The name oversells it

Eight Off Solitaire

Eight reserve cells sounds like twice the room FreeCell gives you. Four of them start with cards in, the tableau packs by exact suit rather than colour, only kings may fill a space, and nothing moves more than one card at a time.

Eight cells, four already full
Build down by suit
Kings only in spaces
One card at a time

Foundations0/52

Reserve4/8

Moves0

Reserve cells

Foundations

Build down by suit and keep reserve cells open.

Eight cells, four already full

Eight Off Solitaire rules

Short, because there is no stock and nothing hidden. Read the Moving group carefully — three of those lines are stricter than the game they are usually compared to.

Eight Off Solitaire setup and rules
Setup
Deck	One standard 52-card deck.
Tableau	Eight columns of six cards — forty-eight in all, every one face up.
Reserve cells	Eight. The last four cards of the deal go into four of them, so you start with four free.
Foundations	Four, one per suit, empty at the start.
Moving
Tableau	Builds down by exact suit. A 6 of clubs takes only the 5 of clubs.
One at a time	Only single cards move. There are no sequence moves and no capacity rule.
Cells	Any exposed card may go into an empty cell, and come out again when it has somewhere legal to go.
Empty columns	Kings only. Unlike FreeCell, a space will not take just anything.
Foundations	Build up by exact suit, ace to king, and are one-way.
Winning
Win condition	All 52 cards on the four foundations.
Losing	No legal move remains. There is no stock to fall back on.

Only two spare at the start

How to play Eight Off Solitaire

Forty-eight cards go into eight columns of six, all face up. The four cards left over drop into four of the eight reserve cells, so the game opens with half the reserve already used and nothing whatsoever hidden.

Tableau columns build down by exact suit — not colour, the actual suit. Foundations build up by suit from ace to king. A cell holds one card of any kind, and an empty column will take a king and nothing else.

Cards move singly. There is no run-moving and no capacity formula: shifting an ordered sequence of four means four separate legal destinations, one per card. That is the rule that most distinguishes Eight Off from FreeCell.

Count what you actually get

Eight cells, but four are already spoken for

The name promises twice FreeCell's reserve. At the deal you have the same four free cells FreeCell gives you — the other four are holding the last four cards of the deck, and getting them out is your first problem rather than a bonus.

The extra capacity is real, but it arrives later and it is paid for three times over: suits instead of colours halves your tableau destinations, kings-only spaces make an empty column far harder to use, and single-card movement removes every shortcut. Eight Off is the harder game, and the bigger number is why people expect otherwise.

Eight Off and FreeCell start with exactly the same working room. The extra four cells only become available once you have emptied the ones the deal filled, and by then the same-suit rule has usually decided how the game is going. Seahaven, for comparison, opens tighter than either — two free cells and ten columns to manage with them.

Eight cells, one suit rule

What eight cells will and will not buy you

Legal and illegal Eight Off moves
The move	Verdict	Why
A column ends in the 7 of clubs. You play the 6 of clubs.	Legal	Down by exact suit — the only tableau rule.
A column ends in the 7 of clubs. You play the 6 of spades.	Illegal	Same colour is not enough. Eight Off wants the suit.
You move any exposed card into an empty cell.	Legal	Cells take anything. Getting it out again is the problem.
You move a king into an empty column.	Legal	Kings, and only kings, may fill a space.
You move a queen into an empty column.	Illegal	This is the rule that separates Eight Off from FreeCell.
You move an ordered 8-7-6 of hearts together.	Illegal	There are no sequence moves here at all. One card, every time.
You take a card back off a foundation.	Illegal	Foundations are one-way on this page.

Spending four free cells

Eight Off Solitaire strategy

Empty the four occupied cells first. Those four cards are doing nothing except denying you room, and until they are placed you are effectively playing FreeCell with strict suits and no supermoves. Finding homes for them is the real opening of the game.

Treat cells as a queue, not a cupboard. Before parking a card, know what will accept it later — with same-suit building that is exactly one card in the deck, so if that card is buried under five others, the cell is gone for a long time.

Hunt for a reachable king early. An empty column is the only place a long sequence can be rebuilt, and it needs a king. Knowing which kings are near the top of a column tells you whether clearing a column is a plan or a fantasy.

Send low cards up promptly. Because the tableau is suit-strict, aces and twos clog it badly and are almost never useful as landing spots. Past the 3s and 4s, slow down — a card on a foundation is gone, and this game has few enough destinations already.

Three ways the cells fill up

Where Eight Off deals lock up

Filling cells because they are there

Eight cells feels like abundance and it is not — every card you park is a card that can only leave onto a foundation or onto the one card in the deck that accepts it. Fill all eight and the game is over regardless of what the tableau looks like.

Digging for a king you cannot reach

An empty column is worth a great deal, but only a king may enter it, and with same-suit building a specific king may be genuinely unreachable. Check that a king is loose before spending a dozen moves clearing a column for it.

Unstacking a column without a plan for the cards

Because moves are single-card, taking apart a column of six means finding six destinations, and cells are the only universal one. Count the homes before you start, not after you are three cards in with five cells full.

Kings-only spaces, how often

Is Eight Off Solitaire winnable?

A good share of deals, but noticeably fewer than FreeCell. Nothing is hidden, so a loss is genuinely yours — but three separate restrictions compound, and the eight-cell reserve is not the compensation it appears to be.

The version with a relaxed space rule, where any card may fill an empty column, is considerably easier and is what many published win rates describe. This page uses the kings-only form. We do not quote a figure for that reason.

This version

Kings-only spaces, single-card moves

Eight columns of six, all face up; eight reserve cells with four filled at the deal.
Tableau builds down by exact suit.
One card moves at a time. There is no sequence movement and no capacity rule.
Empty columns accept a king and nothing else.
Foundations build up by exact suit and are one-way.

Undo is unlimited and unpenalised, with no timer or score. There is no stock and no redeal.

Against FreeCell

Eight Off among the open-cell games

These four all deal everything face up and give you cells to work with. Comparing them is mostly an exercise in noticing that cell count is the least important column in the table.

Eight Off compared with FreeCell, Seahaven Towers, and Penguin
Game	Cells	Tableau builds	Empty columns	Moving
Eight Off	8 total, 4 free at deal	Down by exact suit	Kings only	One card at a time
FreeCell	4 total, all free	Down, alternating colour	Any card	Sequences, by capacity formula
Seahaven Towers	4 total, 2 free at deal	Down by exact suit	Kings only	Sequences, by capacity formula
Penguin	7 total, all free	Down by exact suit, wrapping	The beak rank only	Sequences

FreeCell has the fewest cells and is by far the easiest of the four, which is the whole lesson: colour packing, usable spaces and sequence moves are each worth more than a pair of extra cells.

Explore

More solitaire games

Try the friendlier open-cell game, or one that starts tighter still.

Tested rules

How this solitaire game is checked

Game logic is implemented and tested by Brian Hamilton, then reviewed by Karan Hamilton for rule clarity, player flow, and correction notes.

How we make and test solitaire games