How to Play Solitaire: A Beginner-Friendly Guide

Solitaire at TheSolitaire.com's Solitaire – How To Play

Solitaire

The folks at TheSolitaire.com's Solitaire have kept everything the same, so you don’t have to relearn any complex rules when you give the age-old game another shot. Let's refresh your memories a little and take you through all the pretty piles of cards.

In a traditional solitaire setup, there are 52 cards laid out in three different piles.

At the lower half, you’ll find seven different piles of cards. The first column will have one card, face-up. The second column will have two cards, with only one face-up. This pattern will continue up till the seventh column, where there are seven cards, and only one is face-up.

The Stockpile is a deck of face-down cards. You can draw one card at a time, and should you find an opportunity to put one of these cards in any of the other piles, you can. Personally, I never really liked clicking the Stockpile too much – always left me with this icky feeling of being inefficient. Turns out, the best way to handle the Stockpile is to have a mental catalog of all the cards once you've cycled through it. Save those precious turns, people!

A deck of 52 cards has seven ‘suits’ divided into groups of 13 cards. The end goal is to fill these foundation pile columns with the four different suits in order of lowest to highest (Aces to Kings). Without getting into the nitty-gritty of it, all you need to know is to click the next highest card in order whenever it’s available.

Now, let’s move on to the gameplay. The goal of solitaire is to complete the foundation piles with all 52 cards – 13 per pile. If you’d really like to challenge yourself, you can also challenge yourself to accomplish the goal in the least amount of turns.

One of the most essential parts of learning how to play Solitaire is understanding how to use the Layout pile. You see, you can only arrange cards in alternating colors when you use the layout pile, and that too in descending order. What does that mean? Well, let’s say there’s a black Jack at the bottom of one of the Layout columns. You can only place a red ten on there, and then a black nine, and so on.

The purpose of arranging cards on the layout pile is so that you can quickly transfer them to the foundation piles. Take a scenario where the Layout pile is now neatly arranged into four columns of 13 cards. Now, you can directly add each card to the foundation pile without having to overthink.

Remember to draw from the Stockpile whenever you feel there aren’t any cards that you can move around. This allows you to be more flexible, as you can directly transfer cards from the Stockpile to the Foundation Piles when there are no moves on the Layout Piles. Finally, if you play your cards right, you might just get that pretty little screen at the bottom as the game fills everything out for you.

You can actually play Solitaire in two ways – the 1-turn mode and the 3-turn mode. The only difference between these two modes is in the way you draw cards from the Stockpile. In 1-turn, you only draw one card, which you can immediately place onto the other piles if there’s a legal move. However, 3-turn is a little more challenging, as you draw three cards from the stockpile each time you click it. The catch is that you can only use the topmost card of those three cards, and the ones below that can only be used once the ones on top have been removed.

Once you understand the rules of the game, learning how to play Solitaire is actually quite simple, as long as you keep the basics in mind. However, there are a few tips and tricks you should keep in mind when you venture into the land of nostalgia.

Low cards like Aces and Twos almost always go to the foundation pile without a second thought, so get these cards out of your hand and onto those foundation piles quickly. Essentially, you’re clearing out the easiest chores first, so you have less to worry about later.

Think of the face-down cards in the Layout (those seven piles) as an opportunity to get your hands on a new card. Whenever you get a chance, try to reveal these hidden cards – you never know what you might find, and it could be just what you need!

The stockpile is like your reserve stash, and you don’t want to use it all at once. Sometimes, it’s better to hold off on using a card right away. Wait until using that card really helps you make more moves – otherwise, you’re much better off making available moves on the Layout section of Solitaire.

Whenever you get the chance to clear out a Layout pile, take it! You’ll get the chance to fill it with something better – such as a King so that you can start working on the columns!

Keeping all of these strategies in mind as you dive into your Solitaire game can be a tough ask. That’s why I’ve compiled a quick strategy guide below that you can refer to whenever you’re stuck in a pickle. Take a look:

Now that you’ve learned how to play Solitaire online, hop on to TheSolitaire and give their version a shot! They’ve made everything a lot easier to pick up on while making sure the game doesn’t lose the nostalgic feel everyone knows and loves!