Word.ws English Dictionary

have the cards

have the cards is the ellipsis of have the cards in one's hands.

Meaning of have the cards in one's hands

Verb

have the cards in one's hands (third-person singular simple present has the cards in one's hands, present participle having the cards in one's hands, simple past and past participle had the cards in one's hands)

  1. To have the initiative for, or the means of, success; to be in a position to control the outcome.
    • Gogs bloud Iacke, haue we the cards in our hands?
      Lets take it vpon vs while we haue it.1593, anonymous author, The Life and Death of Iacke Straw […], →OCLC, Act I
    Synonyms:
    have the cards

Forms of have the cards

third-person singular presenthas the cards
present participlehaving the cards
past participlehad the cards
pasthad the cards

Questions about have the cards

What is have the cards the ellipsis of?
Have the cards is the ellipsis of have the cards in one's hands.

Words near have the cards in the dictionary

  1. have the ball in one's court
  2. have the best of it
  3. have the biscuit
  4. have the black ox tread on one's foot
  5. have the blues
  6. have the cards
  7. have the cards in one's hands
  8. have the dirts with
  9. have the drains up
  10. have the drop on
  11. have the first idea

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: have the cards (page history and authors); have the cards in one's hands (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “have the cards.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/have_the_cards. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.