Klondike Solitaire

The classic patience game, dealt before you finish reading this line.

The table above is already dealt — twenty-eight cards in seven columns, one face up on each, the remaining twenty-four waiting in the stock. There is no account to create, nothing to install and no tutorial to click through, because this is the same game you have played on a desktop for years, and it starts better when nobody explains it first. If you have never played Solitaire, everything you need is visible on the table in front of you, and the rules below are four sentences long.

Rules

Klondike is played with one deck and four goals: build every suit from ace to king on the four foundations at the top right of the table.

• The tableau — the seven columns under the deck. Cards are stacked downward in alternating colours, so a red six takes a black seven. Any face-up run that is already in order can be picked up as one piece and laid on another column.
• The foundations — the four piles at the top right. Each one starts with an ace and takes the same suit in order. Nothing else may be played there, and nothing may be taken back off.
• An empty column — only a king (or a run that starts with one) may move into an empty column.
• The stock — turn one card at a time into the waste pile beside it. When the stock is empty, turn the waste back over and go again; there is no limit on how often.

The game is won when all fifty-two cards are on the foundations. It is lost when no move is left and the stock has been turned as often as the deal allows — which, in the standard game, is the same thing.

Strategy

Klondike is a game of information: every face-down card you turn over is a card you can plan with, and every move that does not turn one over is a move that buys you nothing yet.

• Turn cards first. Before you build anything pretty on the foundations, look for the move that exposes a new face-down card. Those are the only genuinely productive moves in the opening.
• Mind what a move buries. A seven that lands on a column can uncover a card underneath it in the same column — or hide the card you needed from another one. Before a long run goes down, ask what it covers.
• Keep one column free if you can. An empty column is the only place a king can go, and the only place a stubborn run can be parked while you dig elsewhere. Spending it early usually costs a deal.
• Build foundations late, not fast. Sending a low card home feels like progress, but cards on the foundations cannot go back to the tableau. If a two is the only thing holding a column together, leave it where it is for now.
• Watch the waste pile. The order of the cards you turn from the stock matters more than the count. A card you passed three turns ago is still in the same place in the pile, and it will be back.
• Hints are free. The hint button looks at the whole table and names a legal move; undo is unlimited and costs nothing. Taking a move back to try another line is how this game has always been learned.