FreeCell Solitaire

Overview

FreeCell is built on open information. One standard deck, all 52 cards dealt face up into eight tableau columns, nothing hidden. There is no stock and no waste.

Unlike Klondike or Spider, you never wait for a face-down card or hope the stock delivers. The whole deal is in front of you from the first move.

Four free cells give you somewhere to park single cards while you reorganise. That does not make the game easy — it moves the difficulty from finding hidden information to using known information properly. The question stops being "what will I turn up?" and becomes "how do I reach the card I can already see?"

The starting layout

The classic deal: seven cards each to the first four columns and six each to the other four — 28 plus 24, all 52, every one face up.

Alongside sit four empty free cells and four empty foundations. Everything you need to solve the deal is visible before you touch a card.

Goal

Move all 52 cards to the four foundations, each built upward by suit from Ace through King. Complete all four and the game is won.

Tableau rules

• Build downward in alternating colours — a red 8 on a black 9, a black 7 on a red 8.
• Any single card may be placed into an empty tableau column, not just a King.
• Ordered runs move together only when you have enough free space to relocate them one card at a time.
• Each free cell holds exactly one card.

How many cards you can move at once

FreeCell has no true multi-card move — the game shifts a run one card at a time using whatever space you have. The exact limit is:

(1 + empty free cells) × 2^{(empty columns)}

So with all four cells free and no empty column you can move 5 cards. Open one column and it becomes 10. Open a second and it is 20.

That is the single most useful thing to know about FreeCell. A free cell adds one to the number you can shift; an empty column doubles it. One caveat: if you are moving a run into an empty column, that column no longer counts toward the multiplier.

It explains why a move that appears to achieve nothing — clearing a column you then leave alone — is often the strongest move available.

Using the free cells

Free cells turn blocked cards into movable ones, which makes them the obvious tool and the easy trap. Each holds one card, and every card you park reduces the size of run you can move.

Fill all four and you have no parking space left; a move that would have been routine becomes impossible until you unload one. Hence the habit worth forming: do not use a free cell just because it is there. Before parking a card, know how you intend to get it out.

Empty columns

An empty column is the strongest resource in the game. In Klondike only a King can start one; in FreeCell any card can, which makes it a genuine workspace rather than a slot waiting for one specific card.

Use it to break apart a run, stage a reorganisation, or double what you can move. Once you fill it, that flexibility is gone — so occupy it only when the move genuinely improves your position.

Foundations

Foundations build upward by suit, Ace through King. Freeing the Aces early gets them started and takes cards out of the tableau.

But sending a card home is not automatically progress. A black 7 ready for its foundation may be the only place a red 6 can go. The right moment is usually when the move does not cost you a destination you still need.

Strategy and tips

• Work toward an empty column before anything else. It doubles your moving capacity; a free cell only adds one.
• Protect your free cells. Every occupied cell shrinks the run you can shift.
• Plan the exit before you park. Identify how a card leaves a free cell before it goes in.
• Free the Aces and low cards early.
• Do not bury what you need. Every card is visible, but visible is not the same as reachable.
• Take your time. Nothing is hidden and nothing is timed, so there is no reason to guess.

Controls and features

• Drag a card or valid sequence to a legal destination.
• Tap a card to see its legal destinations.
• Double-tap a card to send it to a foundation when the move is legal.
• Use Undo to take back moves while exploring a solution.
• Start a New Game for a fresh deal.
• There is no stock or waste — every card is in play from the start.

If you liked FreeCell

Yukon is the other no-stock game here: all 52 cards on the table, though 21 of them face down, and you move any card with whatever is piled on it. Forty Thieves goes the other way — two decks, build down by suit, and only ever one card at a time, so free space matters even more than it does here.

For the opposite experience entirely, Klondike keeps 24 cards in a stock and hides 21 more in the tableau.