What's the difference between Solitaire and Spider Solitaire?

Klondike, what Americans and Canadians simply call Solitaire, and Spider Solitaire have a lot of differences. For one, Spider Solitaire uses two standard 52-card decks, while Klondike only uses one. Also, in Klondike, you’re building foundations from Ace to King per suit; in Spider, you’re building sequences from King to Ace. Depending on the type of Spider Solitaire you’re playing, you may not use all four suits, but every version of Klondike uses all four suits.

Nope! You can be a complete beginner to Solitaire games and still play Spider Solitaire well. Now, whether or not you’ll be good at it right away is a different story. Spider Solitaire can quickly get out of hand if you’re not playing your cards right. Luckily, there’s no shame in starting over, especially if you’re a new player!

Like all Solitaire games, 1-Suit Spider Solitaire requires a careful balance between skill and chance. You’re not going to be able to control the cards that are dealt, but you can control where they go once they’re in play. As you play more, you’ll start to understand things like where you should place cards and what plays aren’t optimal.

Solitaire games have been around since the 18th century, but Spider Solitaire wasn’t introduced to the world until 1949. It was named Spider Solitaire because of the eight foundation piles used. It became one of the most popular versions of Solitaire because of its inclusion on Windows computers by default.

Yes! In fact, we have three different versions other than 1-Suit Spider Solitaire: classic Spider, Two Suit Spider, and Four Suit Spider. As the names suggest, these versions introduce more than one suit into the game. You still build sequences with like suits, but multiple suits offer a layer of complexity and difficulty that you wouldn’t get otherwise.