Niu Niu (Bull Bull)

The game

Niu Niu (Bull Bull, Cow Cow) is a Chinese five-card game. Each hand receives five cards and must form a "bull": three cards whose total is a multiple of 10. The strength of the hand is set by the remaining two cards.

Usually a banker (dealer) hand and several player hands are dealt. Each player hand is compared only with the banker hand, and the stronger hand wins.

Niu Niu rules vary from casino to casino (number of decks, whether Ultimate is used, payouts). The rules below are those used in the trainer.

Cards and values

The game uses a standard 52-card deck without jokers (online versions sometimes use several decks).

Card rank and suit also matter when equal hands are compared. Ranks from high to low: king, queen, jack, 10, 9 … 2, ace. Suits from high to low: spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds.

How to read a hand

• Find three of the five cards whose total is divisible by 10 (10, 20 or 30). That is the bull (niu).
• If no such three cards exist, the hand is No Niu (no bull), the weakest hand.
• The other two cards give the points: the last digit of their sum. 7 + 8 = 15, so Niu 5.
• If those two cards add up to 10 or 20, the hand is Niu Niu.
• Five face cards (any mix of jacks, queens and kings) is Ultimate, which beats Niu Niu.

A quick check: once a bull exists, the hand's points always equal the last digit of the total of all five cards, so it does not matter which qualifying three cards you pick. A last digit of 0 means Niu Niu.

Hand rankings

Who wins

• The hand with the higher ranking wins.
• When the rankings are equal, compare the highest card of each hand: king, queen, jack, ten, 9 … 2, ace.
• If the highest cards are of the same rank, the suit of that highest card decides: spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds.
• This also applies to two No Niu hands: the hand with the higher top card wins.

Casinos may settle equal hands differently (for example, a tie returns the bets). In the trainer, equal rankings are always decided by the highest card and its suit.

Bets and payouts

Pay tables vary between casinos. A typical version (described on wizardofodds.com for Cambodia): the player's bet against the banker is either an Equal bet or a Double bet, and a 5% commission is taken from wins.

On the Double bet the multiplier is set by the winning hand: if the banker wins with Niu 8, the player usually loses twice the bet. That is why a Double bet requires extra chips to be held in reserve.

The trainer does not calculate Niu Niu payouts: it drills reading a hand and picking the winner among 2–4 hands.

Example 1: Niu 4

Check: the total of all cards is 7 + 3 + 10 + 8 + 6 = 34, last digit 4, so Niu 4.

Example 2: Niu Niu and No Niu

Niu NiuNo Niu

Niu Niu wins. On a 100 Double bet under the typical table the win is 3:1 less 5% = 285; on a 100 Equal bet it is 95.

Example 3: Ultimate

Ultimate beats any Niu Niu and every lower hand.

Example 4: equal hands

Hand AHand B

The hands are equal (Niu 7). Both top cards are kings, so compare their suits: spades beat hearts, and Hand A wins.

Rules and pay tables are checked against wizardofodds.com. Casinos may differ — see Variants and differences.