Porchlight › How to play › Klondike
How to play Klondike
The classic solitaire game. Build columns down in alternating colors, and get every card home to its suit.
The aim
Move all 52 cards onto the four foundations, one for each suit, building from ace up to king.
Setting up
Twenty-eight cards are dealt into seven columns: one card in the first column, two in the second, and so on up to seven in the last. Only the top card of each column is face up. The other 24 cards form the face-down stock.
| Variant | Each turn of the stock |
|---|---|
| Draw one | Turns one card onto the waste |
| Draw three | Turns three cards onto the waste (fewer when the stock is nearly empty) |
Each variant has its own daily deal.
Playing
Stock and waste. Turn cards from the stock onto the waste pile. Only the top card of the waste can be played. When the stock is empty, turn the waste over to make a new stock. You can go through the stock as many times as you like.
Moves:
- A card can go onto a face-up card that is one rank higher and the opposite color (a red 6 onto a black 7).
- Face-up cards in a column move together: pick a card, and everything on top of it comes with it.
- Only a king, or a run headed by a king, can be moved into an empty column.
- A single card can go to its foundation if it's the next card of that suit.
- The top card of a foundation can be brought back down onto a column.
When a face-down card is left uncovered, it turns over by itself.
Cards that go home by themselves. Aces and twos go to their foundation as soon as they're free. Any other card goes home automatically once both foundations of the opposite color have reached the rank below it. A red 5 goes up as soon as both black foundations show a 4.
Undo takes back your last move, but never past a card being turned face up, whether from the stock or in a column. What you've seen can't be unseen, so undo can't be used to peek.
Every move, every turn of the stock and every undo counts as one move. Anything that happens by itself doesn't.
Winning
You win when all four foundations are complete. Once the stock and waste are empty and no card is face down, the remaining cards go home by themselves.
If the stock and waste are empty and no move is left, the game tells you, but doesn't end: undo if you can, or give up. Giving up counts as unsolved.
Today's deal and the clock
New game deals a free game, open to everyone. Today's deal is the same for every player and changes at midnight UTC. It's for members only, and you get one attempt per variant, which counts from the moment it's dealt. Only a game cut short on our side can be dealt again.
The clock runs from the deal to your winning move and can't be paused. Making no move for 15 minutes, or leaving or losing your connection for about a minute, ends the game as unsolved. Today's best ranks the day's winners by time, then by fewest moves. Members also see their own record: deals played and solved, best time, and their daily run (the number of days in a row they've solved the daily deal).
On Porchlight
- Click the stock to turn cards. When it shows a circular arrow, click it to turn the waste over.
- Click a card to pick it up, then click where it should go. Legal destinations light up. Click the top card of a foundation to bring it back down.
- Or drag the card, with a mouse or a finger.
- Double-click the top card of a column, or of the waste, to send it home.
- Undo with the button, or Ctrl+Z (Cmd+Z on a Mac).
Tips
- Turning over face-down cards matters most. Prefer moves that reveal one.
- Don't empty a column unless you have a king ready to fill it.
- Don't rush low cards home. You may need that black 4 to hold a red 3.