American Mahjong Rules: The Basics Every Beginner Needs
This is American mahjong boiled down to the essentials: who plays, what the tiles are, and the exact sequence of a hand from shuffle to payout. Read this once, then keep it open during your first game.
Players, Tiles and Equipment
American mahjong is played by 4 people with a 152-tile set: three suits (dots, bams, craks) numbered 1–9, four winds, three dragons, 8 flowers and 8 jokers. Each player uses a rack, and everyone needs the current NMJL card listing the year’s legal hands.
The Sequence of a Hand
- Wash the tiles and build four walls, 19 stacks of 2 tiles each.
- East rolls the dice, breaks the wall, and deals: everyone gets 13 tiles, East gets 14.
- Run the Charleston (passing sequence), then the courtesy pass.
- East discards first. Play proceeds to the right: draw, then discard.
- Anyone may call a fresh discard to complete a pung, kong, quint or winning tile.
- First player to match a hand on the card declares Mahjong and is paid its value.
Core Calling Rules
You may only call the most recent discard, and only before the next player racks their drawn tile. Called pungs, kongs and quints must be exposed on top of your rack. You cannot call for a pair, a single tile, a joker, or to complete a concealed hand — except for the final winning tile.
Joker Rules in Brief
Jokers are wild in pungs, kongs and quints only. They cannot be passed in the Charleston, cannot be called from the discard table, and a discarded joker is simply dead. You may swap the real tile for a joker sitting in anyone’s exposure on your turn.
Winning and Payment
A winning hand must match one complete line on the card, suits included. The discarder of the winning tile pays double the hand’s value; on a self-drawn win, all three opponents pay double. Full money math is in American mahjong scoring explained, and the full game walkthrough is in how to play American mahjong.