Klondike Solitaire: a complete guide to the classic patience

Klondike is the game most people in Britain simply call patience: seven columns of cards, a pile of spare cards to turn over, and four piles to build from Ace to King. This page is a full guide to the game itself — where the name comes from, every rule and term, a walk through your first deal, and a glossary you can come back to. If you are after our research into how often Klondike can be won, the full figures sit on the home page; here we keep the numbers to a minimum and concentrate on how the game works.

You can deal a game on this page straight away. It costs nothing, needs no download and asks for no account.

Where the name comes from

The name is generally linked to the Klondike region of Canada's Yukon, the scene of the gold rush at the end of the 1890s. Wikipedia's article on Klondike gathers the history and the many alternative names the game has picked up.

What turned it from a card-table pastime into something almost everyone has played was the personal computer. Microsoft included the game with Windows 3.0 in 1990, under the plain name "Solitaire", as Wikipedia's Microsoft Solitaire article records, and for many people that is still the picture that comes to mind: green baize, a patterned card back and the cards cascading at the end.

That history is why the same game goes by several names. On this site you will find it as Solitaire, Klondike Solitaire and, in its harder form, Solitaire Turn 3 or Klondike Turn 3. They are all the same family.

The words you need

Klondike has a small vocabulary, and once you know it every rule makes sense.

• Tableau – the seven columns laid out across the table; most moves happen here.
• Foundations – four piles, one for each suit, each climbing from Ace to King. Complete them all and the game is yours.
• Stock – the undealt cards, kept face down.
• Waste – the face-up pile where cards from the stock land when you turn them over. Only its top card can be played.
• Build – putting a card onto the next rank up in the other colour, for example the 6 of hearts onto the 7 of spades.
• Run – a properly built chain of face-up cards, for example 9 of clubs, 8 of diamonds, 7 of spades.
• Redeal – turning the waste back over to become the stock again once the stock is empty.

Every rule, as played on this site

The deal

One standard pack of 52 cards is shuffled. It is laid out in seven columns holding one to seven cards from left to right, with just the uppermost card of each turned face up. That uses 28 cards; the 24 left over become the stock.

Moving cards in the tableau

• Any face-up card may go onto the next rank up in the opposite colour.
• You can lift a whole face-up run in one go, provided the card at its head fits its new spot.
• Clearing the face-up cards off a column flips the hidden card underneath.
• Empty columns accept only a King, or a run that starts with one.

The stock and the waste

On this page the game turns one card at a time from the stock to the waste. When the stock runs out you may turn the waste over and go through it again, and there is no limit on how many times you do so. If you prefer the tougher version where three cards turn at once, try Klondike Turn 3.

The foundations

A foundation begins with an Ace and grows one card at a time in the same suit until it reaches the King. This site also lets you bring a single card back down from a foundation when it would help you park a lower card.

Winning

The game is won once the foundations hold all 52 cards. This site doesn't award points: the game keeps track of your wins, your time and the number of moves in the current game.

Your first deal, move by move

Here is how an unhurried first game might go. The exact cards will differ, but the order of thinking is the same every time.

1. Scan before you touch anything. Look at the seven face-up cards. Is there an Ace? Send it straight to a foundation. Is there a 2 of the same suit? It can follow.
2. Look for builds between columns. If a red 5 is showing and a black 6 is showing, move the 5 onto the 6. Prefer moves that turn over a face-down card, because every hidden card you reveal gives you more choices.
3. Favour the long columns. The right-hand columns hide the most face-down cards. Freeing those early tends to open the game up.
4. Only then turn the stock. When the tableau has nothing useful left, turn a card from the stock and see whether it plays onto the tableau or a foundation.
5. Keep an empty column for a King. If you clear a column, wait until you have a King (ideally one with cards to carry) to put in it.
6. Go round the stock again. Redeals are unlimited here, so a card that was useless on the first pass may fit perfectly on the second.
7. Finish with Auto Play. When nothing is left hidden and the finish is certain, press Auto Play to send the remaining cards up.

If you get stuck, Undo takes back as many moves as you like and Hint suggests a move. There is no penalty for using either.

Five habits of good Klondike players

Turn cards over before tidying up

Revealing a face-down card nearly always beats a move that only makes a column look tidier.

Don't empty a column without a King to fill it

An empty column can only take a King. Clearing one when no King is available leaves a hole you cannot use.

Be patient with the foundations

Low cards belong on the foundations quickly. Middle cards, such as a 6 or 7, can be more useful left in the tableau as somewhere to park lower cards of the other colour.

Choose which black or red card to move

When two cards could take the same spot, pick the one whose move uncovers more, or frees the column you most need.

Use Undo to explore

Try a line, see where it leads, and step back if it goes nowhere. It is the quickest way to learn which moves matter.

Is it you, or is it the deal?

Most Klondike deals are winnable if you could see every card. The published study from the University of St Andrews puts the figure for this one-card version at 90.48%. In practice, a simple computer player in our own tests, which sees only what you see and never takes back a move, managed 42.3% over 10,000 deals. The gap between those two numbers is skill, look-ahead and a little luck with the hidden cards. The home page sets out the full comparison and how we measured it.

How the study behind those two figures was done

1. Rules from our own code. We read this page's game code: one card per turn, unlimited redeals, Kings only into empty columns, runs may move.
2. A player program. We wrote Klondike in Python with a simple rule-based player that sees only face-up cards and never takes a move back.
3. Numbered deals. 10,000 deals, each shuffled from a numbered seed so the test can be repeated exactly.
4. Checking the rules. The program's moves were checked against the rules over 2,000 games.
5. Comparing with St Andrews. The 90.48% figure comes from Blake and Gent's peer-reviewed study (Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, 2026), which uses a solver that sees every card, so it describes the deal, not a player.
6. Margin of error. Our 42.3% has a 95% range of 41.3% to 43.3%.

The code and the AI

Our simulation code is Python 3.11 with nothing beyond the standard library, kept in a module named klondike.py. A shared runner spread the deals across the cores of one machine with Python's multiprocessing, and the 95% range uses the Wilson score interval. Claude, Anthropic's AI assistant, helped us write and check that code and produce a first draft of this guide; the figures themselves come only from running the program, and we checked them against the published study before using them.

Klondike glossary questions

Is Klondike the same as Solitaire?

Yes. "Solitaire" is the name most computers gave it; Klondike is its proper name among card players, and in Britain many people just call it patience.

Why can only a King go in an empty column?

That is the traditional Klondike rule and the one this site follows. It makes empty columns precious, so plan before clearing one.

Can I take a card back off a foundation?

Yes, one card at a time, if you need it in the tableau.

Is there a limit on redeals?

No. Turn the waste over and start again whenever the stock runs out.

What should I try next?

For two packs and more room, try Solitaire Double. For everything dealt face up, try Yukon or FreeCell. The full list is on the games page.

By Admin, solitaire-free.uk. Study date: September 2026.