put your rock, paper, scissors skills to the test in an organized competition. There, you’ll go head-to-head with other experienced players, learn to pick up on their tells, and try to outwit them with superior tactics. There may even be a little bit of prize money or some other reward for you if you emerge the winner. If you can't find an existing group or tournament, start one of your own. Since you don’t need any special qualifications to enter, anyone has a fair shot at winning!