Balatro is a poker is a deckbuilding rogue-like entirely built around illegal and often mysterious hands. The sheer number of possible decks makes Balatro one of the most replayable games on Steam, although several decks certainly stand out amongst the rest.
Balatro has taken Steam by storm, quickly rising as one of the most popular card games on the platform. Already building out a mobile version of the game, it’s clear this twisted version of poker won’t go anywhere anytime soon. If you’re looking to rack up wins in Balatro, below are how we rank the decks.
Balatro Deck tier list
- S Tier – Plasma
- A Tier – Magic, Ghost, Abandoned, Checkered, Erratic
- B Tier – Blue, Yellow, Painted
- C Tier – Red, Green, Zodiac, Anaglyph
- D – Black, Nebula
S Tier
The Plasma deck averages the values of Chips and Mult before multiplying with all extras factored in. This means that your first rounds will be an absolute breeze, as even low score can balloon into massive hands. With the Plasma deck, it’s absurdly easy to get high scores.
A Tier
A Tier is somewhat crowded thanks to all the viable deck builds in Balatro. The Magic Deck is likely the first unique deck you’ll unlock after winning a run with the Red Deck, and it can take you fairly far. The Crystal Ball voucher gives you a valuable consumable, but the free Fool card is an even better addition.
Ghost is my personal favorite card, even if it’s harder to use at higher difficulties. Spectral cards are often among the most powerful in Balatro and these appearing far more often will strengthen your hand very frequently. Abandoned allows you start out with an already thinned deck, and is fantastic for the very flush-oriented gameplay of Balatro.
Similar to Abandoned, you start with 26 Spades and 26 Hearts with the Checkered Deck. Again, this leans heavily into getting plenty of flushes early on. Erratic, as the name may suggest, is completely randomized. Just as this can help you, it can also hurt you. I’ve been fortunate enough to benefit from this more times than not, but if you’re just starting out, I’d recommend any other deck on this tier.
B Tier
Blue is the definition of a middling deck. Plus one to your hand every turn is not a massive benefit, especially when compared to the decks listed above, but it does make the game considerable easier whenever you’re just stepping in. The Yellow Deck starts you off with an additional $10. This might appear inconsequential at first, but I found it useful as the stakes got higher.
C Tier
The Red Deck, being the first, is the most basic out of the bunch. Plus one discard each round is useful, but quickly outscaled. It’s best to put your time into this deck, move on to other decks, and never look back.
The Green Deck is more trouble than it’s worth. You won’t earn interest, but instead gain $2 per remaining hand and $1 per remaining discard. If you’re thinking about Green, just go Yellow and get the flat $10.
The Zodiac Deck gives you immediate access to the Tarot and Planet Merchant, but the Overstock vouchers can replace useful Jokers with Tarot and Planet cards in your shop. The Double Tag that comes with the Anaglyph Deck can be useful, but the times you receive this benefit are relatively slim.
D Tier
Here we get into the decks that actively hurt you more than help. The Black Deck gives you an additional Joker slot at the expense of one hand every round. This makes it hard to get any run going and hurts your chances to make it to higher stakes.
Nebula is my least favorite deck in Balatro. The Telescope voucher is not nearly useful enough to offset the lost consumable slot. Celestial packs don’t come around too often, and on many runs I’ve found myself simply wishing I’d picked a different deck.
