Spider Solitaire 2 Suits — Play Online Free

How to play 2-suit Spider Solitaire

Two-suit Spider is the same game as every other Spider: 104 cards, ten columns, and the goal of building eight runs from King down to Ace in one suit. Each finished run leaves the table on its own, and clearing all eight wins the game. What changes is the deck. Instead of eight sets of Spades, you play with four sets of Spades and four sets of Hearts — 52 black cards and 52 red ones, with four copies of every card.

The rules in brief

• The deal: 54 cards go out to ten columns — six each in the first four, five in the rest — with only the last card of each column face up. The other 50 cards wait in the stock for five deals of ten.
• Building: put any card on a card one rank higher, in either suit. A 5♥ can go on a 6♥ or a 6♠.
• Moving groups: only a run in one suit moves together. 9♠ 8♠ 7♠ travels as a unit; 9♠ 8♥ 7♠ has to come apart one card at a time.
• Empty columns take any card or any same-suit run.
• Dealing: tap the stock to put one card on every column. We follow the Windows rule: you can't deal while a column is empty, unless there are too few cards left on the table to fill them all.

What two suits changes

With one suit, every build is a perfect build. With two, a card has eight possible homes — the four copies of the next card up in its own suit and the four in the other suit — and only half of them let the cards move on together later. A 7♥ on an 8♠ is perfectly legal, but those two cards are now stuck to each other until you take them apart. Much of the game comes down to when a mixed build is worth making, and how you will tidy it up afterward.

Because one suit is red and the other black, you can see at a glance which runs are clean. A run that changes color partway down is a run that still needs work.

Playing on this page

This page always deals two suits. Drag a card or a run, or tap it and it jumps to its best spot. On a keyboard, press H for a hint, D to deal and Ctrl+Z (⌘Z on a Mac) to undo.

Two-suit Spider strategy

1. Take the in-suit home first. When a card can go on either suit, pick the matching one. If there is more than one in-suit choice, take the one that turns over a face-down card or brings you closer to an empty column.
2. Use mixed builds to dig, not to park. Putting a 6♠ on a 7♥ is worth it when it uncovers a hidden card or clears a column. Doing it just because you can only ties two cards together.
3. Swap cards back into suit. If a 6♥ sits on a 7♠ and a 7♥ comes free somewhere else, move the 6♥ — and any Hearts run below it — across. With only two suits, chances like this come up all the time, so keep an eye out for them.
4. Use an empty column as a workbench. To straighten out a mixed run, park its last same-suit piece in the empty column, move the card above it onto its in-suit match, then bring the parked cards back. It costs a few moves, but it turns a tangle into a run that can travel.
5. Get ready before you deal. A deal drops a new card on every column, so finish the runs you can and turn over what you can reach first. Every empty column must be filled before you can deal — use cards you won't mind having covered.
6. Treat Undo as a way to look ahead. Undo is unlimited and costs just one point. Try a line of play, and if it goes nowhere, step back and try another.

Scoring and records

Two-suit games use the same classic Windows scoring as our other Spider games:

A won game always collects 800 points for its eight runs, so the final score is 1,300 minus the moves you made. Sorting out mixed builds takes extra moves, which makes a four-figure score — a win in fewer than 300 moves — a good target at this level. This page keeps its own best score, fastest time and fewest moves, along with your wins and streaks.

How hard is two-suit Spider?

Two suits sits in the middle of Spider's three levels, and for many players it is the sweet spot: hard enough that every choice matters, forgiving enough that a careful game often comes out. One suit has no mixed builds at all, and four suits punishes almost every one. Two suits asks you to think about color without burying you in it.

Not every deal can be won, and some games will run out of moves however well you play. That is part of Spider, not a sign you are doing it wrong. A few habits make a real difference:

• Slow down before each deal. A deal you weren't ready for can bury the runs you were building.
• Empty a column early and treat it as precious.
• Use Undo to test an idea instead of committing to it.

If two suits feels like a lot at first, play a few one-suit games on the main Spider Solitaire page — the habits carry straight over. When two suits starts to feel comfortable, 4-suit Spider is the next step up.