Rules

At first glance, Mahjong may look like a complex game. It is partly true, depending on which version of Mahjong you are playing, there are different rules, which make the game more complicated, but if you want to play online Mahjong, the rules are very simple. With less knowledge and practice, you can master the rules and enjoy exciting and mind stimulating moments.

Here are some simple rules to have in mind, so you can successfully play Mahjong online:

144 tiles

Mahjong is a game where you need to find matching tiles. It has 144 tiles in the standard Mahjong game. They are divided into several types – bamboo, symbols, circles, dragons, wind, flowers and seasons. The different tiles, within each category they must be combined with identical tiles of the same category – for example: one tile with two dots has to be combined with another tile with two dots on it. The only exceptions are flowers and seasons, where you can combine any flower with any other, and any season with any other.

Flowers:

Seasons:

Only eligible tiles can be matched.

An important limitation for the Mahjong game is that not all tiles can be used at any time - the only tiles that are eligible for matching are those tiles that have blank space to the left or right side. That rule includes tiles that are placed upon other tiles on the same level as they are placed. Just because you see a certain tile it doesn’t mean that you can match and remove it from the board. Try to combine the tiles first which are placed on the top, those at the edges. This way, you will continually open new matching tiles without closing or blocking other tiles that can be useful in the game.

Get ready to shuffle the tiles if needed

If you deplete all your matching options and you cannot make any move, you will have to press the button "Shuffle" to rearrange the tiles. This will lead to penalty in the form of extra time to your score. It’s most common that the shuffling of the tiles is the only way to continue the game. Almost every Mahjong puzzle can be solved; however there are configurations that are a lot more complicated than others.

Those are the main rules of the Mahjong game. Find the matching points, remove them from the boar and repeat that move again and again until there are no tiles left. The complexity of the game comes from the wider set of tiles and the constantly changing nature of the playing board. The game changes while it’s still played – this is what makes Mahjong so irresistibly charming.