How to play Klondike Solitaire
- Build four foundation piles, one per suit, from Ace up to King. The game is won when all 52 cards are on the foundations.
- In the seven columns, place cards in descending order with alternating colors: a red 6 goes on a black 7.
- You can move a whole run of face-up cards at once. When you uncover a face-down card, it turns over by itself.
- Only a King, or a run starting with a King, can fill an empty column.
- Tap the stock to turn over one card (Draw 1) or three cards (Draw 3). When the stock is empty, tap it again to turn the waste back over, as many times as you like.
- Tap a card to send it to its best place, or drag it where you want. Tap the same card again to try its next possible place.
Tips
- Turning over face-down cards is the key to Klondike: favor moves that uncover a card in the longest columns.
- Don't rush to empty a column if you have no King ready to put there.
- Keep an eye on both colors: moving a red 5 to a foundation too early can leave a black 4 with nowhere to go. Nothing goes up by itself: you decide, and once every card is face up, the Finish button sends them all home.
- Stuck? Hint (or H) shows a good move, worked out from your current position. Undo (U or Ctrl+Z) takes back as many moves as you want.
- On a keyboard: arrows to move between piles, Enter to play the selected card, Space to pick a card up and drop it, D to draw, F to send every possible card to the foundations.
- Your game is saved after every move: close the page and you will find it exactly where you left it.
About Klondike Solitaire
Klondike is the solitaire most people simply call Solitaire. It takes its name from the Klondike gold rush in Canada at the end of the 19th century, and it became one of the most played card games in the world once it arrived on home computers.
Here, every deal can be won. Each one is checked in advance by a solving program, which only keeps the deals that have at least one winning line: when you lose, there was a way through. Draw 1 is the relaxed version, Draw 3 asks for more planning.
The cards are drawn for this site, with large corner indexes that stay easy to read on a phone. Your statistics (games won, win rate, current and best streak, best time, fewest moves) are kept for each mode.
Points and badges
Finishing a game of Klondike Solitaire earns points for your level. Four badges are waiting in this game, from bronze to diamond: each one says what to do and adds bonus points.
Questions
Can every Klondike deal be won here?
Yes. Every deal comes from a bank of deals solved in advance by a computer, so each one has at least one winning sequence of moves.
What is the difference between Draw 1 and Draw 3?
In Draw 1, the stock turns over one card at a time, so every card is easy to reach. In Draw 3, it turns over three at a time and only the top one can be played, which makes the game harder and more strategic.
Is there a limit to how many times I can go through the stock?
No. You can turn the waste back into the stock as many times as you need.
How is the score counted?
10 points for each card sent to a foundation, 5 points for each face-down card turned over and for each card played from the waste to a column, minus 15 points when a card comes back down from a foundation.
Do hints and undo affect my badges?
The first badges can be earned with all the help you want. The diamond badge is for a game won without any undo or hint.