Play Lady Betty Solitaire Online for Free (No Signup Required)

Sort every card into six reserve piles that never talk to each other, then build foundations strictly by suit. One deck, real challenge, and a 25% win rate to show for it.

Lady Betty Solitaire is Sir Tommy's more particular sister — an English patience from the same nineteenth-century family, carried in patience collections for well over a century. The change sounds tiny: the foundations must now be built up in suit, not merely by rank.

To balance the stricter foundations, you are given six reserve piles instead of four. As in Sir Tommy, cards are turned up from the stock one at a time, and each must be parked on a reserve pile of your choice — and once parked, a card can never move to another reserve pile; its only exit is the foundations.

With four suits to track and only one legal card per foundation at any moment, burying the wrong card hurts even more than in the parent game. You'll win roughly 25% of the time, hard going by any measure. It is played with a single deck, and skill matters far more than luck here.

Obvious follow-ups: Sir Tommy Solitaire and Calculation Solitaire.

For a change of pace, the classic Solitaire trades the strict suit rule back for something looser.

If you run into anything odd or have an idea that would make the game better, please contact me.

Enjoy playing!

How to play Lady Betty Solitaire

Layout:

4 foundation piles: Build up in suit from Ace to King. Piles start empty; play Aces here as they appear.

6 reserve piles: Start empty. Cards from the stock may be placed on any reserve pile; only the top card of each pile may leave, and only to the foundations.

Stock: The top card is face-up. Place it on a reserve pile of your choice or play it straight to a foundation. There is only one pass through the stock.

Foundation:

There are four foundation piles.

Any Ace may be moved to an empty foundation pile. A card can be added to a foundation pile only if it's one rank higher and the same suit as the pile's current top card, so the only card that fits on an 8 of spades is a 9 of spades. There can be no more than 13 cards in a pile.

The top card of each foundation can be moved back into play if another pile will accept it.

Reserve:

There are six reserve piles, all empty at the start of the game. Every card is placed face-up.

Cards may only arrive from the stock: take the top card of the stock and lay it on whichever reserve pile you like, on top of whatever is already there. There are no building restrictions — any card may be placed on any pile.

Once a card is on a reserve pile, it may never move to another reserve pile. The top card of each pile can only be played to the foundations, so try to keep cards of the same suit together and avoid burying low cards under high ones.

Stock:

The stock holds the whole deck at the start of the game.

The top card of the stock is always face-up and must be placed on one of the six reserve piles or played directly to a foundation — there is no waste pile.

You only get one pass through the stock; once every card has been placed, the game is decided on the reserve piles.