How to Play Parcheesi

Parcheesi is the American version of pachisi, the race game from India. Two to four players roll two dice to move four pawns each from their Start circle, all the way round the board and up their Home Path. A 5 brings a pawn into play, doubles can move you 14 spaces, two pawns side by side form a blockade nobody can pass, and every capture earns a 20-space bonus. Parcheesi has been sold in the United States since the 1860s and is one of the oldest trademarked games in the country.

Parcheesi Rules at a Glance

How to Set Up

1. Choose a colour and put your four pawns in the matching Start circle in the corner.
2. Find your Enter space: the blue path space with the circle in your colour, just to the left of your Start circle. Players sit so their Start circle is on their right.
3. Decide who goes first. Everyone rolls both dice and the highest roll starts. Play then passes to the left.

How to Play Parcheesi

1. Enter pawns with a 5. Move a pawn from Start onto your Enter space whenever you roll a 5 on one die, two 5s, or a total of 5 (4 and 1, or 3 and 2). If you can enter a pawn, you must. If you can’t use the 5 to enter, use it to move.
2. Move one or two pawns. With a 4 and a 3, move one pawn 7, or one pawn 4 and another 3.
3. Move if you can. If you can’t use both dice, use one of them. Only if no move at all is possible do you lose the turn.
4. Never more than two. No more than two of your pawns can be on any space.
5. Capture. Land on an opponent’s pawn by the count of either die and you capture it: it goes back to its Start circle. Then move any one of your pawns 20 extra spaces at the end of your turn.
6. Go Home by exact count. After going round the board, a pawn turns up its own Home Path and must reach the Home square by exact count. Then move any one of your pawns 10 extra spaces.
7. Win. The first player with all four pawns Home wins.

Doubles in Parcheesi

• Before all four pawns are out, doubles are an ordinary move, then you roll again.
• Once all four pawns are out, doubles use the numbers on the tops and the bottoms of the dice. Opposite faces of a die always add up to 7, so this four-part move is always 14 spaces. Roll two 6s, for example, and you move 6, 6, 1 and 1, with one pawn or split among two, three or four. If you can’t take all four parts, you don’t move at all. Either way, roll again.
• Third doubles in a row: don’t move. Your pawn closest to Home, even on your Home Path, goes back to its Start circle, and your turn ends.

Safety Spaces and Blockades

• Safety spaces are the blue spaces, including every Enter space. A pawn on one can’t be captured, and two pawns of different colours can never share one. The exception: if an opponent’s pawn is sitting on your Enter space when you bring a pawn in, you capture it.
• Home Path spaces are safe too, and nobody may move onto another colour’s Home Path.
• A blockade is two of your pawns on the same space. No pawn, not even one of yours, can land on it or pass it, and it can’t be captured. A blockade on your own Enter space stops you entering a pawn.
• Blockades can’t march. The two pawns of a blockade can’t move forward together to form a new blockade on another space, and you may be forced to break one up if you have no other legal move.

Parcheesi Rules Questions

Other Parcheesi Rule Sets

Parcheesi has been printed for more than 150 years, and rule sheets differ in places. Check the one in your box. Common differences:

Parcheesi vs Pachisi, Ludo and Sorry!

Parcheesi Strategy

• Get pawns out early. The doubles bonus only switches on when all four pawns are out of Start, and until then each pawn waits for a 5.
• Build blockades in the right places. A blockade just in front of an opponent’s Enter space, or ahead of a pawn chasing yours, holds them up for turns.
• Use the safety spaces. Stopping on a blue space means nobody can capture you, so plan your two dice to finish there.
• Capture when you can. A capture costs your opponent a whole lap and gives you 20 free spaces.
• Don’t stop six spaces in front of an opponent. Once their pawns are all out, half of all rolls can land them exactly on you from there.
• Watch your Home Path count. Pawns already on the Home Path are safe, so use them to soak up awkward numbers while your other pawns wait for a good roll.

Parcheesi Odds

With two dice, the chances are exact:

Moving a pawn by the total counts as two steps, so a capture can also happen on the first die along the way.

Where Parcheesi Comes From

Parcheesi descends from pachisi, the cross-shaped race game of India, whose name comes from the Hindi word for twenty-five, the highest throw of the cowrie shells. The Mughal emperor Akbar is said to have played it on giant boards laid out in his palace courtyards, with people as the pieces. In the United States, John Hamilton copyrighted a version in 1867, and E. G. Selchow & Co., later Selchow & Righter, trademarked it as Parcheesi in 1874. The game later passed to Hasbro, and Winning Moves sells a classic edition today. Ludo, Sorry! and Trouble all come from the same family.

More Games to Try

For two more race games from the same family, see Sorry!, played with cards, and Trouble, with its Pop-O-Matic die. For more dice games, try Farkle and Shut the Box, or the board game mancala.

The marble version: Aggravation, also called Wahoo, with one die and shortcuts through the middle.

Parcheesi: frequently asked questions