About

Klondike Solitaire is the world's most-played card game, familiar to anyone who has ever owned a computer. The goal is to move all 52 cards to four foundation piles, one per suit, built up from Ace to King. It sounds simple — and that simplicity is exactly what makes it so addictive.

The game rewards both forward planning and improvisation. You constantly make small decisions: which card to flip, which stack to build on, when to cycle through the deck. A single misstep early can cascade into a blocked board, while a clever sequence of moves can unblock what looked like a dead game.

Solitaire is the perfect coffee break companion. Games last 5–10 minutes, there's no pressure, and the gentle rhythm of card play is genuinely relaxing. Whether you win or lose, the urge to deal again is always there.

How to Play

• Deal 28 cards into 7 tableau columns, with one card face-up on each column.
• Move face-up cards onto cards of the opposite color and one rank higher.
• Flip the top card of each tableau column when it becomes exposed.
• Click the stock pile to draw cards you can play on the tableau or foundations.
• Build foundation piles (top right) from Ace up through King for each suit to win.

Tips

• Prioritize moves that flip face-down cards — more options is always better.
• Empty columns are valuable: only Kings can fill them, so plan carefully before clearing one.
• Cycle through the stock pile multiple times before concluding a game is unwinnable.

History

Klondike Solitaire's exact origins are murky, but it became globally dominant when Microsoft included it in Windows 3.0 in 1990. The game was added partly to teach users how to use a mouse, but it quickly became one of the most-played programs on the planet. Studies suggest it was played by millions of office workers daily throughout the 1990s and 2000s, making it arguably the most-played computer game in history.