Chinese Official Mahjong Scoring Rules
The Chinese Official Scoring is the standardized ruleset that is maintained by World Mahjong
Association and is used in the World Mahjong Championship. It provides a large array of different
scoring rules that gives players flexibility in gameplay to emphasize skill and strategy.
There are no required Pungs or Chows in order for a hand to be considered valid. Instead, any
combination of 4 triples and a pair can be considered winning, if it scores at least 8 points. There are
also a set of specialty hands that do not form 4 triples and a pair and are still valid.
New to the game? Here's how to play.
Transferring Points
If a player wins, all players must automatically give 8 points to the winner. Additional points equal to the
value of the winning hand must be given by:
-The player who discarded the winning tile if the winner won off their discard.
-All players if the winner won by self-draw.
e.g. Player 1 wins a hand worth 12 points by a discard from Player 2.
Player 1 gains 8×3 + 12 = 36 points
Player 2 loses 8 + 12 = 20 points
Player 3 loses 8 points
Player 4 loses 8 points
e.g. Player 1 wins a hand worth 12 points by self-draw.
Player 1 gains 8×3 + 12×3 = 60 points
Player 2 loses 8 + 12 = 20 points
Player 3 loses 8 + 12 = 20 points
Player 4 loses 8 + 12 = 20 points
General Scoring Principles
When scoring, we follow 5 main principles:
1. The Non-Repeat Principle: When a scoring rule is implied or included by another, it is not
scored.
e.g. If you have a hand of All Even Pungs, you receive the points for All Even Pungs but not the points
for having All Pungs.
2. The Non-Separation Principle: Once pieces are arranged into groups to apply a scoring rule, it
cannot be re-arranged into different groups to apply different scoring rules.
e.g. If you have 3 copies of Bamboo 1,2,3, it arranged into 3 Chows of Bamboo 1,2,3, or a Pung of
Bamboo 1, a Pung of Bamboo 2 and a Pung of Bamboo 3. However, you must pick one arrangement
or another. You cannot have both the points for having a Pure Triple Chow and the points for having
Pure Shifted Pungs.
3. The Non-Identical Principle: One triple cannot be used to score the same scoring rule twice.
e.g. If you have a Chow of Circle 1,2,3, Chow of Circle 4,5,6 and two Chows of Circle 7,8,9, you can
