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How to Play: American Mahjong with Your Hootenanny Playing Cards
Mahjong is best enjoyed the way it's always been: around a table with good company, a little friendly competition, and (we think) something lovely to look at while you play. This guide will walk you through the rules of American Mahjong as adapted for a deck of playing cards rather than tiles, so you can gather your favorite people and get playing, whether you're at home, on a porch, or on vacation.
New to Mahjong entirely? This guide assumes no prior experience, just a little patience for your first hand or two. Like needlepoint or a good dinner party, it rewards practice.
Know Before You Play
This set gives you everything you need to play American Mahjong: the cards and the dice. It does not include a rules card telling you which hands are worth points. Those hands change every year and are published separately by organizations like the National Mah Jongg League (NMJL). If you don't already own a current card, pick one up before your first game. It's the piece that tells you what you're actually playing toward.
This guide covers how to play with your cards. Your official rules card tells you what to build.
Honoring the Game's Roots
Mahjong is a game with real history, and we think that's part of what makes it special. It originated in China in the mid-1800s and made its way to the United States in the early 20th century, where a group of players standardized the rules in 1937 to create what's now known as American Mahjong. The version you're learning here carries that lineage forward.
Our playing cards are simply a new format for an old game, a way to bring the same rules and the same joy to a smaller table, a suitcase, or a weekend away.
What You'll Need to Play
Your Hootenanny American Mahjong Playing Card deck (included)
2 dice (included)
An official Mahjong rules card (sold separately, see Know Before You Play above)
4 players (American Mahjong is traditionally played with four, though it can be adapted for two or three)
A table to play on
Getting to Know Your Cards
Your deck includes 160 cards in total, and every card corresponds to a traditional mahjong tile, so if you've played with tiles before, everything will look familiar.
Because cards shuffle and deal like a standard deck, you can skip the wall-building process that tiles are known for. Just shuffle and deal, and you're off.
Setting Up the Game
1. Shuffle. Shuffle all the cards in the deck. Remove any Blank cards or extra Joker cards according to your table's own preference, if you've decided not to use them.
2. Roll for East. Each player rolls the dice. The highest roller becomes the dealer, also called East.
3. Deal. East deals as you would with a regular deck of cards: 13 cards to each player, and 14 cards to East.
4. Form the draw pile. Place the remaining cards face down in the center of the table to form the draw pile, like a communal wall.
5. Sort your hand. Arrange your cards however helps you think. Many players group jokers and honor cards (winds, dragons, flowers) first, then sort each suit numerically. The goal is to spot which category on your rules card your hand is closest to matching.
The Charleston: Passing for a Better Hand
The Charleston: Passing for a Better Hand
Before play begins, everyone gets a chance to improve their hand through a series of three-card passes called the Charleston.
First Charleston (required):
1. Pass 3 cards to the player on your right
2. Pass 3 cards across the table
3. Pass 3 cards to the player on your left
Second Charleston (optional): Same idea, reversed: Left, Across, Right. Any player may vote to stop it before it begins, as long as no one has looked at the cards they're about to receive. If nobody stops it, it continues.
A few notes on passing:
- Pass cards that don't support your hand. Avoid giving away pairs, matching numbers, or dragons if you can help it.
- Jokers can never be passed during the Charleston.
- Blind passing is allowed only twice in the whole sequence: during the Left pass of the First Charleston, and the Right pass of the Second Charleston (the third and sixth passes overall). On those two passes only, you may take one, two, or three of the cards you just received and send them along face down without looking, filling out the rest of your three cards from your own hand if needed. Every other pass must be made up entirely of your own cards.
- After the Charleston, players sitting across from one another may agree to swap a few additional cards. This is called the courtesy pass, and it's optional.
Playing Your Turn
Play moves counterclockwise, and the flow is simple:
1. East discards first. East places one unwanted card face up and announces it aloud.
2. Draw. The next player draws one card from the draw pile.
3. Discard. That player then discards one unwanted card, naming it aloud, and play continues to the next player.
Every discard must be named out loud. This is how other players know what's been played and what's still available to call.
A helpful table hint: As you play, stack discarded cards on top of one another with the corners exposed, rather than spreading them out. Players can still see what's been discarded, and it saves a surprising amount of table space as the game goes on.
Calling a Discard
At any point, a player may call out to claim a discarded card, but only if it completes a pung (three matching cards), a kong (four matching cards), or a quint (five matching cards, typically including a joker).
A few important rules:
- You cannot call a discard to complete a single card or a pair, with one exception: if it's the final card you need to declare Mahjong.
- Once you call a card, you must immediately lay the completed group (pung, kong, or quint) face up in front of you, in view of the whole table.
- If more than one player calls the same discard, priority goes to whoever is next in turn order, unless another player can use it to declare Mahjong.
- Once a group is exposed, it generally can't be changed, except for cards that include a joker (see below).
Jokers & Joker Exchanges
Jokers are flexible, but they have one hard rule: a joker can never stand in for a single card or a pair. They can only be used within a pung, kong, or quint, and a group can even be made up entirely of jokers.
If a player has an exposed group containing a joker, any other player may perform a joker exchange on their own turn: trading in the matching card from their hand for the joker, which they then add to their own hand. This is a great way to pick up extra flexibility as the game progresses.
Declaring Mahjong
A winning hand has 14 cards and matches one of the hand patterns listed on your official mahjong rules card (see Know Before You Play above). When you complete your hand, either by drawing your final card or calling a discard, announce “Mahjong!” and lay your full hand face up so the table can confirm it.
If the draw pile runs out before anyone completes a hand, the round ends in what's called a "wall game," and no one wins that hand.
A Few Example Hands (For Illustration Only)
On an official rules card, hands are written in shorthand rather than spelled out. Repeated numbers show a matching set, and letters stand in for certain cards (N, E, W, S for Winds; D for Dragon; F for Flowers). Official cards also use color to show which parts of a hand need to be the same suit and which are independent of each other. We've done the same below so you can get used to reading it.
2468
2222
2222
DD
FFF
111
333
555
DD
FFF
NNNN
SSSS
DDD
These are example hands only and are not real hands from any official card.
Table Talk: House Rules & Etiquette
Mahjong has always been a game of tradition and personal touch, and table rules vary from group to group.
Blanks: Blanks aren't part of the official American Mahjong rules, but some groups prefer to play with them. The most common approach: on your turn, exchange a Blank for the most recently discarded card (as long as it's not a discarded Joker) and add it to your hand. Once a Blank has been discarded, it's considered dead, and no other player may pick it up. Whether your table uses all six, a few, or none is entirely up to you.
Extra Jokers: A standard set typically includes 8 Jokers; yours includes 10. Those two extra aren't part of the official rules either, but some groups prefer to play with them. If your table wants to play by the numbers exactly, simply set the extras aside before you deal.
Decide as a table before you start, and make the game your own, the way generations of players have before you.
However you play, we hope this game brings you the same thing it's brought players for countless years: a good excuse to sit down, connect, and spend a few hours making memories with friends and family.
