Play Canfield Solitaire Online
Canfield begins with only 4 cards in the tableau, while 13 more wait in a reserve that feeds empty columns. The first foundation card decides the starting rank for all 4 suits. An opening 6 means every foundation must begin with a 6, climb through King, wrap to Ace and finish on 5.
Because the base changes, the cards worth freeing first change with it. An Ace may need to wait while a 6 or Queen can move straight to its foundation. Emptying a column does not guarantee working space either: if the reserve still has cards, its exposed card takes the gap immediately. Canfield uses less table space than Forty Thieves, but access to the reserve and stock matters just as much as the cards already in the tableau.
A Small Tableau with 3 Separate Card Sources
The opening table has 4 face-up tableau cards, a 13-card reserve, a stock, a waste pile and 4 foundations. The reserve is not a holding cell that you control. Only its top card can be played, and whenever a tableau column becomes empty, the next reserve card moves into that space automatically. The stock turns up 3 cards at a time, with only the upper waste card available.
A tableau move does not reveal a face-down card because every tableau card is already visible. Its value may instead be that it advances the reserve or gives the waste somewhere to land. Most of the opening is on view, but the useful cards still arrive in a strict order.
Tableau Builds Wrap Around
Tableau cards build down in alternating colors. Rank order wraps, so a King may sit on an Ace when the colors alternate. A correctly ordered face-up run can move together. While the reserve still holds cards, an empty column is filled from it before another run can enter.
Foundations Follow the Dealt Base
Each foundation builds up by suit from the rank shown at the top of the board. The order also wraps from King to Ace. A foundation based on 9 therefore runs 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King, Ace and continues through 8.
Reserve Pressure Shapes the Middle Game
A thick reserve means every cleared column has a known cost: it immediately exposes and places the next reserve card. That can be helpful when the reserve is blocking a foundation card, but it can also replace a flexible column with a rank that has no useful destination. The count beside the reserve matters as much as the face of its top card.
Klondike Solitaire rewards uncovering face-down tableau cards. Canfield begins with its tableau exposed and hides the reserve order instead. You can see what is playable now, but not which reserve card will follow it.
The Base Rank Changes What Counts as Progress
In most familiar building games, an exposed Ace is an obvious foundation candidate. Canfield removes that shortcut. In a deal based on Queens, an Ace cannot reach its foundation until the Queen and King of the same suit are already there. Until then, it may still be useful in the tableau because an opposite-color King can descend onto it.
The base rank also changes which cards can leave the tableau first. When the foundations start on 4, every exposed 4 has immediate value, followed by 5s of matching suits. A card's importance comes from its place in this deal's cycle, not from a fixed rule about high or low ranks.
Draw 3 Creates a Waste Order You Can Revisit
Canfield turns stock cards over in packets of 3. After the stock is exhausted, the waste is returned for another pass. Unlimited redeals remove the 1-pass deadline found in Forty Thieves, but they do not make every buried waste card instantly reachable. A useful card can remain underneath the same pair until another play changes the packet order.
Moving a waste card changes which card appears on the next pass. Leaving it in place preserves the old packet order. The stock and pass counts help explain why a card seen earlier has not returned to the top yet.
Working Space Arrives in 2 Stages
Before the reserve empties, clearing a column does not buy storage. It simply puts the next reserve card on the table. Once the 13th reserve card has entered play, a cleared column stays open and accepts any movable run. Column-clearing moves therefore have a different value late in the deal: they create space instead of revealing another reserve card that must be handled.
Players who enjoy the visible planning of FreeCell will recognize the value of open space, though Canfield makes it less predictable. FreeCell gives you fixed cells from the opening. Canfield asks you to earn its empty columns while the reserve keeps refilling them.
Certified Deals Use the Live Canfield Rules
The public rotation contains 1,000 certified Canfield deals. Each deal stores its complete 52-card order and a winning replay checked by the same engine that handles reserve refills, alternating-color runs, rank wrapping, Draw 3 packets and redeals on this page. The proof finishes only when all 4 foundations contain 13 cards.
Hints, undo and the stored winning line remain available for practice. Using assistance marks a finish as Assisted, while a clean certified win can be submitted to the leaderboard. The guide to winnable Solitaire deals explains why a replayed path provides stronger evidence than a label attached to a shuffle.
Where Canfield Fits Among Solitaire Games
Canfield belongs to the reserve builders: games in which a separate pile feeds the tableau while foundations follow a structured rank cycle. It is more compact than the 2-deck builders and less open than the cell games. The types of Solitaire overview places those families side by side.
For a full walk through the deal, including reserve refills, foundation wrapping and stock passes, read how to play Canfield Solitaire. This table is ready to play without an account, and every new certified deal changes the base rank before the first move.