Play Mahjong
A full four-player Chinese mahjong game against three opponents, in your browser.
Shuffling the tiles…
About the Play Mahjong converter
This is the actual game — four seats, a wall of a hundred and thirty-six tiles, and three opponents who play their own hands. Not the solitaire tile-matching puzzle that took the name.
Play it on your own against three opponents the machine plays, entirely in this page with nothing sent anywhere. Or open a table, pass the four-letter code to three friends, and play the real thing — any seat nobody takes is played by the machine, so two of you is enough to start.
What you are trying to do
Four sets and a pair. A set is three of a kind or three in a row of the same suit, and a pair is two of a kind. Get fourteen tiles into that shape and you have gone out, which ends the hand.
You start with thirteen. Every turn you take a tile and throw one away, so the hand stays thirteen until the moment it becomes fourteen and finished. That is the whole game; everything else is about which tile to let go of.
Taking a tile somebody else threw
A discard is not gone. If it completes a set for you, you can take it — and taking it out of turn is what makes mahjong a game between four people rather than four solitaires side by side.
Three of a kind, called a pung, can be claimed by anybody. Three in a row, a chow, only by the player sitting immediately after the one who threw it. Going out beats a pung, a pung beats a chow, and when two players want the same tile equally the one who plays soonest gets it. Claiming jumps the turn to you, so the seats in between lose their go.
The cost is that a claimed set is laid face up. Everybody can see what you are collecting, and a careful opponent will stop throwing the tiles you need. Claiming to save one turn while showing your whole plan is how good-looking hands quietly die.
The fourth tile, and why it is different
Four of a kind is a kong. It is still one set rather than two, so declaring it leaves you a tile short — which is why you draw a replacement from the back of the wall.
That replacement is a free extra draw, and it is the reason kongs are worth declaring even though they score little on their own. You can declare one from your own hand, or add the fourth tile to a pung you already have on the table.
What the panel is telling you
Under the table it says how many tiles you are from waiting. Nought means the next right tile finishes you; two means two exchanges to go. It is worked out by carving your hand up every way it could go and keeping the best of them, and it counts the two odd shapes — seven pairs, and thirteen orphans — alongside the ordinary one.
When you are waiting it lists every tile that would finish you and how many of that tile nobody has seen. Tiles in your hand and tiles on the table are both unavailable, so a wait on four tiles that are all discarded is honestly reported as a wait on nothing.
On your own turn it names the tile that costs least to throw. That is judged on how far the discard leaves you first, and then on how many tiles are still out there that would move you forward — the half people misjudge. Two discards often leave a hand equally close while one waits on sixteen tiles and the other on four.
How the other three play
They are running the same arithmetic on their own hands. Each one throws whatever leaves it closest to finished, breaking ties by how many useful tiles remain, and counts every tile already on the table as gone — so they will abandon a wait whose tiles have all been thrown.
They claim only when a claim genuinely moves them forward, which means they do not pung every pair they hold just because they can. They are not world champions, but they play a coherent hand and they will take your discard the moment it finishes something.
Scoring, and which rules this follows
Hong Kong Old Style. Patterns add fan, and each fan doubles what the hand is worth, up to a limit of ten. All chows, all pungs, half flush, full flush, the dragons great and small, seat and prevailing winds, and the two limit hands are all counted; a win with no pattern at all is a chicken hand and pays one.
Scoring is the part of mahjong that genuinely differs between rulesets and often between two tables in the same city. Yours may count a pattern this does not, or set the limit somewhere else. How far from finished you are, what you are waiting on and what to discard are the same everywhere, because they follow from the shape of a finished hand rather than from how it is paid for.
Playing it
Click a tile in your own row to pick it up, and click it again to throw it — a discard cannot be taken back, so it deliberately takes two. When somebody else throws something you can use, the tile stands up out of their pool and the buttons say exactly what you would be making with it: the tiles, not the jargon.
You can always leave a tile. Passing on a chow you do not really want costs nothing and tells the table nothing, which is more often right than it feels.
Frequently asked questions
Is this the tile-matching game?
No. That puzzle borrowed the tiles and the name; this is the four-player game they were made for. If you came looking for the solitaire one, this will not be it.
Do I need an account, or other people?
Neither. On your own, the other three seats play themselves and everything runs in the page — you can turn the network off and carry on. There is no account either way.
How do three friends join me?
Open a table and you get a four-letter code. Anyone who types it in takes the next free seat. Seats nobody takes are played by the machine, so you can start with two people and let the others drop in.
Can the others see my tiles?
No. Whoever opened the table holds the game, and each player is sent a picture of it drawn for their own seat — their own tiles, plus everything face up on the table. Another player’s concealed hand is never sent to you, so there is nothing to find by looking.
What happens if somebody leaves halfway through?
Play carries on. A seat that stops answering is passed for automatically after a few seconds, so one person closing their laptop cannot leave the other three staring at a table that never moves.
Which rules does it use?
Hong Kong Old Style, which is the most widely played Chinese variant: thirteen tiles, chow, pung and kong, and scores that double with each fan up to a limit. Many tables also set a minimum a hand must reach before it may be won; this one does not, so any finished hand goes out. Flowers and seasons are left out, as many tables leave them out.
Why did somebody take a tile I threw?
Because it finished a set for them. Any seat may claim three of a kind or a win from any discard; only the seat immediately after you may claim a run. Claiming skips whoever is in between.
Why can I not claim a run from that player?
A chow may only be taken from the player immediately before you in turn order. Three of a kind and a winning tile can be claimed from anybody.
What is the number under my hand?
How many tiles you would have to exchange to reach a hand that is waiting. It is called shanten, nought means the next right tile wins, and six is the worst a hand can be.
What happens if the wall runs out?
The hand is washed — nobody has gone out, nobody scores, and you deal again. It happens in perhaps a quarter of hands, which is about right for the real game.
Can I play on a phone?
Yes. The camera pulls back on a narrow screen so the whole table fits, and every tile is a tap.