Chinese Official mahjong recognises a long list of scoring patterns. Most published lists run in point order, which is useless at the table — you never ask “what is worth the most?”, you ask “is there anything in these four chows I have not counted?” The tables below are therefore grouped by how the hand is built, so you can scan the one family your tiles actually belong to.
How to read these tables
What each pattern is worth is not listed here. Scoring varies widely between rulesets, values get misquoted constantly, and the authority is easy to reach: the European Mahjong Association hosts the full Mahjong Competition Rules rulebook free. Read the points off that document rather than off any page that summarises it, this one included.
Do not carry arithmetic across from another variant. Hong Kong play runs on its own faan system, which is built differently from the Chinese Official one. Our guide to Hong Kong mahjong scoring covers that system separately, and mixing the two arithmetics is the commonest counting error at a mixed table.
Count by family, then check the leftovers. Work out what the hand is structurally (runs, triplets, honours, a restricted tile range, an unusual shape) score that family first, then sweep the wait and finishing patterns at the end.
The names below come from the Mahjong Competition Rules set, the Chinese Official code used in international tournament play. Wikipedia’s overview of mahjong is a reliable starting point for how the variant families relate to one another, and its article on scoring in mahjong sets out how differently the major systems handle the same hand.
Hands built from runs
This family rewards chows — three consecutive tiles in one suit. It is where beginners live, because the entries at the bottom of the table are the ones that turn up most often and they stack easily.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| Pure Terminal Chows | 1-2-3 and 7-8-9 twice in one suit, with a pair of 5s |
| Quadruple Chow | The same run four times in one suit |
| Four Shifted Chows | Four runs in one suit, each stepped up by one, or each by two |
| Pure Triple Chow | The same run three times in one suit |
| Pure Straight | 1 through 9 of one suit as three runs |
| Three-Suited Terminal Chows | 1-2-3 and 7-8-9 in two suits, with a pair of 5s in the third |
| Pure Shifted Chows | Three runs in one suit, stepped up by one each, or by two each |
| Mixed Straight | 1 through 9 assembled from one run in each suit |
| Mixed Triple Chow | The same run in all three suits |
| Mixed Shifted Chows | One run per suit, each stepped up by one |
| All Chows | Four runs and a pair that is not an honour |
| Pure Double Chow | The same run twice in one suit |
| Mixed Double Chow | The same run in two different suits |
| Short Straight | Two consecutive runs in one suit, such as 3-4-5 with 6-7-8 |
| Two Terminal Chows | 1-2-3 and 7-8-9 in the same suit |
Hands built from triplets and kongs
This family rewards pungs and kongs. Concealment matters throughout it: a triplet you drew yourself is treated differently from the same triplet claimed from a discard.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| Four Kongs | Any four kongs, melded or concealed |
| Four Concealed Pungs | Four triplets, none claimed from a discard |
| Four Pure Shifted Pungs | Four pungs in one suit, each one number higher |
| Three Kongs | Any three kongs, melded or concealed |
| All Even Pungs | Pungs and a pair of even numbers only |
| Pure Shifted Pungs | Three consecutive pungs in one suit |
| Triple Pung | The same number as a pung in all three suits |
| Three Concealed Pungs | Three triplets, none claimed |
| Mixed Shifted Pungs | One pung per suit, each a number higher than the last |
| Two Concealed Kongs | Two kongs, neither claimed from a discard |
| All Pungs | Four triplets or kongs and a pair, no runs |
| Two Melded Kongs | Two kongs completed from discards |
| Concealed Kong | A kong built entirely from your own draws |
| Double Pung | The same number as a pung in two suits |
| Tile Hog | All four copies of a number used without declaring a kong |
| Two Concealed Pungs | Two triplets, neither claimed |
| Melded Kong | A kong claimed from a discard or promoted from a pung |
Hands built on winds and dragons
These patterns depend on honour tiles. Because there are only four copies of each, this family is the fastest to become impossible — one discarded dragon can end a plan two turns after it started.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| Big Four Winds | Pungs or kongs of all four winds |
| Big Three Dragons | Pungs or kongs of red, green and white |
| Little Four Winds | Three wind pungs and a pair of the fourth |
| Little Three Dragons | Two dragon pungs and a pair of the third |
| All Honours | Winds and dragons throughout, no suit tiles |
| Big Three Winds | Pungs or kongs of three different winds |
| Two Dragon Pungs | Triplets of two different dragons |
| Dragon Pung | A triplet of any one dragon |
| Prevalent Wind | A triplet of the current round wind |
| Seat Wind | A triplet of your own wind |
Prevalent Wind and Seat Wind both depend on where you are sitting and which round it is, so the same triplet does not do the same thing for everybody at the table — see our explanation of how rounds and wind rotation work.
Hands defined by which tiles you are allowed to hold
These patterns say nothing about structure and everything about composition: one suit only, one number band only, no honours, no terminals.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| All Green | Only 2, 3, 4, 6 and 8 Bamboo and the Green Dragon |
| All Terminals | Every set built from 1s and 9s only |
| All Terminals and Honours | Only 1s, 9s, winds and dragons |
| Full Flush | A single suit and nothing else |
| Upper Tiles | Nothing below a 7 |
| Middle Tiles | Only 4s, 5s and 6s |
| Lower Tiles | Nothing above a 3 |
| All Fives | A 5 inside every set and inside the pair |
| Upper Four | Only 6s, 7s, 8s and 9s |
| Lower Four | Only 1s, 2s, 3s and 4s |
| Reversible Tiles | Only tiles that look identical upside down |
| Half Flush | One suit plus honour tiles |
| All Types | One set each of characters, dots, bamboo, winds and dragons |
| Outside Hand | A terminal or honour inside every set and the pair |
| All Simples | Nothing but 2s through 8s |
| No Honours | Suit tiles only; terminals are fine |
| One Voided Suit | One of the three suits missing entirely |
Knitted, paired and other unusual shapes
These are the patterns players collect stories about — knitted sequences spread across the suits, seven pairs, and the famous concealed shapes that people play a whole season without seeing once.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| Nine Gates | Concealed 1-1-1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-9-9 in one suit, waiting on all nine numbers |
| Seven Shifted Pairs | Seven consecutive pairs in a single suit |
| Thirteen Orphans | One of every terminal and honour, plus a duplicate of any one |
| Greater Honours and Knitted Tiles | All seven honours plus knitted singles |
| Seven Pairs | Any seven pairs, entirely concealed |
| Lesser Honours and Knitted Tiles | Fourteen singles drawn from honours and knitted sequences |
| Knitted Straight | 1-4-7, 2-5-8 and 3-6-9 spread one to each suit |
Patterns for how the hand ended
The last group describes the finish rather than the tiles: what you were waiting on, whether you drew or claimed, and whether anything was ever exposed. They attach to almost any hand, and they are the ones tired players forget.
| Hand | What it takes |
|---|---|
| Chicken Hand | A legal hand that scores nothing else whatsoever |
| Last Tile Draw | Winning on the final tile drawn from the wall |
| Last Tile Claim | Winning on the last discard of the hand |
| Out with Replacement Tile | Winning on the tile drawn after declaring a kong |
| Robbing the Kong | Taking the tile a player adds to an existing melded pung |
| Melded Hand | Every set and the pair completed with tiles other players discarded |
| Fully Concealed Hand | Self-drawn win with nothing claimed all hand |
| Last Tile | Winning on a tile whose other three copies are already visible |
| Concealed Hand | No melds all hand, but the winning tile came from a discard |
| Edge Wait | Winning on the 3 of a 1-2, or the 7 of an 8-9 |
| Closed Wait | Winning on the tile between two others, such as the 5 in 4-6 |
| Single Wait | Winning on the tile that completes the pair |
| Self-Drawn | Winning on a tile you drew yourself |
| Flower Tiles | Flowers or seasons laid out beside your hand |
How to count a finished hand without missing anything
Count in a fixed order instead of scanning the list from the top.
- Composition first. Ask what the whole hand is made of before you look at individual sets — one suit, one number band, honours only, no honours. The biggest single number almost always comes from this family.
- Then structure. Work through the runs and the triplets: repeated runs, consecutive runs, shifted pungs, concealed pungs, kongs.
- Then the finish. How the winning tile arrived (self-drawn, claimed, the last tile of the wall, the replacement after a kong) plus the shape of the wait and any flowers.
- Then subtract. Strike out anything the rulebook says cannot be counted alongside a pattern you have already claimed.
That last step is the one people skip, and it is where most disputed scores come from. Check the rulebook rather than trusting a remembered example, and treat any worked total you find online (including in an argument at your own table) as something to verify rather than something to copy. Turning a verified total into chips is a separate step again, covered in our guide to how mahjong points convert into payments.
Which families are worth chasing as a beginner
Ignore the rarest, most spectacular patterns for your first few months. Hands that score well almost always do it by stacking several cheap patterns out of one family, not by landing a single enormous one.
- The chow route. Runs are easier to finish than triplets, because three different tiles can complete one. Commit to chows, keep the hand inside as few suits as you can manage, and let the small combination patterns (a repeated run, two consecutive runs, a straight) accumulate as they appear.
- The pung route. Triplets come more slowly, but a hand made entirely of them scores as a pattern in its own right, and honour triplets, a one-suit-plus-honours hand and concealment all sit on top of it.
Whichever you pick, add the hand up before you claim a tile rather than after. Deciding by roughly the sixth turn which family you are building in is worth more than memorising every pattern above it.
Learning this list with tiles in front of you
Nobody absorbs a list this long from a screen. What works is dealing hands out on a table, forcing yourself to name the family before you name the score, and arguing about the leftovers with three other people.
Two habits make that go faster. Deal a hand, turn it face up, and have each player name the family out loud before anyone reaches for the rulebook — you are training recognition, not recall. Then keep one printed copy of the official list at the table rather than four phones, so a disagreement ends at the same document every time instead of at whoever sounds most certain.
If you are in Sydney and do not own a set, we hire out complete 144-tile sets, and mahjong tables and stools if you want the surface as well, delivered across Greater Sydney or collected from Wolli Creek. Check availability for your date and print this page for the table.
Scoring questions that come up mid-hand
Do all mahjong variants use these hands?
No. This list belongs to Chinese Official rules, used in international tournament play. Hong Kong, Taiwanese, Japanese and American mahjong all use different pattern lists and different arithmetic — American play runs on a card reissued each year by the National Mah Jongg League, and our comparison of Chinese and Western mahjong sets out the rest.
Why are there no point values in the tables above?
Because they are the part that gets misquoted, and a wrong number is worse than no number in the middle of a hand. Values and the notes about which patterns can be counted together differ by ruleset: the European Mahjong Association hosts the full Mahjong Competition Rules, and the National Mah Jongg League issues its card annually for American play.
Can one hand score several patterns at once?
Almost every winning hand does. What limits it is that some patterns cannot be counted alongside others. The rulebook, not a remembered example, is what settles a disputed total.
What are knitted tiles?
A knitted sequence takes every third number in a suit (1-4-7, 2-5-8 or 3-6-9) with each sequence assigned to a different suit. Several of the patterns above are built on them, and opponents rarely see them coming.
Which hand is the hardest to complete?
Nine Gates and Big Four Winds, for opposite reasons: one needs thirteen specific tiles of one suit held concealed, the other needs twelve of the set’s sixteen wind tiles.
Should I memorise the whole list?
No. Learn the cheap, frequent entries in the chow and pung families properly (the repeated runs, the consecutive runs, the doubled pungs) and keep the rest for reference. That handful of patterns appears in the overwhelming majority of scored hands.
Learning on a proper table helps. Rent a complete mahjong set — tiles, table and racks, delivered ready to play across Sydney.
More in Beginner's Guides, Mahjong Variations, Tips & Tricks