Mahjong Solitaire and Mahjong Connect: Tile-Matching Puzzles

Mahjong Solitaire uses the tiles and none of the rules. It is a matching puzzle, and understanding the shape of the layout is the whole skill.

Mahjong Solitaire in brief

A layout of tiles is stacked in a three-dimensional arrangement – the classic turtle formation is the best known. You remove matching pairs, but only tiles that are free can be picked: nothing may rest on top of them and at least one long side must be unobstructed.

Flowers and seasons match within their groups rather than identically, which gives a small amount of flexibility in tight positions.

Solvability and the art of the order

Not every deal is solvable, and the sequence in which you remove pairs determines whether you can finish. The reliable heuristic is to work from the top and the edges inwards, always clearing the tiles that free the most others.

When a choice is available between two matching pairs, take the one that opens up more of the structure, not the one that is easiest to reach. Many positions are lost by clearing a convenient pair that unlocks nothing.

Mahjong Connect and its relatives

Connect games reduce mahjong to pure matching, usually arranged as a grid rather than a stack. You remove identical tiles whose linking path bends at most twice, which adds a spatial reasoning problem on top of simple pairing.

Other relatives include timed versions where a progress bar pushes you forward, and chain versions where cascading removals generate combo multipliers. All of them are time-fillers rather than gambling games, and none involves wagering.

Frequently asked questions