Double Klondike Solitaire

Double Klondike takes everything familiar about the world's most popular solitaire game and doubles it — the deck, the foundations, the columns, and the ways things can go wrong. Played with two standard 52-card decks shuffled together, it demands the same core skills as Klondike but scales them into a harder puzzle.

The tableau expands from seven to nine columns. The ninth column starts with nine cards. This wider field means more buried cards, more sequence-building opportunities, and a longer route to the endgame.

Eight foundation piles must be built instead of four — two complete Ace-to-King runs for each suit. With more columns in play, early moves feel liberating. But as sequences interlock across nine columns, complexity compounds fast.

Cards from both decks compete for the same foundation positions. Managing duplicate ranks requires more foresight than standard Klondike.

Double Klondike is accessible to anyone who knows Klondike — no new rules to learn. But it delivers a meaningfully harder game that can occupy an experienced player for twice as long. Win rates drop considerably compared to the single-deck version.

The game is widely available online and in desktop solitaire collections, often listed as "Double Solitaire" or "Two-Deck Klondike." It is an excellent next step for Klondike players who want a genuine challenge without switching game families.

1. Shuffle two standard 52-card decks together to form a 104-card pack.
2. Deal nine tableau columns in a staircase: column one gets one face-up card, column two gets two cards with only the top face-up, and so on through column nine (nine cards, top card face-up). This places 45 cards in the tableau and leaves 59 in the stock.
3. Place eight foundation piles above the tableau — two per suit. Each suit needs two complete Ace-to-King runs to fill its pair of foundations. Foundations build upward by suit.

On each turn you may do any of the following:

• Move tableau cards. Move a face-up card or a valid sequence from one column to another. The bottom card of any moved sequence must be one rank lower and the opposite color from the card it lands on. A black 8 may go on a red 9. Sequences of any length move as a unit if they are descending and alternating color.
• Play to a foundation. Move an Ace to an empty foundation, or add the next card in ascending suit order to an existing foundation.
• Draw from the stock. In draw-one, one card turns to the waste pile per turn. In draw-three, three cards turn at once and only the top card is playable.

When a face-down card becomes the top of a column, flip it face-up.

Empty columns may only be filled by a King or a sequence whose bottom card is a King.

The game is won when all 104 cards are on the eight foundation piles.

Double Klondike rewards the same instincts as standard Klondike — uncover face-down cards, build sequences carefully, use empty columns sparingly. Every principle applies with greater urgency across nine columns and 104 cards.

• Dig the deep columns first. Columns eight and nine have the most buried cards. Clearing them early opens the game significantly.
• Manage duplicates deliberately. Two copies of every card exist. When one copy is accessible and the other is buried, always use the accessible one. Leave the buried copy as a future resource.
• Be conservative with foundations. Keeping mid-rank cards in the tableau for sequence-building is often more valuable than rushing them to foundations. The extra deck adds some flexibility, but that evaporates fast if foundations are unbalanced across suits.
• Guard empty columns. They are rare and precious. Only clear a column with a concrete plan in mind. Filling it carelessly with a non-King sequence blocks future Kings from finding a home.

Double Klondike emerged as a natural extension of Klondike's popularity. Players wanted a longer, harder version of the game they already loved. The two-deck format appears in card game compendiums throughout the mid-20th century, well before digital solitaire existed.

When Klondike became a global phenomenon through Windows Solitaire in the 1990s, software developers added two-deck variants for experienced players who found the original too brief or too luck-dependent. The expanded tableau and doubled foundations created a more substantial puzzle — without any new rules to learn.

Double Klondike never reached the mass-market recognition of its single-deck ancestor. Most casual players found standard Klondike challenging enough, and the longer game time made it less suited to quick sessions. It remains a staple in dedicated solitaire software libraries, popular among enthusiasts who treat solitaire as a serious strategic hobby.