Klondike Solitaire is the original one-deck card game most people simply call solitaire, built around alternating colours and four tidy foundation piles. You uncover the tableau, shuttle cards from the stock, and race to send every card home from Ace to King. Its steady, readable rhythm makes a gentle contrast to the two-deck grind of Spider.
How to play Klondike Solitaire
Klondike Solitaire deals 28 cards into seven tableau columns — one card in the first, two in the second, up to seven in the last — with only the bottom card of each column face up. The remaining 24 cards form the stock you draw from. In the tableau you build downward in alternating colours, so a black six only lands on a red seven; you may move a single card or lift a properly ordered run of them together. Empty columns are reserved for Kings alone. Your real goal sits above the tableau: four foundation piles, one per suit, that must be filled in ascending order starting with each Ace and finishing with the King. Turn stock cards over to feed both the tableau and the foundations, recycling the waste pile when the stock runs dry. Win by moving all 52 cards up to the foundations. If you enjoy the ordered climb, try the suit-building twist of Scorpion next.
Klondike Solitaire strategy & tips
Winning Klondike Solitaire consistently comes down to exposing face-down cards, so favour any move that flips a hidden card over one that merely shuffles the surface. Do not rush every Ace and Two straight to the foundations — a low card left in the tableau can be a useful landing spot, and sending cards up too eagerly can strand a colour you needed. Think hard before emptying a column, because a gap is worthless unless you hold a King ready to fill it. Draw from the stock deliberately and remember the order of the waste pile, since knowing what is coming lets you set up chains in advance. When you have a choice of Kings for an empty column, pick the one that unlocks the most buried cards. Lean on undo to test a line before you commit to it.
Klondike Solitaire vs Spider
Players who love Spider often wonder how Klondike Solitaire compares, and the two differ in shape as much as difficulty. Klondike uses a single deck and asks you to build up onto four foundations by suit while building down in alternating colours in the tableau — a game of feeding cards home. Spider uses two decks and never builds up at all; you assemble long King-to-Ace runs in place and the game removes them for you. Klondike hands you a stock and a waste pile to draw from at will, whereas Spider deals a whole row across all ten columns at once and only when none stand empty. The upshot is that Klondike is more forgiving and faster to read, making it a fine warm-up, while Spider is the deeper, more patient test once you want a longer challenge.