Word.ws English Dictionary

playing all one's cards

playing all one's cards is the present participle and gerund of play all one's cards.

Meaning of play all one's cards

Verb

play all one's cards (third-person singular simple present plays all one's cards, present participle playing all one's cards, simple past and past participle played all one's cards)

  1. (idiomatic) To use all one's resources.
    • I've played all my cards
      And that's what you've done too
      Nothing more to say
      No more ace to play1980, Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, “The Winner Takes It All”, in Super Trouper, performed by ABBA
    Synonyms:
    play all one's cards at once

Questions about playing all one's cards

What is playing all one's cards the present participle and gerund of?
Playing all one's cards is the present participle and gerund of play all one's cards.

Words near playing all one's cards in the dictionary

  1. playing a part
  2. playing a role
  3. playing a rôle
  4. playing about
  5. playing against type
  6. playing all one's cards
  7. playing along
  8. playing around
  9. playing at
  10. playing away
  11. playing back

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: playing all one's cards (page history and authors); play all one's cards (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.

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