Piquet (/pɪˈkɛt/; French pronunciation: [pikɛ]) is an early 16th-century plain-trick card game for two players that became France's national game. David Parlett calls it a "classic game of relatively great antiquity... still one of the most skill-rewarding card games for two" but one which is now only played by "aficionados and connoisseurs." The game is historically also known as Sant or Saunt, from the French Cent.

Piquet is one of the oldest card games still being played. It is first mentioned, as Le Cent, in a written reference dating to 1535, in Gargantua and Pantagruel by Rabelais. Although legend attributes the game's creation to Stephen de Vignolles, also known as La Hire, a knight in the service of Charles VII during the Hundred Years' War, it may possibly have come into France from Spain because the words "pique" and "repique", the main features of the game, are of Spanish origin. The earliest clear mention of the game – leaving aside various predecessors – is in 1585 by Jacques Perrache, described as a "Provençal gentleman", who refers to two unusual games, "premieres, & piquets".

The game was introduced in Germany during the Thirty Years' War, and texts of that period provide substantial evidence of its vogue, like the metaphorical use of the word "repique" in the 1634–8 political poem Allamodisch Picket Spiel ("Piquet Game à la mode"), which reflects the growing popularity of the game at that time. As with other games like Bête, the substantive form of the word "piquet" was turned into a verb and this is used substantially by Rist's 1640 Spiele, die man Picquetten heißet, who gives the word his grudging assent. Historical sources also distinguish between Rummel-Piquet, the normal game in which Rummel referred to the feature of point, and Offenherziges Piquet (lit.: "Open-hearted Piquet"), which was played ouverte. Mizka states that the former was known as Ronfelspiel (French: Ronfler) until 1664.

Until the early twentieth century, piquet was perhaps the most popular card game in France, occupying a similar position to cribbage in England. It first became popular in England after the marriage of Mary I of England to Philip II of Spain in 1554. During this period the game was known as cent, after the Spanish game cientos, referring to the fact that one of the chief goals of piquet is to reach 100 points. Following the marriage of King Charles I of England to Henrietta Maria of France in 1625, the British adopted the French name for the game. It went in and out of fashion among the upper classes in Britain between the 17th and early 20th centuries, its demise from the end of the First World War being put down to the rise of Gin Rummy "and other lowbrow games that are easier to learn and faster to play."

Piquet is played with a 32-card pack, normally referred to as a piquet pack or piquet deck. The pack comprises the 7s through to 10s, the face cards, and the aces in each suit, and can be created by removing all 2–6 values from a 52-card poker pack. Each game consists of a partie of six deals (partie meaning match in French). The player scoring the most points wins (see the scoring section for further details).

In Piquet cards rank as follows (from highest to lowest) :

The player who cuts the higher card has to deal, and the dealer has the choice of cards at the commencement of each partie. A partie consists of six deals. The players deal alternately for each hand in the partie. It is preferable to deal first so as not to deal the last hand. Dealing puts a player at a disadvantage.

Twelve cards are dealt to each player, with the remaining eight forming the talon, which is placed face-down between the players. The talon may be split by the dealer into two piles of five and three cards, respectively. The dealer is referred to as the younger hand and the non-dealer as the elder hand.