Hong Kong Mahjong
Scoring & Winning Hands
New to Hong Kong Mahjong scoring? You're in the right place.
Every winning hand is worth a number of faan (番), and this page explains what each hand is worth, how faan turns into points, and how the score moves around the table. Start at the top if you're learning, or jump to the faan chart if you're mid-game and need an answer fast.
If you're new to Mahjong, start with [How to Play →] and come back. This page assumes you already know what a chow, pung, and kong are.
Everything here is also printed on our All-in-One Mahjong Tile Pusher, a tool you keep beside your tiles.
Written by the organizers of Play Mahjong San Francisco.
Mahjong scoring varies from table to table. Everything here reflects the most common Hong Kong conventions, but always confirm house rules before you play.
What faan is
Faan (番) is a ranking or rating of your winning hand, not a score. A hand is "3 faan" or "7 faan." That rating converts into points.
Faan comes from three sources and they stack:
Example: four chows and a pair is a Chow Hand, worth 1 faan. You self-drew the winning tile, +1 faan. You never revealed a set (Closed Hand), +1 faan. Total: 3 faan, which is 8 points.
How points are distributed
There are two methods: Half Payment (半銃) & Full Payment (全銃).
They determine how points are distributed among players.
Method 1 - Most Common
Half Payment 半銃
• You won off a discard: the discarder pays double. The other two pay the normal amount.
• You won by self-draw: all three players pay double.
Method 2
Full Payment 全銃
• The discarder pays everything, four times the base. The other two players pay nothing.
Example
Your winning hand is worth 3 faan total = 8 base points, using the Half Payment method.
Won off a discard: discarder pays 16 points, the other two players pay 8 points each. You collect 32 points.
Won by self-draw: all three players pay 16 points. You collect 48 points.
Half Payment spreads the risk across the table. Full Payment makes every discard nerve-racking, which is exactly why some tables use it.
Scoring Table
Faan converts to base points. Two systems exist. Agree on one before you play.
Half-Spicy 半辣上 🌶️ is the most common. Points double every two faan, from 4 faan up.
Double-Spicy 辣辣上 🌶️🌶️ doubles every single faan. Escalates fast, plays wild.
The faan limit (爆棚 / 例牌). Tables cap the maximum, usually at 8, 10, or 13. Ten is most common. If the cap is 10, a 13-faan Thirteen Orphans still pays the 10-faan amount. The cap helps keep scoring balanced and manageable during play.
| Faan | Base Points - Half-Spicy 半辣上 | Base Points - Double-Spicy 辣辣上 |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | 1 | 1 |
| 1 | 2 | 2 |
| 2 | 4 | 4 |
| 3 | 8 | 8 |
| 4 | 16 | 16 |
| 5 | 24 | 32 |
| 6 | 32 | 64 |
| 7 | 48 | 128 |
| 8 | 64 | 256 |
| 9 | 96 | 512 |
| 10 | 128 | 1024 |
| 11 | 192 | 2048 |
| 12 | 256 | 4096 |
| 13 | 384 | 8192 |
8 10 13 are the common faan limits. Agree on one before you play.
House Rule: minimum Faan to win
Most Hong Kong Mahjong tables require 3 faan minimum to declare a win. Some allow 1 or 2.
This surprises new players. You can hold four sets and a pair and still not be allowed to win, because the hand pattern on its own does not meet the minimum faan requirement. A Chicken Hand (雞糊) is worth 0 faan but can still get you there on everything else stacked on top. Say you drew the winning tile yourself (+1), never revealed a set (+1), and were holding your own flower (+1). That's 3 faan, and at a 3-faan table you can declare the win.
So a 0-faan hand isn't a dead hand. It just means every faan has to come from how you won rather than what you built.
💡 Ask before joining a table: what's the minimum, and what's the faan limit?
Hong Kong Mahjong winning hands
A mix of chows and pungs across different suits.
Four chows and a pair.
Every set is a pung or kong.
One suit plus honor tiles. Nothing from the other two suits.
One suit only. No honors at all.
Seven unique pairs. Not a traditional Hong Kong hand, so confirm your table allows it. +1 faan from closed hand. 4 faan total.
Two dragon sets plus a pair of the third.
Three wind sets plus a pair of the fourth.
All three dragon sets.
Four pungs, none revealed. Normally needs a self-draw to complete the fourth pung. Claiming a discard is fine if it completes the pair.
Winds and dragons only.
Ones and nines only.
1112345678999 in one suit, plus any tile from that suit. Must be totally concealed. Note that bonuses for Closed Hand and All One Suit will not be considered in this case.
All four wind sets.
Four kongs and a pair.
One of every terminal and honor, plus a duplicate of any one of them. The only hand allowed to rob a concealed kong. Go to "Common Questions" section below for explanation.
Bonus Faan Based on Winning Conditions
These stack on top of your hand value.
| Condition | 中文 | Faan | What it means |
|---|---|---|---|
| Self-Draw | 自摸 | 1 | You drew the winning tile from the wall. |
| Closed Hand | 門清 | 1 | You never revealed a set. |
| Dragon Pung | 三元牌 | 1 | A pung or kong of any dragon. |
| Seat Wind Pung | 門風牌 | 1 | A pung or kong of your own wind. |
| Prevailing Wind Pung | 圈風牌 | 1 | A pung or kong of the table's wind. |
| Robbing a Kong | 搶槓 | 1 | Someone upgraded a pung to a kong and that tile won it for you. |
| All Terminals & Honors | 花幺 | 1 | Every set uses ones, nines, winds, or dragons. |
| Win by Last Catch | 海底撈月 | 1 | You won on the last tile of the wall or the last discard. |
| Win by Kong | 槓上開花 | 2 | You konged, drew the replacement, and it won. Self-Draw faan included. |
| Win by Double-Kong | 槓上槓 | 8 | Kong, draw the replacement, and that tile lets you kong again. The second replacement is your winning tile. Drawing a bonus tile at either replacement breaks the chain, and Win by Double-Kong is no longer valid. |
Bonus Tiles: Flowers & seasons
They're never discarded and never part of a set. When you draw one, set it face up and draw a replacement from the back of the wall. They only matter when someone wins.
Each is numbered 1 to 4, matching a seat wind:
1 = East • 2 = South • 3 = West • 4 = North.
| Bonus | 中文 | Faan |
|---|---|---|
| Seat wind bonus tile | 正花 | 1 each |
| All 4 flowers, or all 4 seasons suit | 一臺花 | 2 |
| No flower or season tiles | 無花 | 1 |
| All 7 bonus tiles, instant win | 小花糊 | 3 |
| All 8 bonus tiles, instant win | 大花糊 | Limit |
Rare wins
Pure luck. No skill involved. You can play for years and never see one. If it happens at your table, take a picture, because nobody is going to believe you. And go buy yourself a lottery ticket! 😆
| Win | 中文 | Faan | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bless of Heaven | 天糊 | Limit | The dealer wins on the opening hand. |
| Bless of Earth | 地糊 | Limit | A non-dealer wins on the dealer's first discard. |
| Bless of Man | 人糊 | Limit | A win by discard during the first go-around. |
A note on house rules
Mahjong varies from table to table, family to family, and city to city. The faan values on this page reflect the most common Hong Kong scoring conventions, cross-checked across multiple sources and against how the game is actually played at our tables here in the Bay Area.
Even so, you will sit down at tables that score a hand differently, allow hands we don't list, or leave out hands we do. None of them are wrong. Mahjong has never had a single governing rulebook, and that local variation is part of what makes the game what it is.
Treat this page as a reliable default, then defer to whatever your table agrees on before the first hand. If something here looks off to you, or your table plays it differently and you want to tell me about it, email Hello@PlayMahjongSF.com. This page gets updated.
Common Questions
-
Sometimes. Here's the test: could you have built one pattern without automatically getting the other? If yes, they stack. If one pattern guarantees the other, the bigger faan value already includes it and you only count it once.
These stack:
All One Suit (7) + All Pungs (3) = 10 faan. A one-suit hand doesn't have to be all pungs, it could just as easily be all chows. You did two separate hard things, so you get credit for both.
These do not stack:
All Honors (10) + All Pungs (3). Honor tiles can't form runs, so every All Honors hand is automatically all pungs. You didn't do anything extra. Count 10, not 13.
Big Dragons (8) + three dragon pungs (3). The 8 faan already prices in the dragons. Count 8.
Big Winds (13) + seat wind and prevailing wind pungs. Same reasoning. The 13 already includes them.
Small Dragons and Small Winds follow the same logic, and most tables treat the dragon or wind pungs inside them as already counted.
-
Not traditionally. It comes from Cantonese, Japanese, and international variants. Plenty of San Francisco Bay Area tables allow it. Ask.
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You pay the maximum faan to all three players. If the Faan limit is set to 8, the player pays all other players 64 points each.
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There are two ways to make a kong, and the difference decides whether anyone can take that tile from you.
An exposed kong starts as a pung you already claimed and laid on the table. Later you draw the fourth tile and add it to the set, face up. Everyone at the table watched it happen. Because that tile passed through the open, another player can claim it if it completes their winning hand. That's Robbing a Kong 搶槓. This winning condition will add 1 faan.
A concealed kong is four identical tiles that all came from your own hand. You never claimed any of them from a discard. You declare it and reveal your hidden kong. Normally this is completely safe. A tile that was never public can't be taken.
Thirteen Orphans is the one exception. It needs one of every terminal and honor, and a concealed kong is four copies of a single tile, so it may well be sitting on the exact East wind or 9 Circles that finishes the hand. Hong Kong rules allow a player waiting on Thirteen Orphans to claim that tile even from a concealed kong. No other hand can do this.