Hard 16 Against a Dealer Ace
Updated
Surrender if the table allows it. If not, hit. What you must not do is stand — against an ace that is the most expensive mistake on the entire 16 row, worth 15.0% of your bet.
- Surrender if offered.
- Otherwise hit: 51.5% lost, against 66.5% for standing.
- Standing costs 15.0% more than hitting — the biggest gap of any 16.
- These numbers assume the dealer already checked for blackjack and does not have it.
The ace is the strongest card the dealer can show
Even after the dealer has peeked and does not have blackjack, an ace still finishes at 17 or better about 83% of the time and busts only 16.7%. Nothing else on the table is close.
That is why standing collapses here. Standing on 16 wins only when the dealer breaks, and an ace breaks less often than any other card by a wide margin. You are betting on a one-in-six event when the alternative gives you a genuine shot at improving.
What each option is actually worth
Six decks, dealer stands on soft 17, dealer has peeked and does not have blackjack, averaged across every two-card 16. Bet of 1 unit:
On a no-hole-card table
European and most online live tables deal the dealer a single card and take no hole card until the end. That changes the arithmetic in one specific way: if you surrender and the dealer later turns over a blackjack, many no-hole-card tables take your whole bet rather than half.
Where that rule applies, surrender against an ace loses its edge and hitting becomes the practical answer. Check what your table does with surrender against a possible blackjack before relying on it.
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By Martin Kosek · every number on this site is computed by us, not copied.
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