The standard 52-card deck of French-suited playing cards is the most common pack of playing cards used today. The … See more

The most popular standard pattern of the French deck is the English pattern (pictured above), sometimes referred to as the International pattern or Anglo-American pattern. The second most common is the Belgian-Ge… See more

The English pattern pack originated in Britain which was importing French playing cards from Rouen and Antwerp by 1480. The earliest cards of the English pattern date to around 1516. But Britain only started manufacturi… See more

Historically the size of playing cards was down to the printer, but during the 19th century sizes became standardised, initially to a size of 3½  ×  2½ inches. Today these are often referred to as "wide" cards or "poker-size… See more

Some decks include additional design elements. Casino blackjack decks may include markings intended for a machine to check the ranks of cards, or shifts in rank location to allow a manual check via an inlaid mirro… See more

The standard French-suited pack uses black for the spades and clubs, and red for the hearts and diamonds. However, some packs use four colours for the suits in order to make it easier to tell them apart. There are severa… See more