How to Play Mahjong Solitaire: seven tips for clearing the board
Mahjong solitaire is a game about order, not about spotting pairs. Every layout here is dealt backwards from a solved turtle, so a winning line always exists — but the guarantee is that one exists, not that any order works. These seven are about choosing the order.
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Take the pair that frees the most tiles
Matching is easy; choosing is the game. Between two available pairs, take the one that opens tiles underneath or unlocks the end of a long row. A match that changes nothing has spent a pair for free.
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Watch out for the third and fourth tile
Most designs have four of each tile. If two are free and two are buried, taking the free two can strand the buried pair with nothing left to match. Where you can, pair a free tile with a blocked one.
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Work the top layer down
Tiles on upper layers block everything beneath them and can only be removed from above. Clearing height early turns a solid block into a board you can read.
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Long rows are only open at the ends
A tile in the middle of a row is blocked on both sides no matter what is above it. The ends are the only place progress happens, so treat them as the scarcest resource on the board.
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Scan the whole board before the obvious match
The pair sitting in front of you is rarely the pair that matters. A quick full pass costs a few seconds and regularly reveals a match that unlocks a whole region.
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A guaranteed layout is not a guaranteed line
The deal is built in reverse from a finished board, so a winning sequence exists. Taking pairs greedily can still reach a position with no legal match. That is a real dead end, and it is yours, not the deal.
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Undo is part of the game here
Because a winning line exists, undo is how you find it. When the board locks, step back to the last point where you had a choice of pairs and take the other one.
If you take one habit away: before every match, look at what is directly underneath. That single check prevents most of the positions people call unwinnable.