Word.ws English Dictionary

plays all one's cards

plays all one's cards is the third-person singular simple present indicative 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 plays all one's cards

What is plays all one's cards the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Plays all one's cards is the third-person singular simple present indicative of play all one's cards.

Words near plays all one's cards in the dictionary

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

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: plays 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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