Riichi mahjong glossary
Riichi mahjong glossary
Every riichi mahjong term explained plainly: riichi, tenpai, furiten, shanten, ukeire, suji, yaku and the rest of the Japanese vocabulary, in English.
- 立直Riichi (立直)Riichi is the declaration of a closed hand ready to win (tenpai) in riichi mahjong: you bet 1000 points and unlock the uradora.
- 聴牌Tenpai (聴牌)Tenpai is a riichi mahjong hand one tile from completion (zero shanten); several different tile types may sometimes complete it.
- 受け入れUkeire (受け入れ)Ukeire is the set of tiles that advance a riichi mahjong hand by reducing its shanten, together with the count of those useful tiles remaining.
- 振聴Furiten (振聴)Furiten forbids winning by ron on any tile in your own discards: while in furiten you can only win by tsumo until the restriction clears.
- ドラDora (ドラ)Dora are bonus tiles that each add one han to an ordinary winning hand without being a yaku; they are not counted on a genuine yakuman.
- 役Yaku (役)A yaku is a named winning condition in riichi mahjong. Ordinary yaku are worth han, while genuine yakuman use a fixed payout.
- 役満Yakuman (役満)Yakuman is the highest hand class in riichi mahjong: each exceptional pattern has a fixed payout, and multiple yakuman stack.
- 半荘Hanchan (半荘)Without a time limit, a hanchan schedules the East and South rounds, eight base hands extended by any East repeats.
- 東風Tonpuusen (東風)Tonpuusen (東風) is a riichi mahjong game limited to the East round only, four base hands in which each player is dealer exactly once.
- 本場Honba (本場)Honba carries over after a dealer win or exhaustive draw; each counter adds 300 points to the payment of the next win.
- 河Kawa (河)The kawa is a player's discard pile or river in riichi mahjong, laid face up before their seat and read constantly to gauge which tiles are safe.
- ロンRon (ロン)Ron (ロン) is winning by claiming an opponent's discard that completes your tenpai wait. Outside pao liability, the discarder pays in full.
- 自摸Tsumo (自摸)Tsumo is completing a riichi mahjong hand on the tile you draw yourself from the wall, unlike ron; a concealed hand also scores the menzen tsumo yaku.
- ポンPon (ポン)Pon is the call that claims a tile discarded by any opponent to complete an open triplet (koutsu) of three identical tiles.
- チーChii (チー)Chii (チー) is the call that claims the tile discarded by the player on your left to complete a run of three consecutive tiles in the same suit.
- カンKan (カン)Kan is a mahjong call that groups four identical tiles into one meld, drawing a replacement tile from the dead wall and revealing a new dora.
- 現物Genbutsu (現物)Genbutsu is a tile already in an opponent's discards, making it safe against that player's ron thanks to furiten, but not against other players.
- 筋Suji (筋)Suji is defensive reasoning: if a 4 is discarded, 1 and 7 are safer against a two-sided (ryanmen) wait involving the 4.
- 向聴Shanten (向聴)Shanten counts how many tile swaps separate a hand from tenpai: shanten 0 means tenpai, one tile from winning.
- 放銃Deal-in (放銃)A deal-in (houjuu, 放銃) is discarding the exact tile an opponent needs. Outside pao liability, you alone pay their ron.
- ウマUma (ウマ)Uma (ウマ) is the fixed placement bonus, added to each player's final score by finishing rank, that turns table position into settled points.
- 翻Han (翻)In riichi scoring, han measure an ordinary hand: ordinary yaku and dora provide han that combine with fu to set the score.
- 符Fu (符)Fu counts the minor structure points of a winning hand (base, triplets, pair, wait shape) and combines with han to set the score.
- 裏ドラUradora (裏ドラ)Uradora is hidden dora revealed when a riichi hand wins; it adds han to an ordinary hand, not to a genuine yakuman.
- 両面Ryanmen (両面)Ryanmen is the two-sided wait from two consecutive suited tiles, for example 4-5 waiting on 3 or 6, the widest basic wait shape in riichi mahjong.
- 嵌張Kanchan (嵌張)Kanchan is a closed wait for the single middle tile of a run, such as holding 4m and 6m and waiting on 5m, accepting at most four copies.
- 辺張Penchan (辺張)The penchan is an edge wait, a 12 or 89 shape that accepts only one kind of tile (the 3 or the 7) to finish the run.
- 双碰Shanpon (双碰)The shanpon wait is a riichi tenpai on two pairs: completing either pair into a triplet wins by ron or tsumo, and the choice affects fu.
- 単騎Tanki (単騎)Tanki is a single-tile wait where four groups are complete and a lone tile is waiting to become the pair, leaving at most three copies to win.
- 延べ単Nobetan (延べ単)Nobetan is a stretched tanki wait: four consecutive tiles that complete on either end, the winning tile forming the pair.
- 赤ドラAka-dora (赤ドラ)Aka-dora are optional red five tiles (0m, 0p, 0s), used by the Tenhou profile taught here and absent from WRC 2025.
- WRCWRC (World Riichi Championship)WRC refers to the international World Riichi Championship tournament ruleset, used as a comparison throughout Tenpai.gg.