Whist developed it's own terminology to describe various situation that you can encounter during a match or to refer to particular cards and cards combinations. Some of the terms will result similar to other card games.
Here are the terms that will let you speak like you know the game:
- Deal: Going clockwise, the dealer gives one card at a time to each player until there's no more cards in the deck.
- Dealer: The player who deals the cards for a hand.
- Deck: Standard deck of cards consisting of 52 cards in four suits.
- Dummy: In some variations of whist, to play with only three players, one hand is turned face up and it gets to be played from by the player seated opposite.
- Finesse: The play of a lower honour even though holding a higher one, hoping that the intermediate honour is held by a player who has already played to the trick.
- Game: The victory by reaching a total score agreed beforehand to be the score played up to.
- Grand Slam: The winning, by one team, of all thirteen tricks in a hand.
- Hand: Thirteen tricks. (52 cards in the deck divided by four players equals thirteen cards per player.)
- Honours: In some variations of whist, extra points are assigned after a game to a team if they were dealt the ace, king, queen, and jack (knave) of the trump suit.
- Lead: The first card played in a trick.
- Pack: Sometime used instead of Deck.
- Rubber: The best of three games.
- Small slam: The winning, by one team, of twelve tricks in a hand.
- Tenace: A suit holding containing the highest and third highest of the suit or (the "minor tenace") second and fourth highest.
- Trick: Four cards played one each by the players.
- Trump: The suit chosen by the last-dealt card that will beat all other suits regardless of rank. When two cards are played from the trump suit, the higher card wins the trick.
This terms will help you to understand what the more experienced player are saying while playing online whist.