How to Play Solitaire

When most people say “solitaire,” they mean one specific game — the one with seven columns of cards, a stock pile in the corner, and four empty spots waiting for Aces. That game is Klondike. It shipped with Windows in 1990, became the most-played computer game of all time, and in the process quietly redefined a whole genre as a single name.

This guide starts with Klondike — the rules, the setup, the goal, and the key moves. Then it expands to the broader solitaire family: eight other variants you can play at Card & Puzzle, what makes each one different, and where to go once the basics are solid.

What Is Solitaire?

Solitaire is not a single game — it is a genre. There are hundreds of documented solitaire variants, spanning radically different mechanics, deck sizes, and difficulty levels. What they share is the defining constraint: a single player, working alone, completing a structured goal with a standard deck of cards.

The British term for the genre is Patience. The name fits: these games reward unhurried thinking over impulsive moves. You work through the deck methodically, looking for paths that are not immediately obvious. Whether the game takes two minutes or twenty, the experience is the same — a puzzle that unfolds one card at a time.

Klondike became the default meaning of “solitaire” in the English-speaking world because of Windows. It was included as a way to teach users how to drag with a mouse, and it worked — people who had never touched a computer before learned to drag-and-drop by moving cards around a virtual green felt table. The association between the word “solitaire” and that specific game has stuck ever since.

But Klondike is just one of the family. FreeCell is a pure planning puzzle where all cards are visible from the start. Spider uses two decks and builds runs by suit. TriPeaks chains removals through a pyramid with no suit constraint at all. Each game exercises different skills and produces a genuinely different experience. Once you know the rules of Klondike, you have the foundation to explore all of them.

How to Play Klondike Solitaire

Klondike is the right starting point. It is the most-played solitaire variant in the world, and its core mechanics — descending columns, suited foundations, stock drawing — recur in some form across nearly every other variant you will encounter.

The Setup

A standard 52-card deck is dealt into seven tableau columns. The first column gets one card, the second gets two, the third gets three, and so on up to the seventh column with seven cards. In each column, only the top card is face up — all the cards beneath it start face down. This produces the characteristic staircase arrangement of 28 cards across seven columns.

The remaining 24 cards become the stock pile, set face down in the upper left corner. Four empty spaces in the upper right corner are reserved for the foundation piles — one for each suit.

The Goal

Move all 52 cards to the four foundation piles. Each foundation is built in ascending order by suit, starting with the Ace and ending with the King: Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King. When all four foundations are complete — all 13 cards of each suit stacked in order — the game is won.

Moving Cards

Cards on the tableau are moved in descending rank and alternating color. A black 9 goes on a red 10. A red 8 goes on a black 9. The color must alternate — red and black, red and black — and the rank must decrease by exactly one. A correctly ordered sequence of cards can be moved together as a unit, placing the entire sequence on a card of the appropriate rank and opposite color.

When a face-down card is the top of its column, flipping its predecessor off the pile reveals it and turns it face up. Revealing face-down cards is the primary source of progress in Klondike — every face-down card you uncover is a new piece of information and a potential new move.

Empty columns — created when you clear all the cards from a column — can only be filled by a King (or a sequence starting with a King). This makes empty columns valuable, since a King placed there opens a new sequence of builds beneath it.

When no useful moves are available on the tableau, draw from the stock pile. In Turn 1 (Draw 1) mode, you flip one card at a time — every stock card will eventually sit on top of the waste pile and be directly playable. In Turn 3 (Draw 3) mode, you flip three at a time but can only play the top card; the two beneath it are blocked until the card above is moved. Turn 1 is the right starting mode — it produces a casual win rate around 30–35%, compared to 10–15% for Turn 3. Learn on Turn 1 first.

Cards can be moved from the waste pile to the tableau or directly to a foundation. When the stock runs out, flip the waste pile over and draw through it again. There is no limit on how many times you can cycle.

Winning

The game is won when all four foundations are complete — 13 cards each, Ace to King by suit, across all four piles. In many implementations, the game automatically runs out the remaining tableau moves once the path to the foundations is clear. At Card & Puzzle, every deal is guaranteed winnable by default — if you lose, the path existed and something in your play closed it off. That makes every loss instructive rather than arbitrary.

A note on the odds: research by Blake and Gent found that roughly 82% of Klondike deals are theoretically winnable with perfect information — and that figure improves for Turn 1, where more of the stock is accessible. When you play Card & Puzzle’s default mode, unwinnable deals are filtered out entirely — you only receive deals that have a solution.

For strategy beyond the basics, the Klondike Solitaire guide covers foundation pacing, empty column management, and stock cycling in detail.

Other Popular Solitaire Games

Once you have the Klondike basics down, the rest of the solitaire family is accessible. Each game uses different rules and mechanics — some simpler than Klondike, some considerably harder. Here is a brief overview of every variant available at Card & Puzzle.

Spider Solitaire

Spider Solitaire uses two full decks — 104 cards — dealt across ten tableau columns. The goal is to build eight complete runs of King to Ace, each in a single suit, and remove them from the tableau. Spider is available in 1-Suit, 2-Suit, and 4-Suit variants. The 1-Suit version removes the suit constraint entirely, making it an accessible introduction to Spider’s large-board mechanics. 4-Suit — where only same-suit sequences move as a unit — is the hardest widely-played solitaire variant that exists, with casual win rates below 10%.

The opening deal: four columns of six cards each, six columns of five cards each (40 cards total), with the remaining 50 cards in the stock. Ten cards are dealt from the stock at a time, one to each column.

FreeCell

FreeCell Solitaire starts with all 52 cards dealt face-up across eight tableau columns — nothing is hidden. Four free cells in the upper left act as temporary parking spaces for individual cards. The goal is identical to Klondike: four foundations, Ace to King by suit.

FreeCell is the closest thing to a pure logic puzzle in the solitaire family. Of Microsoft’s original 32,000 numbered FreeCell deals, only one — Deal #11,982 — has been confirmed unsolvable. Every other deal can be won with correct play, and broader analysis suggests FreeCell is nearly always winnable in general — not just within that specific set. The casual win rate sits around 30–35%, reflecting not bad luck but planning failures. Every loss in FreeCell is a mistake you made, which makes it uniquely valuable for developing planning skills. The FreeCell guide is worth reading before you start.

TriPeaks Solitaire

TriPeaks Solitaire is the easiest game to learn and one of the most satisfying to play. Cards are arranged in three overlapping peaks, and you clear them with a single rule: remove any exposed card that is one rank above or below the current waste card. No suit requirement, no color alternation — just adjacency. A 7 on the waste accepts a 6 or an 8. That 8 then accepts a 7 or a 9. Chains form naturally and clear large sections of the board in a single run.

Casual win rate is around 85%. Games take two to five minutes. This is the right first game for anyone new to solitaire — or anyone who wants a fast, satisfying session without the planning depth of FreeCell or Spider. See the TriPeaks guide for chain-maximizing strategy.

Golf Solitaire

Golf Solitaire uses the same one-higher-or-lower mechanic as TriPeaks — remove any exposed card one rank above or below the waste card — but arranges the board as seven columns of five cards each, with the stock dealt out progressively. Suit does not matter; only rank does.

The difference from TriPeaks is the tableau structure: only the top card of each column is accessible, and clearing a column exposes the card beneath it. This is the foundational mechanic of Klondike and Spider. Golf is the natural bridge game between TriPeaks and the more complex tableau-builders. Casual win rate is around 65–70%. The Golf guide covers column-sequencing strategy.

Pyramid Solitaire

Pyramid Solitaire uses a completely different mechanic from every other game in this list. Cards are arranged in a triangular pyramid, and you clear them by pairing any two exposed cards that sum to 13 — a 4 and a 9, a 6 and a 7, a Jack (11) and a 2, or a King (13) alone. A card is exposed only when both cards overlapping it from the row below have been removed.

The mechanic creates structural dependencies that can produce unresolvable circular locks — which is why Pyramid’s casual win rate sits around 15–20%. It is a genuinely challenging game with a distinct logic. The Pyramid guide explains the pairing system and how to read the board for traps.

Yukon Solitaire

Yukon Solitaire looks almost identical to Klondike — seven tableau columns, four foundations, Ace to King by suit. The key difference is the movement rule. In Klondike, only ordered sequences (descending rank, alternating color) can be moved as a unit. In Yukon, any face-up card can be picked up along with all the cards on top of it, regardless of whether they form a proper sequence. This sounds like it should make the game easier. In practice, the cognitive load of managing disordered piles across six columns is substantial. Casual win rate around 25–30%. There is no stock pile in Yukon — all cards are dealt to the tableau at the start.

Addiction 7 Solitaire

Addiction 7 Solitaire is unlike anything else in the solitaire family. Instead of columns and foundations, you arrange 28 cards (Ace through Seven of all four suits) in a 4×7 grid by sliding cards into gaps. A card can fill a gap only if it is the same suit as the card immediately to its left and exactly one rank higher. Twos can start any row from the leftmost position. Aces are removed from the board and create the gaps that drive movement. Two shuffles are available when you get stuck.

This is one of the easiest games at Card & Puzzle — the small 28-card deck keeps the puzzle readable, and the two shuffles act as a safety net. The spatial reasoning it requires is genuinely different from any tableau-building game, which makes it a useful change of pace. The Addiction 7 guide covers the gap-filling logic.

Trash Solitaire

Trash Solitaire (also called Garbage Solitaire) is a fast, compact game often played in two-player form but completely playable solo. Ten face-down cards are dealt in two rows of five. You draw from the remaining stock and place each card in its numbered position (Ace = position 1, 2 = position 2, and so on). The displaced face-down card from that position is flipped and placed in its own correct spot, cascading until a Jack, Queen, or King stops the chain. Jacks are wild. Queens and Kings end the turn. The round ends when all ten positions are filled in sequence. A compact, fast game with a completely different structure from the rest.

Quick Solitaire Tips for New Players

Start with TriPeaks or Addiction 7. These are the two easiest games at Card & Puzzle — both have high win rates, short game sessions, and simple rules. An 85% casual win rate in TriPeaks means most sessions end in a satisfying win. Addiction 7’s 28-card grid is compact enough to read the whole board at once. Starting here builds confidence before moving to the more complex tableau games.

Card & Puzzle deals winnable hands by default. Every deal you receive on this site has a confirmed solution. If you lose, the solution existed — something in your play closed it off. This removes the frustration of unwinnable shuffles, particularly while you are still learning. Once you want the traditional experience, including the possibility of an unwinnable deal, you can choose a random deal when starting a new game.

Do not rush cards to the foundations in Klondike. This is the most common mistake new Klondike players make. Moving a card to the foundation feels like progress — and it is — but it also removes that card from the tableau, where it may be needed to complete a sequence. Moving a black 3 to the foundation while a red 4 on the tableau has nowhere to go can stall the game entirely. A general guideline: keep cards in the tableau until you are sure they are not needed as building blocks.

Draw from the stock strategically, not reflexively. Many beginners draw from the stock whenever they cannot see an immediate move, then play the stock card because it is there, then draw again. This burns through the deck faster than necessary and reduces options for later cycles. Exhaust all productive tableau moves first — revealing face-down cards, building sequences, creating useful chains — before drawing from the stock.

Try multiple variants — they develop different skills. TriPeaks trains chain thinking. Golf trains tableau reading. Klondike trains hidden-information management. FreeCell trains multi-step planning. Addiction 7 trains spatial reasoning. Playing across the family makes you better at each individual game, because the underlying skills transfer. A player who has built strong chain instincts in TriPeaks finds Golf immediately intuitive. A player comfortable managing Klondike’s hidden information adapts to Spider’s larger board faster than someone who has only played easy games.

Where to Learn More About Solitaire

If you want to understand where each game sits on the difficulty spectrum — with win rate data across all variants — the solitaire difficulty ranking has the full comparison. Spider 4-Suit sits at the top end; TriPeaks and Addiction 7 at the accessible end; Klondike and FreeCell in the middle.

If you want a broader map of the solitaire family — the different categories of games, the mechanics each one uses, and how the variants relate to each other — the guide to types of solitaire games covers the full landscape, from tableau-builders to matching games to grid puzzles.

If you are new to solitaire and want a recommended progression path — which games to learn first and in what order — the best solitaire games for beginners article walks through the full sequence from TriPeaks to FreeCell, with the reasoning behind each step.

The individual game guides go deeper on strategy for each variant: Klondike, Spider, FreeCell, TriPeaks, Golf, Pyramid, Yukon, and Addiction 7.

Sources

Klondike winnability data from Blake, C. & Gent, I.P. (2026). “The Winnability of Klondike Solitaire and Many Other Patience Games.” Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, 85, Article 21.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do you play solitaire for beginners?

The most common version is Klondike. Deal 28 cards into seven tableau columns (one card in the first, two in the second, up to seven in the last), with only the top card of each column face up. The remaining 24 cards form the stock pile. Move cards in descending rank and alternating color across the tableau, and build four foundation piles — one per suit — from Ace up to King. Draw from the stock when you run out of moves. You win when all 52 cards are on the foundations.

What are the basic rules of solitaire?

In Klondike solitaire: tableau columns are built in descending rank and alternating color — a red 9 goes on a black 10, a black 8 on a red 9. Foundations are built in ascending rank by suit, from Ace up to King. Ordered sequences in the tableau can be moved as a unit. Empty columns can be filled by any King. Draw from the stock pile when no tableau moves are available. The game ends when all four foundations are complete — Ace to King in each suit.

What is the difference between solitaire and Klondike?

Klondike is one specific type of solitaire — the version that became the default meaning of the word after shipping with Windows in 1990. Solitaire is a broad genre of single-player card games with hundreds of variants, including Spider, FreeCell, TriPeaks, Golf, Pyramid, Yukon, and many others. When someone says “solitaire” without specifying a variant, they almost always mean Klondike.

Is solitaire called Patience in the UK?

Yes. In Britain and much of Europe, the game is called Patience rather than Solitaire. The two words refer to the same genre of single-player card games. Individual variants have the same names in both traditions — Klondike is Klondike, Spider is Spider, FreeCell is FreeCell — regardless of which term you use for the category.

What is the easiest solitaire game to win?

TriPeaks Solitaire has the highest casual win rate of any common solitaire variant — around 85%. The mechanic is a single rule: remove any exposed card that is one rank above or below the current waste card, with no suit requirement. Addiction 7 is also among the easiest, with a small 28-card deck and two shuffles available when you get stuck. At Card & Puzzle, every deal is winnable by default, so the win rate reflects skill rather than luck of the shuffle.