Rules
Colorado Solitaire rules at a glance
- Use two standard 52-card decks, for 104 cards total.
- Deal twenty cards face up into twenty separate storage piles.
- Use eight foundations: one ace-up and one king-down foundation for each suit.
- Ace-up foundations build by suit from ace to king.
- King-down foundations build by suit from king to ace.
- Draw one card at a time from the stock as the current card.
- The current card may move to a legal foundation or onto any storage pile.
- Only the top card of each storage pile is available.
- Storage piles do not build by rank, color, or suit.
- Pile cards cannot move between piles.
- When a pile empties, this version refills it from the stock while stock cards remain.
- There is one pass through the stock and no redeal.
- Win by moving all 104 cards to the foundations.
How to play
How to play Colorado Solitaire
Colorado Solitaire is a two-deck planner from the Sir Tommy side of the patience family. The board starts with twenty separate piles, each holding one face-up card. Those piles are not building columns. They are storage. A card sitting on top of a pile can go to a foundation when it is the exact next card needed, but it cannot move onto another pile.
The foundations are the destination. For each suit, one foundation begins with an ace and climbs upward through king. The matching king-down foundation begins with a king and descends through ace. Because two decks are used, both directions are needed: one copy of the heart 7 will eventually belong on the heart ace-up foundation, and the other can belong on the heart king-down foundation.
On your turn, either build an exposed pile-top card to a foundation or draw the next stock card. A drawn card becomes the current card. It must be resolved before you draw again: build it to a matching foundation, or place it on one of the twenty piles and accept that it now blocks whatever was below.
Layout
The layout on this page
The game area has a stock, one current-card slot, eight foundations, and twenty storage piles. The twenty piles are shown as top-card slots with a card count. That is deliberate: only the top card is playable, and showing every buried card would make the game much harder to use on a phone.
Empty piles are handled by the classic Colorado pressure valve. While the stock still has cards, an emptied pile is refilled immediately from the stock. When the stock is gone, empty piles stay empty, so the late game becomes a pure top-card foundation puzzle.
Foundations
How ace-up and king-down foundations work
Foundation moves are suit-specific. The 4 of clubs can build only on the club ace-up foundation when that foundation shows the 3 of clubs. It cannot build on a spade 3, and it cannot build on the club king-down foundation unless that foundation needs a 4.
The downward side matters as much as the upward side. A king-down foundation showing the 10 of diamonds needs the 9 of diamonds next. A queen can start moving only after its king foundation has begun.
Reference
The Colorado foundation order
Every suit has both of these lines. The game is won only when all eight lines are complete, not when one direction looks tidy.
Ace-up foundationsA2345678910JQK
King-down foundationsKQJ1098765432A
Moves
Legal and illegal Colorado moves
A current stock card is flexible only before it is placed. If it fits a foundation, you can build it immediately. If not, or if you choose to hold it for later, place it on any one of the twenty piles. The moment it lands on a pile, it becomes just another pile-top card.
A pile-top card has a narrower life. It can build to a legal foundation or stay where it is. It cannot move sideways to organize another pile, and it cannot be tucked under a card. Buried cards are waiting cards; they matter only after every card above them has moved to a foundation.
Ace-upA of hearts starts the heart ace-up foundation
Ace-up7 of clubs builds on 6 of clubs
King-downK of spades starts the spade king-down foundation
King-down9 of diamonds builds on 10 of diamonds
StorageCurrent stock card onto any one of the twenty piles
IllegalPile-top card onto another pile
Stock
How the stock changes the game
The stock is not just a draw pile. It also refills empty storage piles while cards remain. That means a foundation move from a one-card pile can immediately reveal a new card from the stock, even before you choose your next draw. Sometimes that is helpful because it finds an ace, king, or near-rank card. Sometimes it covers the space you wanted to keep open.
This page uses a one-card current slot and no redeal. You cannot cycle the stock to see a better order. Once a current card is placed on a pile, it will not be available again until it is on top and a foundation needs it.
Strategy
Colorado Solitaire strategy that keeps cards moving
Start by watching both ends of every suit. Low cards are urgent for ace-up foundations: aces, 2s, 3s, and 4s can open a long upward lane. High cards are urgent for king-down foundations: kings, queens, jacks, and 10s create the downward lane. A middle card such as a 7 may be useful in either direction, but only after one of those lanes reaches it.
Use the twenty piles as lanes, not as a single junk drawer. If a pile is topped by a low heart, try not to bury it under a late black king unless the foundations have no short-term need for that heart. If a pile is topped by a queen, it may be a better place for other high cards that belong to the downward side.
Keep near-rank cards visible. If the spade ace-up foundation needs a 5, a visible 5 of spades is valuable even if it is not playable this second. Burying it under an unrelated card may freeze the whole spade-up line until much later. The same idea works downward: a visible jack of clubs is precious when the club king-down foundation is near queen or jack.
Do not overvalue empty piles early. In Colorado, spaces do not behave like FreeCell spaces. They refill from the stock while cards remain, so a space is usually a momentary doorway rather than permanent workspace. The real advantage is not the emptiness itself; it is the new card that appears and the pile-top card you just sent to a foundation.
Mistakes
Common Colorado Solitaire mistakes
- Using the twenty piles randomly instead of separating suits, directions, or rank ranges.
- Burying aces and kings, then wondering why neither side of a suit will start.
- Forgetting that pile cards cannot move to other piles later.
- Placing a current card on top of the exact rank a foundation will soon need.
- Watching only ace-up foundations and ignoring the king-down half of the game.
- Assuming an empty pile is permanent while stock cards still remain.
Difficulty
Is Colorado Solitaire winnable?
Colorado is usually more generous than the harshest one-deck waste-pile planners because twenty piles give you many places to store awkward stock cards. It is still not a guaranteed-win game. The shuffle can make the ace-up and king-down foundations ask for cards that are buried under ranks that will not move for a long time.
This page does not publish a borrowed win rate. A useful percentage should come from measured deals using this exact rule set: two decks, twenty piles, automatic stock refills for empty piles, one-card current stock, no redeal, and top-card-only pile play.
Variants
Colorado variants and house rules
Colorado sits near Sir Tommy, Strategy, Calculation, and other planner solitaires where the player feeds foundations from a stock and several holding piles. The family resemblance is clear, but the details matter. Strategy usually has ordinary ace-up foundations and fewer waste piles. Calculation changes the foundation rank sequences. Colorado uses two decks, twenty piles, and paired suit foundations that build in opposite directions.
Printed and software versions may differ in interface details, especially how quickly empty piles are filled and whether obvious foundation cards are moved automatically. This page keeps the moves manual so the player controls foundation timing, while still refilling emptied piles from the stock until the stock is exhausted.
Comparison
How Colorado compares with nearby solitaire games
Compared with Strategy, Colorado is broader and more suit-specific. You have more storage piles, but you also have twice as many cards and foundations that split every suit into upward and downward work. Compared with Forty Thieves, Colorado has no tableau building at all; the puzzle is placement discipline rather than unpacking same-suit columns.
If you like Colorado's rank timing but want a smaller table, try Strategy or Calculation. If you like two-deck foundation pressure with more visible tableau movement, try Forty Thieves, Josephine, or Algerian. If you want a short game where a few exposed cards decide everything, Aces Up is the cleaner quick-play cousin.