Rules
Russian Solitaire rules at a glance
- Use one standard 52-card deck.
- Deal all cards into seven tableau columns.
- There is no stock pile, waste pile, reserve, or redeal.
- Foundations build upward by suit from ace to king.
- Tableau cards build downward by suit: 6 of hearts onto 7 of hearts.
- Any face-up card may move with every card above it, even when that packet is unordered.
- Only the leading card of a packet has to fit the destination.
- Empty tableau columns accept kings or packets led by kings.
- Face-down cards flip open when they become the top card of a column.
- Aces cannot move onto kings in the tableau.
- Win by moving all 52 cards to the foundations.
How to play
How to play Russian Solitaire
Russian Solitaire is a one-deck foundation game from the Yukon family. Your goal is simple: move clubs, diamonds, hearts, and spades to their foundations from ace through king. The harder part is reaching the buried cards when there is no stock pile to rescue the tableau.
Pick any face-up tableau card. That card and every card above it move together as one packet. The packet does not have to be ordered. The selected card only needs to land on the next higher card of the same suit. A 7 of spades can move onto the 8 of spades, and any loose cards above that 7 ride along. The 7 cannot move onto the 8 of clubs, and the 8 of spades cannot move backward onto the 7 of spades.
Setup
The Russian layout on this page
Russian uses the same opening deal as Yukon. Column one starts with a single face-up card. Columns two through seven each have a staircase of hidden cards covered by five face-up cards. All 52 cards are on the table before you make the first move, so the game is about using visible packets to reach the hidden cards underneath, not about waiting for a draw.
Column 11 card1 face up
Column 26 cards1 down, 5 up
Column 37 cards2 down, 5 up
Column 48 cards3 down, 5 up
Column 59 cards4 down, 5 up
Column 610 cards5 down, 5 up
Column 711 cards6 down, 5 up
Core rule
The same-suit descending rule
Russian Solitaire's defining rule is strict: tableau cards build down by suit. A 10 of diamonds can accept only the 9 of diamonds. A 4 of clubs can accept only the 3 of clubs. Matching color is irrelevant, and building upward is not allowed in this version.
The carried packet can still be messy. If the selected 9 of clubs has a red queen, a 2 of spades, and a diamond 5 above it, all of those cards travel with the 9 when it lands on the 10 of clubs. Russian Solitaire is demanding because the packet rule is generous while the landing cards are rare.
Examples
Legal and illegal Russian moves
The card you select is the front card of the packet. If that front card fits, the rest of the packet comes along even if it is a complete jumble. If the front card does not fit, the move is illegal no matter how useful the carried cards look. A 6 of hearts moves onto the 7 of hearts. It does not move onto the 7 of diamonds, and it does not move onto the 5 of hearts.
Legal6 of hearts onto 7 of hearts
LegalA messy packet led by a queen onto the king of the same suit
LegalKing-led packet into an empty column
Illegal6 of hearts onto 7 of clubs
Illegal8 of hearts onto 7 of hearts
BlockedFace-down cards cannot move
Empty columns are king spaces in this version. A bare king can move into an empty column, and so can any face-up packet led by a king. A queen-led packet cannot fill a space, even if a king is somewhere inside the packet.
Foundations
How foundations work
Foundations are calmer than the tableau. Each suit foundation starts with its ace, then builds upward: 2, 3, 4, and so on to king. Only a single top card can move to a foundation. A selected packet cannot go there, even if its front card is the next card in suit.
Foundation moves can remove useful landing cards from the tableau. Low cards usually belong on foundations, but a 6 or 7 may still be the exact same-suit connector needed to uncover a hidden card. When a card is doing real tableau work, pause before sending it up.
No stock
What no stock pile changes
Russian has no draw pile and no second pass through the deck. Every useful card is already on the table, either visible or buried. That makes hidden-card access the main measure of progress. A move that reveals a face-down card is usually better than a tidy move that only rearranges cards you could already see.
Since there is no stock to break a deadlock, empty columns and same-suit connectors must do the work. The best moves uncover cards, create a useful king space, or place a rare suit connector where it can unlock another buried card.
Strategy
Russian Solitaire strategy that changes the deal
Start by scanning for moves that uncover a face-down card. Russian Solitaire often gives you fewer legal landings than Yukon, so visible shuffling can waste the few connections you have. If a move does not reveal a card, create a space, or set up a reveal, treat it with suspicion.
Track same-suit neighbors. A 7 of hearts is the only tableau landing card for the 6 of hearts. If you bury that 7 under an unrelated packet, the 6 may have nowhere to go later. Middle ranks carry a lot of traffic because they are both landing places and cards that need landing places of their own.
Use empty columns deliberately. A king-led packet that opens several hidden cards is worth a space. A king-led packet that merely parks clutter may cost you the only flexible column on the board. Before filling a space, ask what hidden card or suit chain that move actually helps.
Move foundations with context. Aces and twos are usually safe, but middle cards are often better left in the tableau until their suit chain has done its work. Russian Solitaire is won on the foundations, but it is unlocked in the tableau.
Mistakes
Common Russian Solitaire mistakes
- Forgetting that tableau moves must match suit, not color.
- Trying to build upward, which is allowed in Alaska but not in Russian Solitaire.
- Making a legal packet move that reveals nothing and spends a rare same-suit landing card.
- Filling an empty column before a useful king-led packet is ready.
- Moving middle cards to foundations while they still connect hidden tableau work.
- Assuming a carried packet has to be ordered before it can move.
- Using undo only after a deal is dead instead of testing risky empty-column choices earlier.
Difficulty
Is Russian Solitaire hard?
Russian is not hard because the rules are long. It is hard because the rules combine broad movement with narrow landing places. The tableau looks open, yet hidden cards still control the game. Same-suit bottlenecks can freeze a column even when many visible cards remain.
Compared with Yukon, Russian is less forgiving because a red 6 cannot use a black 7; it needs the 7 of the same suit. Compared with Alaska, it is stricter because the direction never reverses. Compared with FreeCell, it is less exact because 21 cards begin hidden and there are no free cells for precise parking.
Winnability
Is Russian Solitaire winnable?
Russian Solitaire is not always winnable from a random shuffle. The open packet movement can rescue awkward positions, but hidden low cards, missing same-suit connectors, and badly timed king spaces can still stop the deal. Undo lets you explore a route, but it does not turn every shuffle into a solution.
This page does not publish a fixed win rate because a trustworthy number should come from this exact implementation and many measured deals. Rule choices such as king-only spaces, no wrapping, and unlimited undo all change how the game feels in real play.
Variants
Russian Solitaire variants and house rules
Russian belongs to the Yukon branch of solitaire, so rule descriptions can differ between books and software. The biggest points to check are whether empty columns are king-only, whether foundations move automatically, whether undo is limited, and whether the page uses the standard descending-by-suit tableau rule. This page keeps the version direct: king-only spaces, manual foundations, no stock, and descending same-suit tableau moves.
Alaska is the closest named relative to compare against because it uses the same deal and packet idea but allows suit building up or down. Scorpion also builds down by suit, but it aims for complete king-to-ace runs in the tableau rather than ace-up foundations.
Nearby games
How Russian compares with Yukon, Scorpion, and FreeCell
Play Yukon if you like the same deal but want color-based building instead of suit-based building. Play Scorpion if you want same-suit packet movement to become a harsher sequence puzzle, with complete king-to-ace runs as the goal. Play FreeCell if you want every card visible and prefer exact planning over hidden-card discovery.
Russian is best when you want the big packet feel of Yukon with fewer escape hatches. It has enough visibility to reward planning, enough hidden information to stay tense, and enough same-suit pressure to make every exposed connector matter.