Start here

Learn it in order

Three stages. Each one ends somewhere useful, so you can stop when you have enough and come back for the rest. They will make you a correct player, which is the hard half — winning is a different skill, and it starts where the rulebook stops.

Stage 1Meet the table6 guides · An evening Stage 2Read the card8 guides · A couple of sittings Stage 3Play a whole hand8 guides · Learned by playing

You don't need all of it before your first game

Stage one is enough to sit down. Most people pick up stages two and three at the table with somebody telling them — these pages are for the parts nobody remembers to explain.

When you want to find out whether any of it stuck, there areforty free drills — every answer citing the rule it comes from, and no card needed to do them.

Stage 1 · An evening

Meet the table

When you finish: You can sit down, build a wall, and get through the Charleston without anyone waiting on you.

01What Is American Mahjong?The five-minute orientation. What it is and why it plays nothing like the original.02All 152 American Mahjong Tiles, IllustratedEvery tile drawn and named, including the ones beginners misread.03Setting Up the TableWalls, dice and the deal. The three minutes before anybody plays.04The Charleston, Pass by PassAll six passes, drawn. Plus blind passes and the courtesy pass.05The Blind Pass, and When You May Use ItLegal on two passes only. Here is which two, and how to do it.06The Courtesy Pass, and the Rule Tables Get WrongZero to three tiles, across only, and the smaller number wins.

Print for the table: Tiles & groupings · Setup & the Charleston

Stage 2 · A couple of sittings

Read the card

When you finish: You can pick up any year’s card, work out what a line is asking for, and know whether a joker is allowed in it.

01How to Read the Card, Without Us Reproducing a Single HandThe colours, the letters, and the one thing almost everyone gets backwards.02What the Colours on the Card Actually MeanHow many suits, never which. The single most common first-card mistake.03What X and C Mean, and Why It Changes EverythingExposed or concealed — and the row about jokers surprises people.04Matching Dragons, Opposite DragonsThe one place a colour on the card points at a particular suit.05Soap: The Tile That Does Two JobsA dragon and a zero, and the card decides which.06Tiles Printed Together Are Still Separate TilesNEWS is four tiles, not a set. That distinction kills hands.07American Mahjong Joker Rules, SettledWhich groupings take a joker, the three prohibitions, and how the exchange works.08There Is No Chow in American MahjongSequences do not exist here. What the card calls a consecutive run is something else.

Print for the table: Reading the card

Stage 3 · Learned by playing

Play a whole hand

When you finish: You know when a discard is yours to take, who wins a tie, what everybody pays, and what to do when your hand dies.

01How to Play American MahjongFrom opening the box to saying the word, in the order it happens.02Naming Your Discards, and "Down Is Down"What to call every tile, and what happens when you get it wrong.03When Is a Discard Still Claimable?The timing rule behind most table arguments, settled.04Two People Called the Same TileA rule for most of it, and an honest gap where there is not one.05Do Not Put Tiles Down Until the Tile Is YoursThe violation that punishes eagerness, and nobody warns you about it.06The Joker Exchange, Step by StepHow to take a joker off somebody else's rack — and what it costs you.07American Mahjong Scoring, Without the CardThe multipliers never change, even though the numbers do.08Dead Hands: Why You Say NothingYour hand can be dead and still in play. Here is why you keep quiet.

Print for the table: Playing & claiming

After the path · Learned, not looked up

Where the rules stop

Everything above can be checked against a rulebook, which is why we state it plainly. None of what follows can. The Charleston ends, you are holding thirteen tiles, and the card offers something like seventy hands — and no rulebook anywhere tells you which one to go for. That is judgement, and it is the half that decides who wins.

So we do the only honest thing available: name who says what, say where they disagree, and let you pick. These are not instructions.

01Should You Stop the Second Charleston? Four Teachers DisagreeSettled rule, unsettled tactic. Four positions, named.02How Many Hands Should You Chase?Three teachers, three numbers, and what the trade-off actually is.03When to Give Up on Your HandFive signals the hand is finished, and what to do next.04When to Take a Joker — and the One Teacher Who Says WaitTake it, say most. One teacher names the exception.05Spread Your Jokers, Don't Stack ThemOne joker in each of two groups beats two in one.06Hot Tiles and Safe Tiles — and Why Safe Ones Go HotTwo categories, and the half of the hand where neither applies.07The Tells You Give Away Without Saying AnythingHow you sit, how fast you rack, and the call you took back.08What the Teachers Actually Disagree AboutWhat is settled, what is not, and who says what.

There are 52 guides in all

The path is the 22 that answer the questions in the order they come up, and the 8 above are where the rulebook runs out. The rest — joker edge cases, disputes, the tiles nobody can explain — are on the index, sorted by topic.

Browse all 52 guides

When you have read it all

Knowing a rule and recognising the situation it covers are different skills, and only the first one is taught by reading. The rules workbook is 105 questions about exposures, dead hands, claims and jokers, with an answer key that cites the rule behind every answer.

See the rules workbook — $19