Free Pyramid Solitaire

What you do

Puffin Bluff Solitaire is Pyramid, the quick solitaire of pairs, laid out on a sea-glass blue picnic table at the top of a grassy bluff, with a lighthouse on the headland and sailboats out on the water. Twenty-eight cards make a pyramid of seven rows. Pair any two free cards that add up to 13, like a 6 and a 7 or an Ace and a Queen, send each King off on its own, and turn the stock for new cards to pair until the whole pyramid is gone. Choose one pass through the stock, the traditional rule, three passes, the usual computer rule, or as many as you like, while Skipper the puffin, in her yellow rain hat on a coil of rope, cheers each pair and leans in to think when you ask for a hint.

• Winnable deals: before you see a deal, our solver finds a way to clear the whole pyramid with your pass setting. Choose any shuffle in Settings to play plain shuffles instead, as with real cards.
• One, three or unlimited passes through the stock, from the traditional one-pass game to the most relaxed.
• Today’s deal: the same winnable three-pass deal for everyone each day, with your best try kept.
• Hints that use only the cards you can see: they never peek at the face-down stock, say when a move is only a best guess, and tell you when no way to clear the pyramid is left so you know to undo.
• Unlimited undo, a move counter, an optional timer and statistics for each pass setting, saved on this device with the deal in progress.

How to play

1. Press Deal the cards. Twenty-eight cards are dealt face up in a pyramid of seven rows, each row overlapping the one above. The other 24 cards are the stock, face down except its top card.
2. A card is free when no card covers it: a pyramid card once both cards lying on it are gone, the face-up stock card and the top card of the waste.
3. Remove two free cards that add up to 13. An Ace counts 1, a Jack 11 and a Queen 12, so the pairs are Ace and Queen, 2 and Jack, 3 and 10, 4 and 9, 5 and 8, and 6 and 7. A King counts 13 by itself and goes on its own.
4. Tap the face-down stock to move the stock card onto the waste and turn up the next one. When the stock runs out, tap it again to turn the waste back over for another pass, if your setting has one left.
5. You win when all 28 pyramid cards are gone. Cards left in the stock and waste do not matter.

Controls

• Touch or mouse: tap a free King to remove it, or tap a free card and then a card that adds up to 13 with it; the cards it can pair with glow. You can also drag a card onto its partner, or a King onto the woven tray. Tap the face-down stock to turn a new card. Undo, Hint and Menu sit on the shelf below the table, or beside it on a wide screen.
• Keyboard: the arrow keys move between the pyramid cards, the stock and the waste. Enter or Space picks a card and pairs it, or removes a King, D turns the stock, U undoes, H shows a hint and Escape puts a picked card back.
• Restart in the toolbar replays the same deal from the start. Menu starts a new deal, opens today’s deal, changes the passes, the kind of deal and the timer in Settings, and shows your statistics. The toolbar also has pause, help, optional sound and fullscreen.

Tips worth knowing

• Work from the bottom up. The bottom row is free from the start, and each pair you take there frees cards in the row above.
• Before you pair, look for the card each choice frees. When two pairs are possible, take the one that uncovers more cards, or the cards you have no other way to reach.
• Watch out for a card and its partner stacked in the same line down the pyramid: they can never pair with each other, so each one needs a partner from somewhere else.
• Count the partners left. There are four of each rank, so if three Jacks are gone and a 2 is buried, the last Jack is the only card that can ever take it.
• Do not rush the stock. Turning past a card you will need later means waiting a whole pass to see it again, and with one pass it is gone for good.
• Ask for a hint when you are stuck. Once you have seen every stock card, the hint can tell you for sure whether a way through is left, and undo is unlimited.

Accessibility

• Everything can be played with a keyboard: the arrow keys move a visible focus between the pyramid cards, the stock and the waste, and Enter or Space picks and pairs.
• Each card is a button that reads out its name and whether it is free, covered or picked, and the stock says how many face-down cards and passes are left.
• Nothing is timed unless you turn the timer on, and undo is unlimited.
• Every card shows a large rank and suit along its top edge, red for hearts and diamonds and black for spades and clubs, readable even where the pyramid rows overlap. Covered cards are shaded and the cards that can pair glow.
• Reduced motion stops the dealing, sliding and flipping cards, the shakes and Skipper’s fidgeting, and keeps the sparkles and petals small and still. Sound is optional and never needed to play.

Guides and roundups

• How to Play Pyramid Solitaire: Setup and Rules