Clock Solitaire
Cards turned: 0
- Category
- Card
- Players
- 1
- Controls
- Tap
- Odds
- About 1 in 13
- Loads
- No download
Controls
| Turn card | Flip the next card and follow it to its hour. |
| New deal | Shuffle and start again. |
Next up
| Turn card | Flip the next card and follow it to its hour. |
| New deal | Shuffle and start again. |
Clock Solitaire deals thirteen piles of four cards, twelve arranged like the numbers on a clock face and one in the centre. Turn the top card of the centre pile, tuck it under its matching hour, and turn the top card of that pile next. Keep going until you either place all fifty-two or hit a pile that is already empty.
There is no decision to make anywhere in the game, which is exactly what makes it interesting. The outcome is fixed the moment the cards are shuffled, and roughly one deal in thirteen can be completed. It is a small demonstration of how a game can be entirely determined and still feel tense.
There is genuinely nothing to decide. The shuffle determines whether the deal can be completed, so the game is about watching it unfold rather than playing well.
The odds are about one in thirteen. Completing a deal is a real event, not an expectation, so a run of failures is entirely normal.
Use it to teach card values. Matching a card to its hour is a natural way for a child to connect jack, queen and king to eleven, twelve and thirteen.
Watch the centre pile. The game always ends on the last king, so counting how many kings have appeared tells you roughly how close you are to running out.
About one deal in thirteen, which is a mathematical property of the layout rather than anything you control.
None at all. Every move is forced by the card you just turned.
Jack is eleven, queen is twelve and king is the centre pile.
Because the game stops when you turn the fourth king, which is always the last card placeable.
Nothing at all. The whole of Clock Solitaire is built into the page itself, which is why there is no loading bar and no waiting before you can play.