The goal
Mahjong solitaire starts with all 144 tiles of a mahjong set stacked in a pattern, several layers high. You take them away two at a time, always a matching pair, until none are left. That is the whole game: there are no points to count and no opponents.
It uses the tiles of mahjong, the four-player game, but it is a different game, and you do not need to know the rules of mahjong to play it. It is sometimes called Shanghai, after one of the first computer versions, and the classic layout is known as the Turtle.
Which tiles are free
You can only take a tile that is free. A tile is free when two things are true:
- Nothing lies on top of it, not even partly.
- Its left side or its right side is open: there is no tile directly beside it on that side, on the same layer. One open side is enough. Tiles above or below it on the page do not matter.
Which tiles match
Two tiles match when they are exactly the same: two 5 of Dots, two East Winds, two Red Dragons. Most tiles come four times in a set, so there are usually two pairs of each.
There are two exceptions. The four flower tiles all match each other, and so do the four season tiles. Any flower can be paired with any other flower, and any season with any season, even though their pictures differ.
On this site the flowers have a green frame and the seasons a blue one, so you can tell the two families apart at a glance. Every tile, with its name and meaning.
Taking a pair
- Click or tap a free tile. It lifts and turns amber.
- Click or tap a free tile that matches it. Both disappear.
- If you pick a second tile that does not match, it simply becomes your new pick. Click a picked tile again to put it down.
Taking tiles uncovers others, and new tiles become free. Keep going until the table is empty. If no free pair is left, you are stuck: undo a few matches and try another way, or shuffle.
Tips for clearing the board
- Work from the top and the long rows. Tiles on high layers and in the middle of long rows hold the most other tiles in place. Freeing them early opens up the board.
- When all four of a kind are free, take both pairs. They cannot block anything you will need later.
- When three of a kind are free, think before you choose. Leave free the one whose partner, the fourth tile, it can still reach. Ask: if I take these two, can the last two still meet?
- Watch for stacked partners. If the last two tiles of a kind lie one on top of the other, they can never be paired. Take one of them with another partner while you can.
- Do not rush the easy pairs. A free pair stays free; taking tiles only ever frees more. If a pair is not in anyone’s way, it can wait.
Hints, undo and shuffle
Every deal here can be cleared: it is built so that a full clearing exists before you see it. Hint shows you a pair to take and explains in one sentence why it is free. It always picks a pair that keeps the whole board clearable, and if the board can no longer be cleared, it says so.
Undo takes back any match, as many times as you like. Shuffle re-deals the faces of the tiles that are left, so they can all be cleared again; the tiles keep their places, and you keep the same tiles in play. In the daily deal, hints and shuffles are shown in your result.
Which board to start on
Easy has 72 extra-large tiles in two layers, and every tile has exactly one partner, so there is never a wrong choice. Pyramid has 120 tiles in four layers. The classic Turtle has all 144 tiles in five layers. Daily Mahjong is one Turtle deal a day, the same for everyone.