Kubb Rules: How to Play the Viking Lawn Game

Kubb is a team lawn game from Gotland, Sweden. Two teams stand at opposite ends of a 5 by 8 meter pitch and throw wooden batons underarm at the other side’s wooden blocks, called kubbs. Knock down all of the other team’s kubbs, then knock down the king in the middle, and you win. Knock the king down before that and you lose on the spot.

The rules below follow the Kubb World Championship (VM i Kubb) rulebook and the U.S. National Kubb Championship rules, which are adapted from it. Where the two differ, or where backyard play usually differs, it says so.

What you need

A standard tournament set has:

• One king, the tallest block. The World Championship rulebook gives 9 x 9 x 30 cm. The U.S. rules allow anything from 8 x 8 x 25 cm to 9 x 9 x 30 cm.
• Ten kubbs, 7 x 7 x 15 cm each.
• Six batons, the throwing sticks, 30 cm long and 4.4 cm across.
• Four corner stakes to mark the pitch. The U.S. rules add two more to mark the center line.

Cheaper retail sets are often a little smaller. That is fine for the garden.

Setting up the pitch

Mark out a rectangle 5 meters wide and 8 meters long with the corner stakes. The short ends are the baselines. A center line splits the pitch into two halves, one per team.

Stand the king upright in the exact center. Each team then stands five kubbs along its own baseline. The U.S. rules add that no kubb may be closer than one baton length to a corner stake.

On a smaller lawn, shorten the pitch. The World Championship booklet lists a 6 meter length as an accepted casual variation.

How to throw

All baton throws are underarm. The baton should fly lengthwise toward the target and may tumble end over end. Spinning it flat like a helicopter blade is not allowed. The U.S. rules put a number on it: the baton must stay within 30 degrees of vertical.

Your feet stay behind your throwing line and between the sidelines while you throw. The U.S. rules also cap each player at two batons per turn.

The opening turn

Going first is an advantage, so tournaments cut down the first team’s opening throws. The usual fix is the 2-4-6 opening:

1. The first team throws 2 batons.
2. The second team replies with 4 batons.
3. From then on, every turn uses all 6.

The U.S. rules require the 2-4-6 opening in every game. The World Championship lets the two teams choose before the game: either 2-4-6 or all six batons from the very first turn. Backyard players often skip it and throw all six.

The U.S. rules decide who starts with a lag throw: one player from each team throws a baton toward the king, and the closest baton that doesn’t knock it over wins the choice.

A turn, step by step

Each turn has the same three parts.

1. Throw in the fallen kubbs. Pick up every kubb the other team knocked down in your half during their turn. Stand behind your baseline and throw them underarm into the other team’s half. You can throw kubbs any way you like, tumbling or not, as long as it is underarm. This throw-in is called inkasting, from the Swedish for “throw in.” On the very first turn there is nothing to throw in, so skip this step.

2. The other team stands them up. The defending team raises each thrown kubb on end where it landed. These are now field kubbs. The kubbs still sitting on the baselines are baseline kubbs.

3. Throw your batons. Throw at the other team’s kubbs in this order:

• every field kubb in their half first,
• then their baseline kubbs,
• then the king, if everything else on their side is down.

Then the teams swap roles and the next turn starts with step 1.

Field kubb rules

Field kubbs are what make Kubb more than a throwing contest. A few details matter.

Field kubbs come first. If you knock over a baseline kubb while a field kubb is still standing, the baseline kubb is stood back up. It stays a baseline kubb.

Missed throw-ins get one retry. If a thrown kubb lands where it can’t be raised inside the opponent’s half, you throw it again. If it misses a second time it becomes a punishment kubb (also called a penalty kubb). The other team places it anywhere in their own half they like, as long as it is at least one baton length from the king and from the stakes. They usually put it somewhere awkward for you.

On the line counts as in. A kubb is in bounds if at least half of it is inside the pitch once raised.

Kubbs that hit kubbs. If a thrown kubb knocks over a field kubb that is already in play, both are raised where they end up.

The advantage line. If a team fails to knock down every field kubb on its turn, the other team gets a reward. On their next turn they may step forward and throw batons from the line of the field kubb closest to the center line, not from their baseline. This is the advantage line. Throw-ins and shots at the king always come from the baseline, never from the advantage line.

The king shot and how you lose

Once every field kubb and every baseline kubb on the other team’s side is down, you may throw at the king. That throw must come from your own baseline. Topple the king and you win the game.

You lose immediately if your team knocks over the king at any earlier point. It doesn’t matter if it was by a baton or a thrown kubb, or whether it was on purpose. A wild baton that clips the king in the opening turn ends the game.

Tournament play adds a few more limits. The U.S. rules play each match as best of three games. The World Championship puts time limits on group and knockout matches.

Common house rules and variations

Kubb is played in a lot of gardens with a lot of local habits. Agree on these before the first throw:

• All six batons from the start. Many casual games skip the 2-4-6 opening. It makes the first turn stronger.
• Shorter pitch. A 6 meter pitch is the World Championship booklet’s own suggestion for a quicker game. Smaller lawns often go shorter still.
• Stacking field kubbs. If a thrown kubb lands touching another, some players stack it on top to make a tower that has to be knocked down with batons. The World Championship booklet lists this as a variation and suggests a limit of three in a tower. Tournaments don’t use it.
• Fewer batons for small teams. At the World Championship, a team with fewer than six players throws one baton per player. Backyard games usually just share the six batons around.
• Easier rules for young children. The German Wikipedia article notes that very young players are sometimes allowed to throw from the center line.

Kubb is not hnefatafl

Kubb is often sold as “Viking chess,” and in German it is sometimes marketed as Wikingerschach. Neither name is historical. There is no evidence the Vikings played Kubb; the game’s recorded history is in twentieth-century Gotland, and its first World Championship was held at Rone, Gotland, in 1995.

The game the Vikings did play, the one with real archaeological evidence, is hnefatafl. That is a two-player board game where one side tries to get its king to safety and the other tries to trap him. The two get confused all the time, so there’s a page on Viking chess vs Kubb that sets them side by side. If hnefatafl is the one you were looking for, you can play it free online here.