In plain terms
Free software still costs something to make
So the honest question is not whether you pay, but how — and whether anyone told you.
Most free solitaire answers that question with a video ad between hands, a banner over the board, a subscription to remove them, or a pack of themes behind a paywall. CardTray answers it with a different arrangement, and this page is the whole of it, including the parts that are less flattering.
The exchange
Bandwidth instead of your wallet or your attention
The usual arrangement
A free card game with an ad after every deal, a timer before you can skip it, and a premium tier to make it stop. Or a web page that tracks you across the internet while you play. The payment is there; it is just not itemised anywhere.
Ours
CardTray offers a slice of your device's spare internet bandwidth to Massive when it can. In exchange, every game, deck and table is free, unlimited and ad-free, and runs entirely on your own machine from a signed installer that updates itself. Your games, scores and history are not part of the deal in any form.
The bandwidth is used by Massive, our vetted partner network, which relays other people’s ordinary web traffic — the same category of arrangement that funds a number of free desktop tools. It reads nothing on your disk, and your own browsing is not touched or recorded.
The specifics
What it is, and what it isn't
The second list matters more than the first, so it is not in the small print.
What it is
- A share of your spare internet bandwidth, offered when your connection is not busy — and only when it can be offered at all. Only one Clearware tray app shares at a time, so if a sibling is already sharing on this PC, CardTray will not.
- Opt-in at install, in plain language, before anything starts.
- Switchable off at any timefrom Settings or from Massive’s own tray icon. The games pause while it is off, and the app says so.
What it is not
- Not your games. Your saves, replays, scores and streaks live in a database on your PC. None of it is read, uploaded or transmitted.
- Not your browsing. Your traffic, history and accounts are not monitored, recorded or relayed.
- Not crypto mining. Nothing here consumes your processor for someone else. The one thing being shared is network capacity.
Good-citizen defaults
How it behaves on your machine
An app that lives in the tray, keeps your game history and shares bandwidth has to be unusually well-behaved about all three, and unusually clear about saying so.
You are asked first
A plain-language dialog at install, before any sharing begins. The arrangement is stated before you commit to it, not discovered afterwards in a settings pane.
It never hides
A visible tray icon, a menu with its own sharing switch, and a working Quit. An app that shares bandwidth cannot also be coy about being there.
Your games stay yours
The sharing subsystem has no access to your games. Saves, replays and records live in your own profile folder, in a separate part of the app entirely.
One switch, and an honest trade
Sharing lives behind a single switch. The games pause while it is off. That is the exchange, said plainly rather than buried, and a game in progress is saved, never lost.
Your control
One switch, and what it actually does
Sharing lives behind a single switch in Settings, and you can also stop it from Massive’s own tray icon. While it is off, the games pause until you turn it back on.
That is the exchange, and we would rather write it down than have you discover it. It is not a paywall: there is no tier to buy, no feature held back and no ad while it is running. Your stats, replays and themes stay open with it off. It is the one thing CardTray asks for in return, and if you would rather not, uninstalling ends it completely and takes the app with it.
Privacy
What we can and cannot see
Every game, move, score and replay is stored on your machine. We never receive your history, your seeds or your move logs. There is no upload step to intercept.
The shared bandwidth carries other parties’ web traffic across your connection. It does not read your disk, your clipboard or your browsing, and it is not a channel through which anything of yours leaves the machine.
The full detail, including the little we do collect, is in the Privacy Policy.
That's the whole arrangement
No subscription, no ads, no paid decks, and nothing of yours leaving the machine. Free for Windows.
Windows 10/11 (x64) · Free · No account