Solitaire Klondike

Solitaire Klondike rules and strategy

The best-known solitaire game: seven columns, hidden cards to uncover and a stock to turn over. This site explains the exact rules, strategy and winning games, verified card by card. To play: Solitaire Klondike, on iPhone, iPad and Android.

Read the rulesDownload the app

Available on the App Store and on Google Play.

Solitaire Klondike on a phone held in landscape orientation, at the start of a game on the green playing surface: on the left, the stock with blue card backs, the empty waste and four empty foundations; on the right, seven columns of one to seven cards, with only one face-up card per column; at the bottom, the time, score and move count are all zero.

Klondike at a glance

Klondike is played alone with a deck of 52 cards. 28 cards form 7 columns of 1 to 7 cards: only the last card in each column is face up. The other 24 remain face down in the stock. The aim is to move all 52 cards onto 4 foundations, one per suit, from ace to king.

In the columns, you place a card on a card of the opposite color and one rank higher: a black 9 on a red 10. Each face-down card you uncover is turned over and becomes playable. The rules detail every move, and the strategy explains how to go about it.

A deal from the app

Here is the deal with code KL1-D1N-AAAAAAG exactly as the app deals it. Paste this code into the New Game window to play it; a winning game completed in 113 actions is detailed on the Examples page.

Stock: 24 cards; waste empty. Cards on the foundations: 0 spades, 0 hearts, 0 diamonds, 0 clubs. Column 1: 0 face down, then jack of spades; column 2: 1 face down, then 10 of clubs; column 3: 2 face down, then 7 of diamonds; column 4: 3 face down, then 5 of spades; column 5: 4 face down, then 7 of clubs; column 6: 5 face down, then jack of hearts; column 7: 6 face down, then ace of hearts.

Deal KL1-D1N-AAAAAAG at the start: columns of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 cards, with only one face-up card in each, and 24 cards in the stock.

Where to start?

On phone and tablet

The app is played in landscape orientation. It offers a choice of drawing 1 or 3 cards, Normal or Vegas scoring, a code for each game to replay or share a deal, undo for the last 100 actions, and statistics.

Solitaire Klondike on a phone in landscape orientation, a game in progress with Draw 3: the waste fans out its latest cards, three aces have been moved to the foundations, a king occupies the first column to be emptied, score 65.
Phone, in landscape orientation.
Solitaire Klondike on a tablet in landscape orientation: the same game with Draw 3, smaller cards, plenty of green playing surface beneath the columns, and the foundations at the bottom left.
Tablet, in landscape orientation.