Klondike Solitaire — Play Free Online

Klondike Solitaire is the card game most people mean when they just say "solitaire": one deck, seven columns, and the job of sorting all 52 cards into four foundation piles. Here it runs in the browser with nothing to install, which makes it an easy pick when you want a few quiet minutes between rounds of something faster.

It is a slow, thinking game, and that is why it fits on a site built around Doodle Jump. Where a jumper rewards reflexes and rhythm, Klondike rewards patience and planning. A hand can take ten minutes or end in thirty seconds when you run out of moves, and either way starting again is one click.

How to play

The layout is the standard one. Seven tableau columns hold cards that start face down, with only the top card of each column showing. The rest of the deck sits in a stock pile that you turn over to find more playable cards. The goal is to build four foundation piles, one per suit, from ace up to king.

On the tableau you stack cards in descending order and alternate colours, so a red six can sit on a black seven. You can move a whole run of correctly ordered cards at once, and only a king, or a run starting with a king, can fill an empty column. Moving the last face-up card off a column lets you flip the card beneath it, which is how new options open up.

The page lists the generic mouse and touch controls. In practice that means you select and move cards with the mouse, or tap and drag on a phone, and click the stock to deal from it.

Tips

• Uncover face-down cards first. Prefer a move that flips a hidden card over one that merely tidies the board, since hidden cards are what block you.
• Do not rush cards to the foundations. A low card left in the tableau may be needed later as a landing spot for a card of the opposite colour.
• Think before emptying a column. An empty space is only useful if you hold a king to put in it.
• When two moves look equal, pick the one from the column with more face-down cards underneath.
• Go through the whole stock once before committing to a risky move, so you know which cards are coming.

Not every deal can be won, so a stuck board is not always your mistake. Restarting is part of the game.

Similar games on Doodle Jump

If you want something else on the calmer side, Fireboy and Watergirl is a puzzle game built around two characters solving rooms together, while Bloons Tower Defense 2 is a strategy game about placing towers and planning ahead. Helix Jump and Bird Jumper are the quick-reaction end of the catalogue, so they make a good contrast after a long solitaire session.

Klondike suits short breaks, one-handed play on a phone, and anyone who likes a puzzle they can pick up and put down without a tutorial.