Malaysian Mahjong Scoring: Tai, Fan and Payouts Explained

Malaysian mahjong scoring looks hard at first, but it rests on one simple idea. Every scoring feature of your hand earns a unit called tai or fan. Then each extra unit doubles what the losers pay. This guide shows the common tai values, the payment tables and worked sums for real hands, in both the 4-player and 3-player games.

House rules vary a lot, so treat the numbers here as the common versions. Agree your table's rules before play. If you are new to the game, start with how to play mahjong and come back once you know chow, pong and kong.

Tai and fan: two names for one count

Tai (台) and fan (番) both mean a scoring unit. Singapore guides and players say tai. Malaysian sources, such as the Lowyat forum and the 3-player rules, mostly say fan. In practice you will hear both words around Malaysian tables, and they count the same thing.

So in Malaysian mahjong scoring, a hand of "3 tai" or "3 fan" means three scoring units. The mahjong terms glossary lists the other words you will hear, such as 自摸 (zi mo, self-draw) and 平胡 (ping hu).

How tai turn into points

Before play, the table agrees what a 1-tai win is worth. Then each extra tai doubles that value. This guide uses a base of 1 point.

This doubling is what sets Malaysian mahjong scoring apart from competition rules, which add points together. One extra tai does not add a little. It doubles the bill.

Malaysian home games often settle in money; this guide uses points. For the legal background, read is mahjong legal in Malaysia in our FAQ.

Minimum tai and the limit

Under most Malaysian mahjong scoring rules, you need a hand worth at least 1 tai to win. Singapore players call this rule 起胡 (qi hu). Because of it, the zero-tai chicken hand (鸡胡) no longer counts in most circles. The Lowyat forum and singaporemahjong.com both give 1 fan as the default minimum. TheSmartLocal gives no minimum and says tai depend on house rules.

At the top end, a typical limit is 5 tai, but each table agrees its own. Some big hands list "10 points, or the limit, whichever is the smaller". So with a 5-tai limit, those hands simply pay 5 tai. We found no source for a 2-tai or 3-tai minimum. If your table uses one, treat it as a house rule.

The tai list for 4-player games

The values below come mainly from the archived Wikipedia article on Singaporean mahjong scoring. Malaysian mahjong scoring for four players follows the same pattern, though tables differ on details. Add up every item your hand has. Then read the total against the doubling table. That is the heart of Malaysian mahjong scoring.

A non-matching flower (偏花) scores nothing. Also, sources disagree on some values. A "common rule" in Singapore counts three dragon pongs as 5 tai, whatever the rest of the hand holds.

Limit hands

Limit hands pay the full limit straight away. They are the biggest mahjong winning hands, and they are rare. The usual list is below.

• All 8 flowers (花胡), an instant win.
• Robbing the eighth (七抢一): you hold seven flowers when another player draws the eighth.
• Hidden treasure (四暗刻): four concealed pongs, self-drawn.
• Nine gates (九连宝灯), pure terminals (清么九) and all honours (字一色).
• Big four winds (大四喜) and four kongs, also called the Eighteen Arhats (十八罗汉).
• Thirteen wonders (十三幺): 13 or limit, and "all players pay double that of the limit".
• Heavenly, earthly and humanly hands (天胡 / 地胡 / 人胡), which "often" pay the limit.

Bonus tiles: flowers and animals

Flowers and animals never form part of your four sets and a pair. Instead, you place them in front of you and draw a replacement tile. Even so, they matter in Malaysian mahjong scoring, because they still add tai when you win. For what each tile looks like, see our guide to mahjong tiles.

Each seat owns one flower and one season by number. East has Plum and Spring (1). South has Orchid and Summer (2). West has Chrysanthemum and Autumn (3). North has Bamboo and Winter (4). Your own flowers score 1 tai each. Other players' flowers score 0.

Every animal scores 1 tai, whatever your seat. All four animals score 5 tai in total, because the full set adds 1 extra. So a player with all four animals already holds the usual limit.

Who pays: the mahjong payout systems

Once you know the tai, you need to know who pays. This is where Malaysian mahjong scoring varies most, so ask before you start. Both start from the doubling table above.

Everyone pays, discarder pays double

In this system, all three losers pay when you win on a discard. However, the player who threw the winning tile pays double. The table below uses a base of 1 point.

Self-draw (zi mo)

If you draw the winning tile yourself (自摸), nobody fed it to you. So all three players pay double.

Shooter pays all

The Wikipedia source calls this "common among younger Singaporeans". Here only the "shooter", the player who discarded the winning tile, pays. That player covers the whole bill. On a self-draw, each player still pays double as before.

Some tables also add a small zi mo bonus on top of a self-draw. Others make the dealer pay and receive double. Meanwhile, singaporemahjong.com counts one step higher: a 3-fan win takes 16 points from the discarder and 8 from each other player.

Worked examples: hands with their tai

These three hands show Malaysian mahjong scoring step by step: add up the tai, then pay. Each one uses a base of 1 point.

Example 1: half flush with a dragon pong

ChowPongChowPongPair

The hand holds one suit plus honours, so it is a half flush worth 2 tai. The Red Dragon pong adds 1 tai. That makes 3 tai, with a base value of 4 points. Under "everyone pays", the two other losers pay 4 each and the discarder pays 8. So the winner gains 16. Under "shooter pays all", the discarder pays all 16.

Example 2: all pongs with a seat flower, self-drawn

PongPongPongPongPairFlower

Say you sit East and the prevailing wind is South. All pongs gives 2 tai. The East Wind pong is your seat wind, so it adds 1 tai. Plum is East's own flower, which adds 1 more. That totals 4 tai, a base of 8 points. Because you self-drew, each player pays double: 16 points each, or 48 in all.

Example 3: the sequence hand (ping hu)

ChowChowChowChowPair

Every set is a chow, and the hand holds no flowers or animals. The player waited on 7 and 8 of Characters, so either a 6 or a 9 would win. That two-sided wait makes a full ping hu worth 4 tai, a base of 8 points. If one flower had come in, it would drop to the lesser sequence hand at 1 tai. For tips on building hands like this, see our mahjong strategy guide.

Instant payouts during play

In Malaysian mahjong scoring, some events pay at once, before anyone wins the hand. Not every table plays them, so agree this first. Some tables pay these events only for animals, and some pay none at all.

Bitten (咬到): animal and flower pairs

When you hold both the Cat and the Rat, every other player pays you straight away. The same goes for the Rooster and the Centipede. This event has the name 咬到 (yao dao), "bitten", since the hunter "bites" its prey. A common amount equals a 1-tai self-draw, which is 2 points from each player at our base.

All four animals usually pay double, and the payouts add up. So a full set pays 2 + 2 + 4 points from each player. If the animals were in your starting tiles, many tables pay more, often 4 per pair. Holding both of your own seat flowers also counts as a bite. A full group of four same-colour flowers pays like a concealed kong.

Kong payouts

Kongs also pay at once in many versions of Malaysian mahjong scoring. An exposed kong (明杠) pays like a bite, so 2 points from each player. A concealed kong (暗杠) usually pays double. The singaporemahjong.com rules instead give "two points from each player". If another player robs your kong to win, you get no kong payout. Instead, you count as the discarder.

Bao (包): when one player pays for all

Bao (包) punishes a risky discard. If your tile completes certain big hands, you pay for every loser. Common bao cases include the following.

• 包三元: a player shows two dragon pongs and you feed the third dragon.
• 包四喜: a player shows three wind sets and you feed the fourth.
• 包滿貫: a player one tai short of the limit takes your dragon or wind.
• 包清一色: a player shows three or four sets of one suit and wins on your tile.
• Fresh tile rules (生牌) late in the hand, such as "7 tiles Pao Kong, 5 Tiles Pao Fresh". Some players reverse these numbers.

Scoring in Malaysian 3-player mahjong

The 3-player game uses 84 tiles, and 3-player Malaysian mahjong scoring has its own scale. The main source is the Sloperama notes on 3-player Malaysian mahjong, and Wikipedia and SAYS agree on the key numbers. You need at least 5 fan to win, and 10 fan is the maximum. Our Malaysian 3-player mahjong guide covers the rest of the rules.

The 3-player fan list

Most items are worth 1 fan each. These include one face tile, one animal, your own flower or season, and a pong of a dragon, your own wind, East or North. A mixed one-suit hand, seven pairs, robbing a kong and winning on a replacement tile also earn 1 fan. All pongs earn 2 fan. A pure one-suit hand earns 3 fan, and so do two dragon pongs plus a dragon pair.

Several hands go straight to max fan. Examples are 13 wonders, nine gates, four kongs, three dragon pongs and four flies. A hand with no flower, season, face or animal also counts. So does any hand that reaches ten fan or more.

3-player points and payments

A win is worth a base of 100 points, and each fan is worth 20. A max-fan hand pays a double of 200 points. The sources list these three numbers but give no worked sum. One reading makes them fit: the 100 base covers the 5-fan minimum, and each fan above five adds 20. Then 10 fan comes to 200, the same as max fan. Agree your own reading before play.

On a self-draw, each loser pays double the winning points. On a discard, the discarder pays double and the other loser pays the winning points once. If a hand meets several max-fan conditions, the max-fan points double for each one.

The two losers may also settle between themselves. If nobody has max fan, they compare fan. When one holds 5 fan or more and the other does not, the lower player pays the difference.

Fly and kong payouts in the 3-player game

Each fly (飛) tile you hold earns a side score of 50 points at the end. During play, a concealed kong takes 100 points from both other players. An exposed kong earns 50, but if you made it from a discard, the discarder pays 100. A full set of four flowers, seasons, faces or animals pays 100 from each player if you held it from the start, or 50 if you gathered it later.

How competition (MCR) scoring differs

Mahjong Competition Rules, also called MCR or Chinese Official, work in a different way. According to the World Mahjong Organization rulebook, there are 81 scoring elements. A hand must total at least 8 points, and flower points do not count toward those 8.

Also, MCR adds points together instead of doubling them. Each loser pays 8 points. On a self-draw, each of the three pays 8 plus the hand value. On a discard, the discarder pays 8 plus the hand value, while the other two pay 8 each. So a big hand costs far less in MCR than under the doubling of Malaysian mahjong scoring.

Malaysian mahjong scoring cheat card

Keep this card next to your table. Cross out anything your house plays differently. For the wider rules, see our guide to Malaysian mahjong rules and the 4-player Malaysian mahjong guide.

Frequently asked questions