Riichi Mahjong Glossary

Fifty terms you will meet at any Japanese mahjong table, grouped by where they show up. Tap «Read more» on any entry to jump to a full explainer.

Game flow and state(10)

Yaku (役): Scoring patterns required for a legal win. Every winning hand needs at least one yaku — dora alone never qualifies.Read more →
Tenpai (聴牌): The state of being exactly one tile away from a legal winning shape. Required before you can declare riichi or collect the noten payment.Read more →
Shanten (向聴): How many tile swaps a hand sits from tenpai. Shanten 0 is tenpai; -1 is an already-winning hand.Read more →
Noten (不聴): Not tenpai. At exhaustive draw, noten players pay 3000 points total to the tenpai side.Read more →
Agari (和了): Winning the hand — the umbrella term that covers both tsumo and ron.
Tsumo (自摸): Winning on the tile you draw yourself. On a closed hand it also scores 1 han via menzen tsumo.
Ron (栄和): Winning by claiming an opponent's discard. Blocked by furiten.
Ryuukyoku (流局): Exhaustive draw — the live wall runs out before anyone wins. The tenpai payment settles and the dealership may rotate.Read more →
Renchan (連荘): Dealer keeps the seat after winning the hand or being tenpai at exhaustive draw. The honba counter ticks up.Read more →
Honba (本場): Bonus-round counter incremented on every renchan or ryuukyoku. Each typically adds 300 points to the next winning hand.Read more →

Riichi (立直): Closed-tenpai declaration: discard sideways, bet 1000 points, lock the hand. Scores 1 han and unlocks ippatsu and uradora.Read more →
Ippatsu (一発): Winning within one uninterrupted go-around after riichi. Worth 1 han; cancelled by any call between the riichi and the win.Read more →
Menzen (門前): Closed hand — no calls have been made. Riichi, pinfu, ippatsu and menzen tsumo all require menzen status.Read more →
Pon (ポン): Calling any opponent's discard to complete a triplet using a pair from your hand. Opens the hand.Read more →
Chi (チー): Calling the left-side opponent's discard to complete a sequence using two tiles from your hand. Opens the hand.Read more →
Kan (カン): Four-tile group declaration. Closed (ankan), extended (kakan) or open (minkan). Each kan flips a new dora indicator.Read more →
Rinshan (嶺上): Replacement tile drawn from the dead wall after a kan. Winning on it scores Rinshan Kaihou (1 han).Read more →
Furiten (振聴): Locked out of winning by ron because one of your waits sits in your own river — or in anyone's river after riichi.Read more →

Manzu (萬子): Character suit, 1m–9m. Each tile is marked with a Chinese numeral and the 萬 character.
Pinzu (筒子): Circle suit, 1p–9p. Each tile shows that many round dots.
Souzu (索子): Bamboo suit, 1s–9s. The 1s is traditionally drawn as a bird.
Honors (字牌): Winds (East / South / West / North, 1z–4z) and dragons (White / Green / Red, 5z–7z). Honors never form sequences.
Terminals (老頭): The 1s and 9s of the three numbered suits. Their presence drives the chanta family of yaku.
Simples (中張): The 2s through 8s of the numbered suits — neither terminals nor honors. A hand made entirely of simples scores tanyao.
Dora (ドラ): Bonus tile. Each one in the winning hand adds 1 han, but dora is not itself a yaku.Read more →
Aka Dora (赤ドラ): Red 5m, 5p and 5s. Each red five counts as 1 han, independent of the dora indicator.Read more →
Ura Dora (裏ドラ): Dora revealed by flipping the tile underneath each dora indicator — only counted when winning after riichi.Read more →

Meld (面子): Any completed group: sequence, triplet, kan or pair. A standard hand is four melds plus a pair.
Shuntsu (順子): Sequence — three consecutive same-suit tiles such as 4-5-6p. Honors cannot form sequences.
Koutsu (刻子): Triplet — three identical tiles. Concealed triplets (ankou) add fu and may score sanankou.
Kantsu (槓子): Kan — four identical tiles declared as a single group. Replaces a triplet in the four-melds-plus-pair count.Read more →
Toitsu (対子): Pair — two identical tiles. Every standard hand needs exactly one as the head.
Ryanmen (両面): Two-sided open wait — 5-6m waits on both 4m and 7m. The most flexible wait shape and required for pinfu.
Kanchan (嵌張): Closed-in middle wait — 5-7m waits only on 6m. Adds 2 fu.
Penchan (辺張): Edge wait — 1-2 waiting on 3, or 8-9 waiting on 7. Adds 2 fu and forbids pinfu.
Shanpon (双碰): Two-pair wait — completing either pair to a triplet wins. Adds no fu for the wait.
Tanki (単騎): Single-tile pair wait — twelve tiles already form four melds, waiting on the head. Adds 2 fu.

Han (翻): Doubles count — sum of every yaku in the hand plus 1 per dora. The exponent in the base-points formula.Read more →
Fu (符): Base-value points capturing hand shape — wait, triplets, kan, yakuhai pair, and win method. Rounded up to the next 10.Read more →
Yakuhai (役牌): 1-han yaku from a triplet of any dragon, the round wind or your seat wind. The workhorse for open hands.Read more →
Mangan (満貫): Scoring cap at 8000 base points. Reached at 5 han, or 4 han with 40+ fu, or 3 han with 70+ fu.Read more →
Haneman (跳満): Scoring tier at 12000 base points. Awarded for 6–7 han.Read more →
Baiman (倍満): Scoring tier at 16000 base points. Awarded for 8–10 han.Read more →
Sanbaiman (三倍満): Scoring tier at 24000 base points. Awarded for 11–12 han.Read more →
Yakuman (役満): Top scoring tier — 32000 base points. Awarded for 13+ han or any qualifying yakuman shape such as Kokushi Musou.Read more →

Genbutsu (現物): Safe tile already in the threat's river — by furiten, they cannot ron on it for the rest of the hand.Read more →
Suji (筋): Number-line inference: if 5 is in the river, 2 and 8 are safe against a ryanmen on that suit. Doesn't cover other wait shapes.Read more →
Kabe (壁): Wall reading — all four copies of a connector tile are visible, so any wait depending on it is impossible.Read more →
One Chance (ワンチャンス): Three of the four copies of a key connector are visible. Waits requiring it are unlikely but not impossible.Read more →
Betaori (ベタ降り): Full defense — picking the safest possible discard every turn, even at the cost of breaking your own shape, until the threat clears.Read more →