The tableau is the main playing area, the columns of cards dealt at the start. The foundations are the four piles you build up by suit from Ace to King to win. The stock is the face-down pile of cards left over after the deal, and the waste is where cards from the stock land face up. Most other solitaire words describe what you do with those four.
Why solitaire has its own vocabulary
The words are old. People played patience with real cards for well over a century before computers, and the rule books, from Lady Cadogan's in the 1870s to David Parlett's The Penguin Book of Patience (1979), settled on a shared set of terms. Some come from French: tableau is French for a picture, and talon, an older word for the stock, is French for "heel".
Even the game's name depends on where you live. Americans say solitaire, the British say patience, and both mean the same family of one-player card games. Wikipedia keeps a glossary of patience terms with the sources for each word; the list below covers the ones you meet when you play online.
The places on the table
| Term | What it is | Also called | Where you see it |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tableau | The columns dealt at the start, where you move cards around | Layout, columns, piles | Nearly every game |
| Foundation | A pile built up in one suit from Ace to King; filling all of them wins | Home cell | Klondike, FreeCell |
| Stock | The face-down cards left after the deal, turned up during play | Talon, draw pile | Klondike, Spider, Pyramid, TriPeaks |
| Waste | The face-up pile where stock cards are turned; its top card can be played | Talon, discard pile, waste pile | Klondike, Pyramid, TriPeaks |
| Free cell | A space that holds one card at a time | Cell | FreeCell |
| Cascade | One of the overlapping columns of the tableau | Column, pile | FreeCell |
One word is used both ways. Some books call the stock the talon; others use talon for the waste. If a set of rules says "talon", check which pile it means.
Tableau
In Klondike, the classic game that came with Windows, the tableau is seven columns holding 28 cards, with only the last card of each column face up at the start. In FreeCell it is eight columns with every card face up. Most games build down the tableau, each card one rank lower than the one it goes on, often in alternating colors.
Foundations
Each foundation starts with an Ace and grows one rank at a time in the same suit. In Klondike and FreeCell there are four; in Spider, which uses two decks, finished runs from King to Ace leave the table instead, and you win when all eight are gone.
Stock and waste
The stock is the part of the deck you have not seen yet. In Klondike you turn cards from it onto the waste, one at a time in Turn 1 or three at a time in Turn 3, and when the stock runs out you turn the waste over to make a new stock. That is called a redeal. In Spider there is no waste: each deal from the stock puts one card on every column.
Words for moves
- Build: put a card on another one according to the rules, up on a foundation or down on the tableau. "Build down in alternating colors" means a red 7 goes on a black 8.
- Run or sequence: a group of cards already in order, like 9-8-7. In many games you can move a whole run at once if it is in the right order.
- Supermove: in FreeCell, moving a run of several cards in one go. It is a shortcut for moving them one by one through empty cells and columns, so the limit is (empty free cells + 1) × 2 to the power of empty columns.
- Available card: a card that isn't covered by another and can be moved.
- Blocked: no legal move is left, which usually means the game is lost.
- Auto-play: a computer game moving cards to the foundations for you when it is safe to do so.
Words for the deal itself
- Deal number or seed: a number that fixes the order of the shuffle, so the same number always gives the same deal. FreeCell made this famous with its numbered games; on this site every Klondike, Spider, FreeCell, Pyramid and TriPeaks deal has a number you can share.
- Open game: one where all cards are face up from the start. FreeCell is the best known: with nothing hidden, almost every deal can be won with careful play.
- Winnable or solvable: some sequence of legal moves wins the deal. Not every deal is; our post on whether every Klondike game is winnable has the numbers.
- Daily deal: one deal that everyone plays on the same day. Ours is on the daily page.
FAQ
What is the tableau in solitaire?
The tableau is the set of columns dealt face up or partly face down at the start of the game. It is where most of the play happens: you move cards between its columns to uncover the ones you need.
What is the foundation in solitaire?
A foundation is a pile you build from Ace to King in one suit. Klondike and FreeCell have four. Getting all 52 cards onto them wins the game.
What is the difference between the stock and the waste?
The stock is face down and holds the cards you haven't seen. The waste is the face-up pile where those cards go when you turn them, and only its top card can be played.
Is patience the same as solitaire?
Yes. Patience is the usual British name and solitaire the American one for the same family of one-player card games. Klondike, the game most people mean by "solitaire", is often called just "Patience" in Britain.
What is a talon in solitaire?
An older word for the stock, the cards left over after the deal. Some rule books use it for the waste pile instead.