About ClapOut
ClapOut is a free card game for friends around a table, each on their own phone. It is made by HAYE CO, a small independent studio.
What ClapOut is
If you have ever played a colour-and-number card game, you already know most of ClapOut. You match the card on the pile by colour or by number, you play action cards to skip, reverse and make others draw, and you race to empty your hand first. When you are down to your last card, you do not shout a word — you clap. Clap in time and you are safe; miss it, and anyone who claps before you catches you — and it costs you two cards.
On top of that familiar core sits a layer of its own. The four suits are elements — Ember, Sol, Tide and Dusk — and they act on each other. Tide douses Ember, Ember lights Dusk, Dusk sets Sol and Sol dries Tide, so every time you change the pile's suit you are making a real choice. Land the same element three times running and it surges. The elements guide explains it all, and the host can switch the elements off for a plain game of matching.
You can play with friends in the same room, with friends far away over voice chat, or with our bots filling the empty seats. A table seats two to six players, and the complete rules take about ten minutes to read.
Who makes it
ClapOut is designed, written and run by HAYE CO, a small independent studio. ClapOut is not a licensed version of any other card game: its cards, its names and its rules for the elements are its own. We build it, run the tables it is played on, and read what players send us.
What we believe in
Free, on any phone, with no install
ClapOut runs in the web browser you already have. There is nothing to download and no account to make: type a name, start a table, and share its four-letter code or invite link. Everyone at the table plays the full game for free. Signing in is optional and only there to keep your Claps and purchases with you across devices.
Nothing you can buy changes the rules
ClapOut has a store, and it has an optional Club membership, because running a live game costs money. But no purchase gives you better cards, a bigger hand, an extra turn or any edge at the table. Every player at every table plays by exactly the same rules. You can read more in Claps, the Club and the store.
Every suit reads without colour
Each of the four suits has its own glyph as well as its own colour, printed on every card: a flame for Ember, a sun for Sol, a wave for Tide and a moon for Dusk. If you see colour differently, play in bright sunlight, or simply prefer shapes, you can tell every card apart by its symbol alone.
Fair play, enforced by the table
ClapOut is server-authoritative. Your phone shows you the game, but the table itself — our game server — deals the cards, checks every move and enforces every rule. No phone can play a card it does not hold or see a hand it should not see. The bots play by the same rules and see only what a player in their seat would see: their own hand, the pile and the table. They do not peek.
Honest ads
ClapOut shows rewarded video ads only when you tap to watch one, in exchange for free Claps. An ad never interrupts a turn, never plays in the middle of a game, and never pops up on its own. If you never tap, you never see one.
We collect only what the game needs to run. Clap detection happens on your own device, and voice chat is live, not recorded. The details are in our privacy policy.
Credits
ClapOut would sound and look much poorer without the generosity of others.
- Every card and clap you hear is recorded — the Freesound community and Kenney (kenney.nl), all CC0.
- Sun, moon, eclipse and star imagery courtesy NASA.
- The sun — NASA/GSFC Scientific Visualization Studio, the SDO Science Team, and the Virtual Solar Observatory (public domain)
- The eclipse — NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (NASA/Vanessa Thomas) (public domain)
- The moon — NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio (CGI Moon Kit) (public domain)
- The stars — NASA, ESA, and K. Sahu (STScI) (CC BY 4.0; cropped and colour-graded)
- Other sounds and footage: CC0, Pexels and Pixabay licences.
NASA's imagery is used under its media guidelines and does not imply any endorsement of ClapOut by NASA.
Get in touch
We would love to hear from you — with a bug, an idea for a house rule, a problem with a purchase, or just to tell us how game night went. Email connect@mikehaye.com, or see the contact page for what to include. Many quick questions are already answered in the FAQ.