What is an opening lead trainer?

An opening lead trainer is a bridge opening lead quiz that shows an auction and your hand and asks for the lead. The Lead Trainer then grades every card you could have led over 4,000 double dummy layouts that fit the bidding.

Where can I practice opening leads online?

The Lead Trainer runs in any web browser on a free account. Practice draws hands from real auctions, and the Daily adds five new hands every day.

What does double dummy opening lead analysis mean?

Double dummy analysis works out the result of a deal with all four hands in view and best play by both sides. The Lead Trainer runs it after every possible lead on each of its 4,000 layouts.

Why not grade the lead against the actual deal?

One layout is a coin flip. The queen from Q-J-9-x can be the right lead over the long run and still give away the contract on a particular deal, so the trainer measures the decision over 4,000 layouts that fit the auction.

Why do IMPs and matchpoints pick different leads?

The two scorings reward different things. At IMPs beating the contract is what pays and an overtrick costs very little, so a lead that sets it more often wins. At matchpoints every trick counts against the field, and a lead that gives away fewer overtricks can score better even if it beats the contract less often.

Can I compete against other players?

Yes, through Duels. You and another player lead the same hands in Classic, Survival or Rush, at IMPs or matchpoints, and each format keeps its own rating.

The Lead Trainer

Updated 19 October 2026

Picking the opening lead is the one decision a defender makes before dummy comes down, with only the auction and one hand to go on. The Lead Trainer sets you that problem again and again and shows how your choice stacks up against the alternatives you held. Players use it to build judgment for both IMPs and matchpoints.

What the Lead Trainer does

The BridgeTricks Lead Trainer is an opening lead trainer that shows an auction and your hand, asks for the opening lead, and grades every card in your hand over 4,000 double dummy layouts that fit the bidding, at IMPs and at matchpoints.

The hands come from real auctions. The Daily gives everyone the same five lead problems each day, Practice draws from a pool that keeps growing, Survival and Rush are runs, and Duels set you against another player.

Every mode needs a free account, which keeps your results and streaks across devices.

How to use the Lead Trainer

1.Sign in with a free account and open the Lead Trainer.
2.Start with the Daily. Its five hands are scored at IMPs one day and at matchpoints the next.
3.Read the auction and your hand, then choose the card you would lead. Your first lead on each hand is the one that counts.
4.Study the analysis, which shows how every card in your hand fares over the layouts.
5.Move on to Practice, choose IMPs, matchpoints or both, and lead hands you have not seen yet.
6.Try Survival, where any lead other than the best ends the run, or Rush, three minutes to find as many best leads as you can.

A Daily adds up what your five leads cost against the best lead on each hand. A perfect day scores 0.0, and everyone who finishes on the day's best total wins the day. Afterwards the day has its own board and chat.

How a lead is graded

Your hand stays fixed while the other three hands are dealt 4,000 times within what the auction allows. Every layout is solved double dummy after every possible lead.

At IMPs, a lead costs the IMPs it loses per board against the best lead. At matchpoints, on each layout your lead earns 2 points for every other lead it does better than (declarer scores less), 1 for each it ties and 0 for each lead that beats it. The points become a percentage, averaged over all the layouts, and the cost of your lead is the best lead's percentage minus yours.

Touching cards, such as the king from K-Q, count as one lead.

The two scorings can rank the leads differently. The analysis ranks every lead in the scoring of the hand you played, and the Daily switches between IMPs and matchpoints from one day to the next.

What it costs

The Daily and duels are unlimited for everyone. Practice and the Arcade each have a daily allowance, and Survival and Rush share the Arcade's. A free account gets 3 hands or runs a day in each, Pro gets 10 a day and Master is unlimited.

Kib, the AI explainer in the Lead Trainer, answers 3 questions in total on a free or Pro account and 50 a day on Master. Pro costs $7 a month or $60 a year, and Master $12 a month or $99 a year. Euro prices use the same figures, and players under 26 get 50% off. The full list is on the pricing page.

What the Lead Trainer will not do

It trains the opening lead only, not the play that follows.
Grades are double dummy. Each layout assumes best play with all four hands in view, so a lead that only works when declarer misguesses gets no credit for it.
A Daily you missed cannot be opened later. The archive calendar keeps only the days you finished.
The iOS and Android apps have only the double dummy solver today. The Lead Trainer runs in any browser, phone browsers included.

FAQ

Common questions

Short answers to what readers ask most.

What is an opening lead trainer?: An opening lead trainer is a bridge opening lead quiz that shows an auction and your hand and asks for the lead. The Lead Trainer then grades every card you could have led over 4,000 double dummy layouts that fit the bidding.
Where can I practice opening leads online?: The Lead Trainer runs in any web browser on a free account. Practice draws hands from real auctions, and the Daily adds five new hands every day.
What does double dummy opening lead analysis mean?: Double dummy analysis works out the result of a deal with all four hands in view and best play by both sides. The Lead Trainer runs it after every possible lead on each of its 4,000 layouts.
Why not grade the lead against the actual deal?: One layout is a coin flip. The queen from Q-J-9-x can be the right lead over the long run and still give away the contract on a particular deal, so the trainer measures the decision over 4,000 layouts that fit the auction.
Why do IMPs and matchpoints pick different leads?: The two scorings reward different things. At IMPs beating the contract is what pays and an overtrick costs very little, so a lead that sets it more often wins. At matchpoints every trick counts against the field, and a lead that gives away fewer overtricks can score better even if it beats the contract less often.
Can I compete against other players?: Yes, through Duels. You and another player lead the same hands in Classic, Survival or Rush, at IMPs or matchpoints, and each format keeps its own rating.

Lead today's five hands in the Lead Trainer. The opening leads guide explains how to choose a lead, and the opening lead practice comparison sets the trainer beside other ways to practice.

Open the Lead Trainer

Lead today's five hands and see how every card in your hand does.

More tool guides

The Suit TrainerHow the BridgeTricks Suit Trainer works: a daily suit combination puzzle, graded practice, duels and a free solver with the exact odds of every card.
The Bridge Hand SimulatorHow the Bridge Lab simulator works: up to 20,000 hands that fit your constraints, solved double dummy to compare contracts or rank every opening lead.
The Double Dummy SolverHow the BridgeTricks double dummy solver works: makeable contracts for every declarer and strain, card-by-card play, and free manual entry with no account.