Shuffling…

TriPeaks Solitaire

Three peaks, one waste pile, and a card that must sit one rank above or below the last. Long chains score far more than short ones, so patience pays twice.

ObjectiveClear all twenty-eight cards from the three peaks before the stock runs out.

Three peaks, one running chain

TriPeaks lays twenty-eight cards into three overlapping pyramids and turns one card face up beneath them as the waste. Any uncovered card that is one rank above or below the waste card can be played onto it — an Eight takes a Seven or a Nine — and each play makes that card the new waste. Kings and Aces wrap, so King, Ace, Two is a legal run.

Clear all three peaks and the board is done. The stock waits underneath for the moments when no card fits, but every stock turn breaks your chain, and the chain is where the game lives.

TriPeaks solitaire opening layout with three card peaks above a face-up waste card and stock
The three peaks. Ten cards start playable; the eighteen behind them are why runs need planning.
  • Play any uncovered card that is one rank above or below the waste card.
  • Kings and Aces wrap: K → A → 2 keeps a run alive.
  • Every card in a run scores more than the last, so chain them.
  • Turning the stock breaks the chain and costs five points.

How the peaks are stacked

Three peaks of six cards each sit above a shared bottom row of ten, twenty-eight cards in all. Only that bottom row starts playable; the eighteen cards behind it unlock in pairs as the row beneath each one clears. The remaining twenty-three cards are the stock.

So the budget is fixed and small: twenty-three stock turns to clear twenty-eight cards, minus every card you clear on a chain instead. A hand that turns the stock twenty times has almost certainly lost, even if the board still looks alive.

Peak card
The single card at the top of each pyramid. Three of them, each needing two cards cleared first.
Chain
An unbroken series of plays onto the waste. Each card in it scores more than the last.
Wrap
Rank continuing past the ends: King to Ace to Two counts as consecutive here.
Covered
A card with cards resting on it. It cannot be played until both are gone.

Why long runs beat quick plays

Scoring rewards momentum: every card in an unbroken run is worth more than the one before it, and turning the stock resets the run and costs five points. Two runs of eight score far more than four runs of four built from the same sixteen cards.

So before playing the obvious card, trace where the chain goes afterwards and start from the end that travels furthest. Wrapping is what makes the long chains possible — a sequence can climb to Queen, King, then wrap to Ace and keep going, turning a corner that a plain up-or-down rule would have killed.

The two goals do pull against each other. The highest-scoring line and the line that clears the board are rarely the same, and when they conflict, clearing wins: a spectacular chain that leaves a peak card covered still ends the hand.

Five habits for clearing all three peaks

  1. 01

    Take the peaks down evenly

    Tunnelling into one peak leaves the other two intact when the stock runs dry, and a single covered peak card ends the board. Spread the damage: the goal is three shallow peaks, not one cleared and two standing.

  2. 02

    Trace the chain before you commit to it

    The first card of a run is often playable in two directions. Following each one on paper — up through the Nines or down through the Sevens — usually shows one branch running two cards longer, and that difference is most of the score.

  3. 03

    Turn the stock early rather than hunting

    A chain you cannot continue is worth nothing, and the penalty for turning is small. Players lose far more by stalling on a dead chain, hoping a buried card appears, than by resetting and starting a fresh run.

  4. 04

    Watch for exhausted ranks

    Once all four Sevens are played, every Six and Eight still in the peaks can only be reached from its other side. Noticing that early changes which cards you chase; noticing it late is how a nearly-cleared board stalls.

  5. 05

    Break ties by what gets uncovered

    When two cards would both continue the chain identically, take the one that exposes more of a peak. Score follows the chain, but finishing follows the excavation, and only one of those two things is optional.

Questions about this game

Can every TriPeaks deal be cleared?
Here, yes — deals are verified by the solver before you get them, so a full clear is always available. The interesting question each hand is how few stock turns you can manage on the way.
Do Kings and Aces really connect?
In this implementation, yes: rank wraps in both directions, so an Ace sits next to both the King and the Two. Some other sites rule the wrap out, which is worth knowing if the game feels different elsewhere.
How is TriPeaks different from Pyramid?
TriPeaks plays cards one rank apart onto a running waste pile; Pyramid removes pairs that add up to thirteen. TriPeaks rewards long chains and is generally the faster, more forgiving of the two — Pyramid is the counting game.