Easthaven Solitaire: a quick, stock-driven game that is kinder than it looks
Easthaven looks like a cut-down Klondike: seven short columns, a stock pile and four foundations. It plays very differently, though. The stock never goes to a waste pile. Each tap deals a fresh card onto every column at once, and there is no second trip through the stock. Five taps and the stock is gone.
That makes Easthaven a neat fit for a short session, and on this site it is also a forgiving one. When our solver was allowed to see every card, it won 97.6% of 3,000 deals and did not find one it could prove impossible.
Easthaven at a glance
| What we measured | Result | Deals |
|---|---|---|
| Deals won by a solver that sees every card | 97.6% (range 97.0–98.1%) | 3,000 |
| Deals proven impossible | 0 | 3,000 |
| Deals left undecided | 2.4% | 3,000 |
| Deals with no move among the seven face-up cards at the start | 8.2% | 3,000 |
| Aces that start face down | 1.06 of 4, on average | 3,000 |
| Taps on the stock in a full game | 5 (four deals of 7 cards, then 3) | Fixed by the rules |
The 97.6% is a ceiling: our solver knew where every hidden card was, which you do not. It tells you almost every Easthaven deal on this site can be won with the right moves, not that you will win almost every game.
Easthaven on solitaire-online.nz
Twenty-one cards, fourteen of them hidden
- Seven columns of three cards. Only the top card of each is face up, so 14 cards start hidden.
- A stock of 31 cards. There is no waste pile.
- Four foundations, built up by suit from Ace to King.
Building and moving runs
- Build down in alternating colours: a black 6 on a red 7.
- A face-up run moves as one unit.
- Any card or run may go into an empty column, not just a King.
- When a column's face-up cards are all moved away, the card beneath turns over.
Five taps and done
Tap the stock and one card lands on each of the seven columns, from left to right. The first four taps deal seven cards each; the fifth deals the last three to the first three columns. The stock is not recycled, so once it is empty, what is on the table is all you have. On this site you may deal even when a column is empty.
The rule that makes Easthaven forgiving
Being able to move whole runs, rather than one card at a time, makes a huge difference. We tested the same deals with the stricter one-card rule, the version usually described in the research literature, and there the solver proved 42.3% of 300 deals impossible (95% range 36.9–48.0%), with many more left undecided. With runs allowed, as they are here, it proved none impossible.
So if you have played a stricter Easthaven elsewhere and found it brutal, this version really is different.
A short game, played well
Use the table before each tap
Each stock tap drops a card on every column, including on top of runs you were building. Before you tap, make every useful move on the table, especially moves that turn over one of the 14 hidden cards.
Clear a column before the next deal
An empty column takes any card and gives you room to rearrange. Getting one before a stock tap means one column receives a fresh start rather than a card on top of a mess.
Count your taps
You get five, and the last is only three cards. Knowing how many deals are left tells you how much time you have to dig out a buried Ace.
Do not panic at a frozen opening
In 8.2% of our deals there was no move at all among the seven face-up cards. That is not a lost game: tap the stock and see what arrives.
Undo is your friend
Since so few deals are impossible, a stuck game usually means an earlier choice went wrong. Step back and try another order.
Easthaven on a phone
Seven short columns fit neatly on a phone screen, which makes Easthaven one of the more comfortable games to play on the go. Tap a card, then its destination; use zoom if the cards feel small. The game records your wins, time and moves, and you can mute the sound.
How Easthaven compares with other quick games
Easthaven's stock is gone after five taps, which puts a natural limit on how long a game can run. Here is how its odds compare with a few other games from our study, all measured by solvers that could see every card:
| Game | Deals won by the solver | Deals proven impossible |
|---|---|---|
| Easthaven | 97.6% | 0 |
| Eight Off | 99.89% | 0.11% |
| Scorpion | 12.9% | 67.5% |
Easthaven and Eight Off are the forgiving end of the scale: nearly every deal can be won, so a loss usually means a different order would have worked. Scorpion is the opposite, with most deals impossible from the start.
How we did the research, step by step
The solitaire-online.nz team added Easthaven to its study in September 2026, to see how often a deal can be won on this site's rules and whether the run-moving rule matters.
- Rules from the site code. Seven columns of three with the top card up, a 31-card stock dealt one card to each column with no waste and no redeal, alternating colours, runs moving as a unit, and any card to an empty column. The code also lets you deal with an empty column.
- A copy of the game. We wrote these rules into a program, plus a second version that moves one card at a time, so we could see what the run rule is worth.
- Numbered deals. 3,000 deals from seeds 1 to 3,000 for the site's rules, and 300 deals for the one-card version.
- A solver that sees everything. It knows the hidden cards and the order of the stock, and searches through possible moves. That makes its result a ceiling.
- A limit per deal. Up to 100,000 positions. Deals not settled in that budget were counted as undecided.
- Published results. A published figure exists (Blake & Gent, 2026), but it is for the stricter one-card rule, so it cannot be compared with this site's game. On our own one-card version our results did not match theirs, and we have not yet found out why, so we do not rely on that comparison.
- Error bars. The 97.6% has a 95% range of 97.0% to 98.1%.
- Limits. This is a ceiling, not what a person will win. We did not build a player that plays without seeing hidden cards for Easthaven.
The technical side
Easthaven has its own Python 3.11 module, easthaven.py, using only the standard library. The solver is a depth-first search that tries moves one after another, backs up when it hits a dead end, and keeps a set of positions it has already visited so it never searches one twice. runner.py spread the deals over many processes with Python's multiprocessing; the 3,000-deal run took about 7 minutes. The ranges are Wilson score intervals. An AI assistant, Claude by Anthropic, helped write and review the code and draft this page. Every figure comes from running the code.
By Admin, solitaire-online.nz. Study date: 19 September 2026.
Short answers before your next deal
How long does a game of Easthaven take?
Not long. There are only five taps on the stock and no second pass, so a game is over once the stock is used and the table is played out.
Is there a second trip through the stock?
No. Once the 31 stock cards are dealt, there is no redeal.
Does a space in Easthaven need a King?
Yes, on this site any card or run can.
Is Easthaven like Klondike?
It shares the alternating-colour building, but the stock works completely differently. If you want the classic, try Klondike Solitaire.
What is a good game to try next?
Yukon also lets you move big groups, or see all the options on the games page.