Solitaire is a family of single-player card games, and when most people say “solitaire” they mean one specific version: Klondike, the game that shipped with Microsoft Windows and taught a generation to use a mouse. This guide explains how to play Klondike solitaire from scratch — the setup, the goal, and every legal move — then walks through the draw-one and draw-three options, your real odds of winning, the mistakes that cost most games, and the popular variants such as Spider, FreeCell and Pyramid. You only need a standard 52-card deck and a flat surface to follow along.
Quick Facts
| Players | 1 (double solitaire: 2) |
|---|---|
| Equipment | One standard 52-card deck, Jokers removed |
| Tableau | 7 columns, 28 cards dealt (top card of each face up) |
| Stock / waste | 24 cards in the stock; waste starts empty |
| Foundations | 4 piles, built up by suit from Ace to King |
| Goal | Move all 52 cards onto the four foundations |
| Setup time | About 1 minute |
| Typical game length | 5–15 minutes |
| Difficulty | Easy to learn; winning depends on the deal |
What is solitaire?
Solitaire is any card game designed to be played alone, which is why it is also called “patience” in British English. The goal in almost every version is to sort a shuffled deck into an ordered arrangement by following strict placement rules. Klondike is the best-known member of the family, but the word “solitaire” now covers dozens of layouts, from the near-always-winnable FreeCell to the brutally hard Pyramid.
Because you compete only against the shuffle, solitaire is a true solo pastime — the same appeal behind many modern solo board games. A few versions, such as double solitaire, adapt the format for two people, but the classic game is strictly one player against the deck.
What you need to play Klondike solitaire
You need one standard 52-card deck with the Jokers removed, and enough table space for four rows of cards. That is the entire equipment list. Unlike the other classic card and dice games on this site, solitaire needs no opponents, no score pad and no timer unless you choose to add one.
The layout has four parts, and learning their names makes the rest of the rules easy to follow:
- Tableau — the seven columns of cards in the main playing area where most of the action happens.
- Foundations — four piles (one per suit) that you build up to win.
- Stock — the face-down pile of cards you draw from when you run out of moves.
- Waste — the face-up pile beside the stock where drawn cards land; its top card is always playable.
Setting up the tableau
Deal seven columns from left to right, giving each column one more card than the one before it. The first (leftmost) column gets one card, the second gets two, and so on up to seven cards in the seventh column. That uses 28 cards in total. Turn only the top card of each column face up; every card beneath stays face down for now.
The stock, waste and foundations
The 24 cards left after the deal (52 minus 28) form the stock, placed face down to one side. Leave an empty space beside it for the waste pile, which starts empty and grows as you draw. Above the tableau, leave room for four foundation piles — one for each suit — which also start empty. Your setup is now complete and you are ready to play.
How to play Klondike solitaire step by step
The aim of Klondike is to move all 52 cards onto the four foundations. Each turn you look for a legal move; when none remains in the tableau, you draw from the stock to uncover new options. Below are the rules for every kind of move, in the order you will use them.
The goal: build the four foundations
You win when all four foundation piles are complete. Each foundation is built up by suit, starting with the Ace (low) and climbing in order to the King (high): Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King. A foundation can only ever hold one suit, so the four finished piles are one each of hearts, diamonds, clubs and spades. When all 52 cards sit on the foundations, the game is won.
Building down the tableau
Within the tableau, cards are built down in rank and in alternating colours. A red card can only be placed on a black card one rank higher, and vice versa — for example, a red 6 (hearts or diamonds) goes onto a black 7 (clubs or spades). You can move a single face-up card, or move an already-ordered run of cards as one unit onto a valid card. Whenever a move uncovers a face-down card in a column, flip it face up; it is now in play.
Drawing from the stock
When you have no useful tableau moves, draw from the stock to turn cards onto the waste. The top card of the waste is always available to play onto a foundation or into the tableau. When the stock runs out, you turn the waste back over to form a new stock and continue — how many times you may do this depends on the variant you are playing (see draw-one vs draw-three below).
Filling empty columns
Only a King — or a properly ordered run of cards headed by a King — may be placed into a completely empty tableau column. This is one of the most important rules in the game: emptying a column is valuable, but you can only refill it with a King, so clearing space for a King you can actually reach is a core part of good play.
Moving cards back from the foundations
Most rule sets let you move a card back down from a foundation to the tableau if it helps you — for instance, pulling a 5 of hearts off its foundation to accept a black 4 that would otherwise be stuck. Some strict versions forbid this. Decide which rule you are using before you start, because it noticeably changes how often you can dig yourself out of trouble.
Draw one vs draw three: which version are you playing?
The single biggest rules difference in Klondike is how many cards you turn from the stock at a time. In draw-one (also called Turn 1), you flip one card to the waste per draw, so every card in the stock is eventually playable in turn. In draw-three (Turn 3), you flip three cards at once and only the top of those three is immediately playable — the two beneath it are hidden until you cycle through again. Draw-three is substantially harder because it hides cards you may need.
There is also the question of passes, meaning how many times you may recycle the waste back into the stock. Documented options for Klondike include:
- Turn three cards, unlimited passes.
- Turn three cards, three passes.
- Turn one card, three passes.
- Turn one card, a single pass (play each card if possible).
- Turn one card, unlimited passes.
Computer versions usually default to draw-three with unlimited passes, or offer draw-one as an easier setting. There is no single “official” combination — agree on your draw count and pass limit before you deal.
How to win solitaire more often
Winning Klondike is mostly about uncovering face-down cards and keeping your options open. A few habits make a measurable difference:
- Play Aces and 2s to the foundations immediately, since they can never usefully stay in the tableau.
- Uncover face-down cards before anything else. A move that flips a hidden card is almost always better than one that does not, because it adds information and new possibilities.
- Do not rush every card to the foundations. A card sent up too early cannot catch an opposite-colour card in the tableau later. Build foundations roughly evenly across suits.
- Prioritise columns with the most hidden cards, because those are where you free up the most new cards per move.
- Plan how you will refill an empty column before you empty it — remember, only a King can go there.
Common mistakes to avoid
The errors below lose more games than bad luck does:
- Dumping cards onto the foundations as fast as possible. This feels like progress but strands tableau cards that needed that rank to stack on.
- Emptying a column with no King available, leaving a dead space you cannot use.
- Drawing from the stock before exhausting tableau moves, which wastes passes and skips cards you could have played.
- Moving a long run just because you can, when breaking it up would have uncovered a hidden card instead.
What are the odds of winning solitaire?
Your realistic win rate depends on the variant, the draw rule and your skill — and the published figures vary a lot because they measure two different things. Theoretical solvability is the share of random deals a perfect player could win with full knowledge; practical win rate is how often ordinary players actually win.
- Klondike, draw-one: commonly cited as roughly 79–82% theoretically solvable. Real players win far less often — reported averages range from about 15% up to around 60% depending on the source and skill.
- Klondike, draw-three: clearly harder in practice and lower theoretically, because the three-card draw hides cards you need. Real win rates are typically in the low tens of percent.
- FreeCell: almost every deal is winnable — of the first million numbered deals, only one (deal #11,982) is known to be unsolvable.
- Pyramid: one of the hardest common variants, with only a small single-digit percentage of deals winnable.
Treat exact percentages as estimates: they differ by study and by how “winnable” is defined. The reliable takeaway is the ranking — FreeCell is easiest, Klondike draw-one is winnable most of the time with good play, draw-three is harder, and Pyramid is hardest.
Popular solitaire variants
Klondike is one game in a large family. Once you know its vocabulary — tableau, foundation, stock, waste — the other versions are quick to pick up. The table below compares the most popular ones, and the notes that follow explain what makes each different.
Variant Comparison
| Variant | Decks | Core goal | Relative difficulty |
|---|---|---|---|
| Klondike (draw-one) | 1 (52 cards) | Build 4 foundations Ace to King by suit | Moderate — often winnable |
| Klondike (draw-three) | 1 (52 cards) | Same goal, three-card draw | Harder — hides needed cards |
| Spider | 2 (104 cards) | Build King-to-Ace runs in the tableau | Easy (1 suit) to hard (4 suits) |
| FreeCell | 1 (52 cards) | Build foundations using 4 free cells | Easiest — nearly all deals winnable |
| Pyramid | 1 (52 cards) | Remove card pairs that total 13 | Hardest — few deals winnable |
| Canfield | 1 (52 cards) | Build foundations from a random start rank | Hard — luck-driven |
Spider
Spider uses two decks (104 cards) and asks you to build complete descending sequences from King down to Ace within the tableau; a finished sequence is removed. It is usually played with one, two or four suits — one suit is easy, four suits is a serious challenge because colour and suit both restrict your moves.
FreeCell
FreeCell deals almost every card face up from the start and gives you four “free cells,” each able to hold a single card as temporary storage. Because so little is hidden and you can park cards aside, nearly every deal is solvable with careful planning, which makes FreeCell the thinking player’s favourite.
Pyramid
Pyramid lays 28 cards in a pyramid shape and asks you to remove pairs that add up to 13 (for example a 9 and a 4, or a Queen and an Ace). Kings are worth 13 and are removed on their own. Few deals are fully winnable, so it rewards planning over speed.
Canfield
Canfield is the harder ancestor of Klondike, named after casino owner Richard Canfield. It starts each foundation from a randomly chosen rank rather than always from the Ace, and uses a reserve pile of cards that feed into play — a tougher, more luck-driven cousin of the Klondike layout.
Vegas scoring Klondike
Vegas is not a new layout but a scoring variant of Klondike, traditionally framed as a betting game: you imagine “buying” the deck and “earning” back a set amount for each card you move to the foundations. It is normally played draw-three with limited passes, which makes it much harder to come out ahead than standard Klondike. Treat the money framing as a scoring device, not a reason to gamble.
Double solitaire
Double solitaire is Klondike adapted for two players, each with their own deck and tableau but sharing the foundations in the middle — players race to place cards on the shared piles. It is one of the few genuinely competitive forms of solitaire, closer in spirit to the two-player board games covered elsewhere on the site.
A short history of solitaire
Single-player card games appeared in European books by the late 18th century, often under the name “patience,” with early examples associated with France and Scandinavia. Klondike itself has a murkier origin: the earliest known rules appear in the 1907 edition of Hoyle’s Games under the name “Seven-Card Klondike,” and a 1913 rulebook changed it to turn the pack one card at a time, renaming the older three-card game Canfield. The name “Klondike” is often linked to the 1890s Klondike Gold Rush in the Yukon, but historians note there is no firm evidence for that story, so the origin remains uncertain.
What is certain is how the game became a global default: Microsoft bundled a digital Klondike, called Microsoft Solitaire, with Windows starting at version 3.0 in 1990. It was included partly to teach users the then-novel skill of dragging and dropping with a mouse, and it went on to become one of the most-played computer programs ever written. If you want to place solitaire among other household staples, see our guides to the rules of classic board games and our wider beginner’s guide to board games.
Sources
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
How many cards are in a game of solitaire?
Klondike solitaire uses one standard 52-card deck with the Jokers removed. The deal places 28 cards into the seven tableau columns and leaves 24 cards in the stock. Some variants differ — Spider uses two full decks (104 cards), while Pyramid uses a 28-card pyramid plus the remaining stock.
Can every game of solitaire be won?
No. In Klondike, a meaningful share of random deals have no winning path no matter how well you play — draw-one is roughly 79–82% theoretically solvable, and draw-three is lower. FreeCell is the exception: almost every deal is winnable, with only a single known unsolvable deal among the first million.
What is the difference between draw one and draw three?
Draw-one turns a single card from the stock to the waste each time, so every card becomes playable in turn. Draw-three turns three cards at once and only the top one is immediately playable, hiding the other two until you cycle the stock again. Draw-three is noticeably harder.
Is solitaire a game of skill or luck?
It is both. The shuffle decides whether a deal is winnable at all, which is luck, but skilful play — uncovering hidden cards, not rushing the foundations, and managing empty columns — turns winnable deals into actual wins. Skilled players win far more often than beginners on the same deals.
What card goes on an empty column in Klondike?
Only a King, or a correctly ordered run of cards led by a King, may be moved into an empty tableau column. No other card can start an empty column, which is why planning for a reachable King before you clear a column is an important part of strategy.
