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Spider Solitaire Rules, Setup and Strategy

Everything about how Spider works, from the first deal to the last King-to-Ace run, plus what to do differently with one, two or four suits.

Spider is a solitaire game for one player with two decks and ten columns. It is slower than Klondike and rewards patience. This page covers the rules in full, and then the habits that win more games. You can try everything as you read: play Spider with one suit.

Setup

With one suit the game uses eight copies of spades. With two suits it is four copies each of spades and hearts. With four suits it is two full decks, as you would expect. The rules are the same, only the difficulty changes.

The goal

Assemble eight complete runs from King down to Ace, every card in a run being the same suit. When you finish one, it leaves the table by itself. Remove all eight and you win.

What you can move

Spider has two rules that look alike but are different, and most beginners trip on this.

• Where a card can go: onto any card exactly one rank higher, whatever its suit. A 6 of hearts can go onto a 7 of spades.
• What you can pick up: only a run of cards in descending order that are all in the same suit. A 7 of spades with a 6 of spades and a 5 of spades moves as one piece. A 7 of spades with a 6 of hearts on it does not: you can move the 6 of hearts alone, and then the 7.

An empty column takes any card, or any run you can pick up.

Dealing from the stock

When you run out of useful moves, click the stock. It puts one new card face up on every column. This is the only way new cards come into the game, so use it five times and no more. The one rule to remember: you cannot deal while any column is empty. If you are stuck, put any card into the empty column first.

Finishing a run

When you place the last card to make King, Queen, Jack, 10 and so on down to Ace in a single column and a single suit, the whole run flies to the top of the screen. That empties part of your column and often turns a face-down card over.

Scoring on this site

You start with 500 points. Every move costs 1 point, and dealing a row counts as a move. Each finished run is worth 100 points. The leaderboard ranks by finishing time, not score, so play at the speed you like.

Strategy

1. Empty a column early. It is the strongest thing in the game. Go for the column with the fewest cards.
2. Turn over hidden cards first. New information is worth more than a tidy column.
3. Keep runs in one suit. When two cards could take the card you are moving, choose the one that keeps the suit.
4. Deal last. A deal buries every column under ten new cards. Make all your useful moves first.
5. Do not strand a King. A King at the top of a column can only be built on if you can collect the whole run in that column. Think before you bury one under mixed cards.
6. Use Undo to look ahead. It is unlimited, so test a line, see where it goes, and step back.

One suit

Every run is automatically a same-suit run, so nothing is blocked. Concentrate on emptying columns and not wasting deals. Most one-suit deals can be won with careful play.

Two suits

Now you have to care about suit. When you can choose, build on the matching suit, and keep one suit spread across fewer columns. You will not win them all, but a lot are winnable.

Four suits

This is the full game. Building on the wrong suit locks cards away, so every move needs a reason. Expect to lose many deals. The gap between the best and a careless player is large, and most random deals cannot be won.

Common mistakes

• Dealing while moves are still available.
• Moving a card onto another suit just because it fits, when a same-suit card was available.
• Emptying a column and then having nothing to put in it. Plan what goes there.
• Forgetting that you cannot deal into an empty column.

Play and learn more

Play 1 suit, 2 suits or 4 suits. For the other games, the solitaire rules page covers each one, and types of solitaire compares them.