Since the rules of Blackjack are really simple, you can learn them quickly and be ready to play in a relatively short amount of time.

Placing Your Bet

The first part of playing Blackjack at a casino is placing your bet. Before any of the cards are dealt, you are going to have to lay a bet down on the table. When you are laying a bet, remember that you don't have to worry about anybody else, your bet simply claims that you think you are going to be dealt a hand that is closer to twenty-one than the dealer. Most Blackjack bets are even money. 

Terminology

After you have placed your bet, the dealer will deal themselves and you two cards. When you look at your cards you are going to have to decide if your want to surrender, double down, split, hit, or stand. The surrender term means that you will take half of your bet back and kill the hand. The only time you can chose to surrender is when you only have your first cards.   

When you opt to double down you are telling the dealer that you want one last card and that you are going to double the amount of your bet.  

You can only split when your first two cards have the same face value, splitting the cards turns them into two separate hands. Most Blackjack players believe that you should never split your tens but always split aces. You can not split your hand if you have more than the first two cards you were dealt.

The most commonly used words at the Blackjack table are hit and stand. The term hit means that you would like the dealer to deal you another card. You want to use the term hit until you are holding a hand that is close to, but not more than twenty-one. The phrase stand means that you are happy with the cards you have and you don't want anymore cards. Most Blackjack dealers opt to stand when they have a hand that adds ups to seventeen.

Practice First

If you are seriously planning on playing Blackjack, the next time you go to the casino and you would like to make some money doing so, you should pick up a book on Blackjack strategies and maybe play some Blackjack computer games before sitting down at the real table and playing with your real money.