When the cut card appears, the current hand finishes and the shoe is reshuffled. Its position determines penetration, meaning how much of the shoe is actually dealt.
Placing the cut card early leaves a large unseen remainder, which is deliberate: it makes card counting substantially less effective, because the count never gets deep enough into a shoe to become reliable.
For a basic-strategy player the cut card position changes nothing at all. It is purely a countermeasure against advantage play.
The cut card is also the reason the last hand of a shoe is not the last hand dealt. When the card surfaces mid-deal the round completes normally, so a shoe can run several cards past the marker. Players who believe the appearance of the card ends play immediately are occasionally surprised to be dealt into one more hand.
Where the numbers come from
Related terms in casino floor
- Commission — A percentage charged on winning bets that would otherwise favour the player.
- Push — A tie in which the bet neither wins nor loses and the stake is returned.
- Natural — A hand that wins immediately on the first cards dealt.
- Shoe — The box holding several shuffled decks from which cards are dealt.
- Penetration — The proportion of a shoe dealt before the reshuffle.
- Comp — Complimentary goods or services given to players based on tracked play.
Where an entry quotes a number, that figure comes from the computed sections of this site rather than from another glossary, so the definition and the derivation cannot drift apart. Each entry links to the page where the number is worked out.