Objective and layout
Play happens across three areas. Eight tableau columns hold the whole deck at the start — the four left-hand columns receive seven cards apiece, the four right-hand columns six. Above the tableau sit four single-card slots, the free cells, and four foundations, one for each suit.
You win by completing all four foundations in ascending suit order. Since no card is ever face-down, the only unknowns in FreeCell are the consequences of your own choices.
Where a card may land
Inside the tableau, cards stack downward in alternating colors: a red 9 belongs on a black 10, a black Jack on a red Queen. Only a card at the bottom of its column (or one waiting in a free cell) is available to move.
An empty column is a wildcard — it accepts whatever card you choose, King or otherwise. That is a sharp departure from Klondike, and it is why open columns dominate expert play.
The free cells
Treat the four free cells as parking spaces: each fits a single card, any card, for as long as you need. A parked card can later rejoin a tableau stack that accepts it or go straight up to its foundation once its suit is ready.
Parking is never free, though — each occupied cell shrinks the largest group of cards you can relocate in one action (see the multiplier rule below), so strong players park late and retrieve early.
Moving runs: the multiplier rule
An ordered, color-alternating sequence can travel between columns as one action. Capacity is pure arithmetic: take your open free cells plus one, then double that capacity for each empty helper column you are not landing on: (free cells + 1) × 2^(helper columns).
Two open cells and no empty column carries a run of three; add one empty column and the same position carries six; a second empty column raises it to twelve. Landing on an empty column removes that column from the count.
Most lost games trace back to overlooking this number — check it before committing a big transfer.
Winning, undo, and taking cards back
The game ends when all fifty-two cards sit on the foundations, each pile running Ace, 2, 3 … King in a single suit.
StillDeck lets you step backward freely with Undo — including un-playing a card that already reached a foundation — but treat that as a correction tool rather than a tactic: a position that needs foundation cards back on the table usually went wrong several moves earlier.
FreeCell vs. Klondike at a glance
- The full deck is dealt face-up, so nothing depends on a lucky draw.
- Klondike cycles a stock; FreeCell gives you parking spaces instead.
- An open column here takes any card — in Klondike, Kings only.
- Ordered runs relocate in one action when your capacity allows it.
- Skill dominates: just 8 of the first 1,000,000 Microsoft deals are unwinnable.