How to Play Catan
Settle an island, harvest what the dice give you, trade like a merchant, and race everyone to 10 victory points.
Rules as printed in the current standard edition · Last verified 2026-10-16
⚡ Quick Start — playing in 2 minutes
- Build the island from the 19 terrain hexes, place the number tokens, and put the robber on the desert. Everyone picks a colour and takes 5 settlements, 4 cities, and 15 roads.
- Setup goes in snake order: each player places one settlement with a road touching it, then in reverse order everyone places their second settlement and road — and collects one resource card for every hex touching that second settlement.
- On your turn, roll the dice first: every player with a settlement or city beside a hex showing that number collects resources from it. Then you may trade and build, in any order.
- Roll a 7 and the robber wakes up: anyone holding more than 7 resource cards discards half (rounded down), then the roller moves the robber, blocks that hex, and steals a card from a neighbour.
- Settlements are worth 1 point, cities 2. First player to reach 10 victory points on their own turn wins — the game ends the moment it happens.
The Short Version
Catan is a race to build the strongest settlement network on an island of 19 numbered hexes. Each hex produces one resource — wood (forest), brick (hills), sheep (pasture), wheat (fields), or ore (mountains) — whenever its number is rolled and you have a settlement or city touching it. You spend resources to build roads, settlements, and cities, trade with other players and with the bank, and buy development cards that might help you or secretly be worth points. Settlements score 1 victory point, cities 2, and bonus cards for the Longest Road and Largest Army are worth 2 each. First to 10 points on your own turn wins.
What You Need
The base game only: terrain hexes and sea frame, number tokens, the robber figure, two dice, resource cards, development cards, building cost cards, and each player’s 15 roads, 5 settlements, and 4 cities. This page covers the 3–4 player base game — the 5–6 player extension adds a special building phase that isn’t covered here.
Set Up
Assemble the island (the rulebook’s beginner layout is best for a first game; experienced tables randomise the hexes and number tokens). Place the robber on the desert hex.
Setup runs as a snake draft. In turn order, each player places one settlement on any intersection and one road along an edge touching it. Then, in reverse order, everyone places their second settlement and road the same way. When you place that second settlement, immediately collect one resource card for each terrain hex touching it — that’s your starting hand.
Two placement rules govern everything that follows: the distance rule (a new settlement must always be at least two edges away from any other settlement or city, yours or anyone’s) and connection (new roads must touch your existing network, and new settlements must sit on your own road).
How to Play
Your turn runs in a fixed order:
1. Roll the dice. Add the two dice. Every player — not just you — with a settlement beside a hex carrying that number takes 1 resource card from it; a city takes 2. If the bank runs out of a resource, see Variations.
Roll a 7? The robber activates. First, every player holding more than 7 resource cards discards half, rounded down (8 or 9 cards means discarding 4). Then the roller must move the robber to a different hex, and steals one random card from a player with a settlement or city beside it. That hex produces nothing until the robber moves again.
2. Trade and build, in any order. Trade resources with any player who’ll deal (only on your turn — other players can only trade with the active player, never among themselves). Or trade with the bank at 4:1: four identical cards for any one. A settlement on a generic port (3:1) trades any resource three-for-one; a special port (2:1) trades its named resource two-for-one. You may also play one development card per turn at any point during your turn — a knight can even be played before your roll (see the disputes above for the one-turn waiting rule on newly bought cards).
Building costs:
| Build | Cost | Worth |
|---|---|---|
| Road | 1 brick + 1 wood | Extends your network |
| Settlement | 1 brick + 1 wood + 1 wheat + 1 sheep | 1 victory point |
| City | 2 wheat + 3 ore | 2 victory points (upgrades a settlement) |
| Development card | 1 sheep + 1 wheat + 1 ore | Drawn face down; see Scoring |
A city must replace one of your existing settlements (the settlement piece returns to your supply). Development cards stay secret until played.
Scoring
Victory points come from five places: settlements (1 each), cities (2 each), victory point development cards (1 each, kept hidden until the win), Longest Road (2 — you must hold the longest continuous road of at least 5 segments), and Largest Army (2 — you must have played at least 3 knight cards, and more than anyone else). Ties never steal a bonus card: if another player merely matches your road length or army size, you keep the card; they must strictly beat you to take it. But watch out — an opponent’s new settlement built onto your road breaks it into two pieces, which can cost you Longest Road on the spot.
Winning
The game ends the instant a player reaches 10 victory points on their own turn — you cannot win during anyone else’s turn, even if a roll or a reveal puts you at 10. (If your points reach 10 off-turn, you simply wait, nervous, for your turn to come around.) There is no finishing the round and no tie-break: the first player to declare 10 on their turn wins, full stop.
Variations Worth Knowing
Resource shortage: if the bank can’t pay everyone what a roll produces, nobody receives that resource on that roll — scarcity is part of the game, not a bookkeeping error. Beginner layout: the fixed setup printed in the rulebook balances the island while everyone learns; switch to random islands once placements start to matter. Two-player Catan isn’t part of the base game — the official answer is the separate Catan Rivals card game; homebrew neutral-settlement rules exist, but treat them as house rules and agree them before you start.
Settle the Argument
Can I trade or build before I roll the dice?
NO. — the roll always comes first on your turn.Your turn has a fixed opening: roll, and everyone collects production from hexes matching the number. Only after that may you trade and build, in any order and as often as you can pay for. This matters more than it sounds — the roll can hand you the exact card you were about to trade away, and it decides who holds more than 7 cards when a 7 might be coming.
When I move the robber, who do I steal from and how much?
One resource card, taken at random, from ONE player with a settlement or city beside the robber's new hex.You choose which neighbouring player to rob, but not which card — they hold their hand out face down and you draw one blind. You may not rob a player with no cards (bad luck, no compensation), and you can't rob two players. The robber then sits on that hex: it produces nothing while he's there, and nobody may place the robber back on the same hex he just left.
Does a city really produce double?
YES. — a city collects 2 resource cards from its hex on a matching roll; a settlement collects 1.That doubling is the whole point of the city's steep price (2 wheat and 3 ore). Resource cards are never doubled by anything else — ports and trades change what you pay, never what a hex pays out.
Can I play a development card the turn I buy it?
NO. — a development card must wait until a later turn, with one exception: victory point cards.Bought cards sit face down until a later turn, and you may play only one development card per turn — though a knight may be played at any point in your turn, even before you roll, which is the standard way to chase the robber off your own hex before production. Victory point cards are the exception to everything: they're never 'played' during a turn at all. Keep them hidden and reveal them only when showing them gives you 10 points and the win — and revealing them at that moment is allowed even on the turn you bought one.
House RulesNOT OFFICIAL
Beloved, common, and not in the official rules. Play them if your table loves them — just know they're yours:
- Friendly robber: many tables agree the robber can't block or rob anyone until every player has at least 3 victory points, so nobody gets bullied in the opening minutes. Popular and harmless — but it is a house rule.
- No sniping setup spots: some groups use the official fixed beginner layout printed in the rulebook for the first games instead of free placement. That's an official learning option worth using before you house-rule anything.
- Pity resource: a player who gets nothing from a roll draws one card. Not in the rules, and it quietly breaks the trading economy the game is built on — know that before you adopt it.