Folding means abandoning your own hand to avoid feeding another player's win. Knowing when to fold — and how to do it safely — separates good players from lucky ones.
Big three dragons — pungs or kongs of all three dragons — is one of the most recognisable big hands. Little three dragons, two pungs and a pair, is its smaller cousin.
Hong Kong and riichi mahjong share the four-sets-and-a-pair structure, but riichi adds the yaku requirement, furiten, riichi declarations and dora, while Hong Kong keeps flowers and faan.
Singaporean and Malaysian mahjong adds animal tiles — cat, mouse, rooster and centipede — to the flowers and seasons, with instant payments for bonus tiles and tai-based scoring.
In Chinese Official mahjong, speed alone does not win. Players must spot a path to eight points early, keep flexible options, and avoid feeding high-value hands.
Declaring riichi means announcing that your closed hand is one tile from winning. It costs a 1,000-point deposit and locks your hand, but it gives you a yaku and the chance of bonus tiles.
The Charleston is the American Mah Jongg ritual of passing unwanted tiles before play begins: right, across, left, then an optional second round and a courtesy pass. Here is exactly how it works.
Since 2002 international championships have brought together players under the Chinese competition rules, and since 2014 a World Riichi Championship has done the same for Japanese mahjong.
Britain caught the mahjong bug in the 1920s, developing its own "British rules". Continental Europe followed, and since the 2000s a network of national associations has built a thriving competitive scene.
The game's name is usually written 麻將 or 麻雀 and is often translated as "sparrow". The many spellings — mah-jongg, mahjongg, majiang, mājan — tell the story of its journey around the world.
