Splitting Eights

Standard 56-card deck (Photo credit: Wikipedia)








 

Splitting 8's when the dealer has a 10 or face card as their up card?

Should a player split 8's against the dealers up card of a 10 when late surrender is offered? 

Basic strategy says that you should always split aces and eights but it also tells you that you should surrender your hand when you have hand that is a total of 16 against a dealers 10/face card, so what about two eights? 

I often get this exact question, "Should I split my 8's or surrender when the dealer is showing an up card of 10/Face card".  

Yes, you still want to split your eights against even if late surrender is offered.

Even when you base the math on a two-deck game, that does not allow double after splitting, these being less favorable house rules than most, the expected value of splitting 8's,  against a 10 is -0.480673, but it is still a shade better than the -0.5 by surrendering..

It's pretty close, mathematically but you should split your eight's, even when the casino offers late surrender or does not allow double after split.

Late Surrender-  Late Surrender is when the house offers you as a player the choice to fold your hand, at the cost of half of the original bet. You must make that after the dealer has checked for blackjack and the decision to surrender is made prior to taking any other action on the hand. For example, once you draw a third card, or split, or double down, surrender is no longer an option.

Related articles

• Surrendering your bet

Blackjack Busting Chart: Percentages for both player's and dealer'shand busting

Blackjack Bust Chart

Do you feel as if you always bust when you hit 16? 

Does it seem that the dealer rarely busts whenever they have a 2 as their up card? 

The chart below shows the busting percentages for the player's hand and for the dealer's hand after each has been dealt 2 cards.

Players starting hand busting percentage:

The left side of the chart contatins the busting percentages for the player's starting hand.  The players staring hand is the first two cards dealt to the player.

Dealers starting hand busting percentge showing one card:

The right side of the chart contains the dealers busting percentage with a certain up card, before the hole card is revealed or the dealer hits.

Cardroom Insider Blackjack Busting Chart

Basic strategy for Spanish 21

Strategy Chart is for Spanish 21

Dealer hits soft 17

Redoubling 3 times (4 hands total), drawing on split aces and

Surrender Allowed