How to Play Rainbow Solitaire

A flexible Canfield variant where the foundation starting rank is chosen randomly each deal, giving you a fresh puzzle each game with a single pass through the stock. The goal: Move all cards to the foundations, with each building upward in suit from a randomly chosen starting rank.

Setup

1. Use one standard deck (52 cards).
2. The first card dealt to the foundation sets the starting rank for all four foundation piles—ranks wrap around (King continues to Ace).
3. The tableau receives four piles with one card each, all face up.
4. One reserve pile holds 13 cards with only the top card face up.

How to play

• Build each foundation upward in suit from its randomly chosen starting rank.
• Within the tableau, build downward in any suit—you can move runs of cards together if each successive card is one rank lower.
• Only the top card of each pile can be played to the foundations.
• Empty tableau piles are immediately refilled with the top reserve card.
• Click the stock to deal one card to the waste; only the waste top card is playable.
• Cards automatically move to the foundations once no other card could be built on them (you can change this behavior in Settings).

How to win

Objective: Move all cards to the foundations, with each building upward in suit from a randomly chosen starting rank.

You win when all cards are on the foundations. You're stuck when the stock is gone and no moves remain.

Tips

• Since there's no redeal, use your stock carefully—play waste cards to tableau when possible to preserve stock cards.
• Create empty tableau piles early to gain flexibility for upcoming stock cards.
• Build foundation piles at roughly the same pace to avoid trapping cards of one suit.

Play Rainbow free on Windows

CardTray is a free solitaire app for Windows that includes Rainbow alongside 300+ other games. It saves every move as you play, so you can close the window and pick the game up later, replay any deal, and take on a new Daily Challenge deal every day. Browse every game in the Game Gallery.

Related games

More games from the Canfield family:

• Acme — This Canfield relative tightens the rules: every stack has to match suit, you can only ever move one card at a time, and the stock only cycles through twice before the deal is over.
• Canfield Rush — A variant of Canfield that gets progressively easier with each deal.
• Beehive — A Storehouse variant where you match cards by rank alone, building identical-rank stacks in the tableau.