History of Solitaire

Origins in Europe

Card games for one player go back at least to the late 18th century. The earliest known description of a game called "Patience" appears in a German games anthology, Das neue Königliche L'Hombre-Spiel. The edition is usually dated 1783, though some sources say 1788. Oddly, that first account describes a game for two players taking turns. Historians generally place the game's origins in Germany or Scandinavia, and much of the early literature on it came from France. That is why the game is called patience in British English, Patience in German and réussite or patience in French, while American English settled on solitaire.

The 19th-century patience boom

By the 1800s, patience was a fashionable pastime across Europe. In Britain it took off in the second half of the century, helped by printed collections of games. Illustrated Games of Patience by Lady Adelaide Cadogan, first published around 1870 and reprinted many times, is usually credited as the first collection of patience games in English. Books like hers spread dozens of layouts, each with its own name and rules.

Where the name "Klondike" comes from

The game we now call Klondike appears in print in the early 20th century. A 1905 book describes the three-at-a-time version, and American editions from 1913 and 1914 use the name Klondike. The name is popularly linked to the Klondike Gold Rush in Canada's Yukon, which sent an estimated 100,000 prospectors north at the end of the 1890s. That story is plausible but not documented, so treat it as a likely tale rather than settled fact. In Britain the same game is often simply called patience, and in the US older books sometimes confuse it with Canfield, a different solitaire named after a casino owner.

From card tables to computer screens

Solitaire was a natural fit for computers, since it needs one player, no opponent and a clear set of rules. The breakthrough came in 1990, when Microsoft shipped Solitaire with Windows 3.0.

• Intern Wes Cherry wrote the program, and designer Susan Kare drew the cards.
• Microsoft has said the game helped people learn to use a mouse: dragging cards was perfect practice for dragging windows and files.
• It has since run on well over a billion computers.
• In 2019 it was inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame.

Later versions of Windows added FreeCell and Spider Solitaire, which became classics in their own right.

Solitaire online

Once browsers could handle smooth drag-and-drop, solitaire moved to the web, and today anyone can open a deal without installing anything. Online play also made the old one-player game social again. Shared deals let many people play the same shuffle, so results can be compared fairly. Live matches turn solitaire back into a race, oddly close to that first 18th-century description of patience played by two people taking turns.

Klondike on VSolitaire

VSolitaire keeps the classic rules: seven columns, four foundations, Draw 1 or Draw 3. It adds the parts that only make sense online:

• a Daily Challenge where everyone plays the same deal;
• VS matches, where two players race one shuffle;
• public leaderboards.

If you want to try the game the way millions learned it, start with how to play Klondike.