How to Play Solitaire

Hey there! This website does contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through this page, Cats and Dice may earn a share of sales from the link. Learn more.

Sometimes, you just can’t get people together to play card games. Even finding another person for two-player card games can be a hassle sometimes. Maybe your cat is the only one around to play with (and let’s face it: these two are cheaters, anyway). Or other times, maybe you just want to play a quick game by yourself to take a break. Solitaire card games are a great way to do that.

Solitaire has been around for years, but it might be brand new to you. The term “solitaire” refers to any card game played by just one person. Popular games like Aces Up, Free Cell, and Pyramid all fall under the “solitaire” umbrella.

When someone wants to know how to play Solitaire, though, they usually mean Klondike Solitaire. You will learn how to play Klondike Solitaire through this post today.

Klondike Solitaire Set Up

To set up a game of Solitaire, you will need a deck of 52 cards. Buying several at once in a pack will save you money on decks, which are prone to wearing out with use.

Remove the Jokers and shuffle the deck thoroughly. Then, deal out the cards.

You will have a row of seven cards. The first column will have a single card face up. The second column will have two cards, the bottom one face down and the top one face up. The next column will have three cards with the top card face up. This pattern will continue until you reach the seventh column. One card will be face up and the rest will be face down.

Leave room above your columns for four piles. Then, place the deck to the side or in your hand. You will be using it often throughout gameplay.

How to Play Solitaire

The goal of Solitaire is to get all the cards in order from low to high in the correct suits in your “suit piles,” starting with Aces.

To do this, you will draw three cards from the top of the deck at a time and flip them over. Do not change their order! This will ensure that the cards are flipped in the right order as you go through the deck. You then may play the top card if possible into a pile or a column.

To play in a pile, whenever you can reach an Ace through your flipped cards or your columns (that is, it’s not buried by other cards), you will place it in your designated area for suit piles. After that, you will place the Two into the pile that matches the Aces suit, then the Three, and so on all the way to the King.

To play in a column, you may place a card of the opposite color one number lower onto a card. For example, if you flip up a Nine of Diamonds, you may play it on top of a Ten of Spades or a Ten of Clubs if one is currently in a column. You may move cards from one column into another in the same way. When you move cards from a column, you will flip over the top card in that pile.

If a column is empty, you may place any King into that column and stack cards following the rules above.

When you run out of cards in your deck, you will pick up the discard pile, flip it over, and begin going through them again. Do not shuffle the cards!

Play will continue until you have completed all four columns or until you cannot play anymore. If you cannot play anymore, you have lost and will need to deal out a new game.

For variations on Klondike Solitaire or to learn other solitaire games, check out the Ultimate Book of Card Games.

Simple Solitaire Strategy Tips

When you first learn how to play Solitaire, don’t worry too much about the strategy. Like with any game, you will learn it as you go along.

With that said, there are three pieces of strategy that will help you out right away.

#1 Open up as many cards as you can.

To win Solitaire, you need to get every single card face-up and placed in order into the suit piles. But you won’t be able to do that if cards are buried in the columns or the deck! So it is to your advantage to stack cards in the columns as much as possible with one exception in mind.

#2 Keep lower numbers open as much as possible.

I cannot tell you how many times I played a Two of Hearts on top of a Three of Clubs, thinking that surely the Ace of Hearts must come up soon just to get stuck. Early on in the game, it’s possible you will get jammed up if you play too many low cards on top of each other. It’s okay to do this if doing so will free up an Ace or another low card you can move right away. Otherwise, you might want to avoid it.

#3 Play a lot to learn.

One of the best ways to learn strategy for any game is to simply play it. Solitaire is a quick game to learn but a difficult game to win. The odds just aren’t in your favor sometimes. As you play more, though, you will understand more about the strategy. It’s a quick game, so play a lot to get better and win more.

Play Solitaire Online

You can play free solitaire card games almost anywhere. Microsoft Windows computers still come with it for free. Or, you can play it any number of places online. In fact, if you simply Google “Solitaire,” Google will give you a way to play for free.

There are also dozens of apps that allow you to play Solitaire on your phone so you can play on the go. Many of these apps include multiple kinds of solitaire so you can learn a different version of the game.

It is worth noting that if you play on Google or through other websites and programs, they will often automatically move cards for you. This helps you think about less as you’re learning to play. Playing with physical cards, however, will make sure you fully understand the rules of the game.
To play other amazing games online, check out our post on where to play board games online. (sometimes for free!)