Championships, dates, rule changes, and results from Europe, Japan, and the wider riichi world. The stories worth following, all in one place.
Shiro Washi Taikai 2026: 108 seats and eight hanchan on November 14 and 15 in WarsawIORMC 2026: qualifiers on November 7, team final and individual tournament on November 21UK Open: Eliot Hollier wins ahead of Jay Li and Frank LeeSwedish Open: Oskar Lappi wins ahead of Guanzhou Xu and Berke ZorluWRC 2028: ARA counts each player’s six best results before its InvitationalM Tournament 2026: Rio Tojo wins with 131.6 pointsRiichi Nomi Open 2026: Saikouisen rules replace WRCFrance 2026: Joël Ratsimandresy wins the national title2025-26 M.League: EX Fūrin Kazan claims its second titleWRPM: four Japanese organizations recognize the international statusERMC 2027: Katowice, August 5 to 8, four days on the EMA calendarWorld Mahjong Championship 2026: October 18 to 22 under MCR rulesWhite Rose Riichi: October 24 and 25, 2026, in LeedsGraz Riichi Open: November 28 and 29, 2026, in AustriaBoston Riichi Open: the first edition ran August 14 to 16 in Cambridge
The regular season began on September 14. Megumu Aikawa won the first match with +58.0 points, followed by Kōshin Asakura with +54.7 in the second. The schedule runs for 300 matches through March 2, 2027.
Rio Tojo wins M Tournament 2026 with 131.6 points. Naoki Setokuma finishes second ahead of Sayaka Okada and Kenji Katsumata. Both final hanchan are now available in our replay reader.
From the opening round to Rio Tojo’s winning final, all 35 M Tournament 2026 tables are collected here with their combined standings and two hanchan. Open any game on the Tenpai table and follow the actual play from each of the four seats.
Ryan Z finishes second, ahead of Max Suddendorf and Henry Leung. Capacity for the first edition had expanded from 96 to 112 seats.
Philly Mah-Jawn Club filled all 160 seats for its third open in under 24 hours, despite doubling capacity from 2025. The tournament will use a nine-hanchan cumulative format at Live! Casino & Hotel Philadelphia.
Korea Mahjong League has set qualifiers for November 7, followed by the team final and individual tournament on November 21. Both days begin at 11:00 UTC.
The tournament lists 108 seats across 27 tables and eight 90-minute hanchan on November 14 and 15 in Warsaw.
Riichi Nomi, Toronto, Boston, and North Texas filled four consecutive weekends before the WRL August Major on August 29 and 30 in New York.
The sixth Riichi Nomi Open brought 256 players to New York. Erik Karhan finished first in the standings published by the ARA, ahead of Bichen W and Ty Kennedy. The event also switched from WRC to Saikouisen rules and removed big honba.
World Riichi Professional Mahjong has formalized an agreement with four Japanese organizations. WR Pros can access a long list of title events as well as Saikyousen professional qualifiers and MONDO Pro League.
The EMA calendar now lists 26 riichi tournaments between August 1 and December 13. Toulouse, Louvain-la-Neuve, and Tampere host the final three events on December 12 and 13.
After ten of seventeen rounds, BGT Berserker leads 健康カモンズ. Each player’s highest total across a twenty-hanchan run will count before the Best 8.
ARA retains a points route and an Invitational. On August 17, its WRC representative estimated that about eight United States seats would pass through this system, without presenting that figure as final.
Soichi Hinago wins the 20th Masato Iida Cup Saikouisen Classic with 55.5 points. The NPM Champion Road continues through January.
The eighth World Mahjong Championship appears on the EMA calendar from October 18 to 22, 2026, in Kunming, China. Five days are listed. The name is easy to misread: this event uses Mahjong Competition Rules, or MCR, not riichi. It is separate from the World Riichi Championship.
The M.LEAGUE × World Riichi tour brought more than one hundred players to Las Vegas before exhibitions in New York. Yuhao L. won the main tournament ahead of Sayaka Okada.
World Riichi confirms New York for its fifth championship in 2028. It will be the second edition held in the United States after Las Vegas in 2017. The United States qualification route leads to a 64-player Invitational.
The European Mahjong Association published a 2025 edition of its riichi rules, dated August 2025. The official document includes wording clarifications and states that riichi may be declared with at least one tile left in the wall. EMA-certified tournaments should be read against this text, while many North American opens announce the WRC 2025 ruleset and their options.
White Rose brings eight hanchan to The Tetley in Leeds on October 24 and 25. Graz Riichi Open follows in Austria on November 28 and 29, the same weekend as Oranda Sai Kou in the Netherlands. All three opens are approved on the EMA calendar.
The European Mahjong Association has listed the seventh European Riichi Championship in Katowice, Poland, from August 5 to 8, 2027. Claude Sessin is the defending champion after winning in Valencia in 2024.
Fifth at the cut, Arthur K. took the lead during hanchan 7 and finished on 116.2 points. Vincent Shao placed second ahead of Ding.
Jesper Nøhr finishes the eight hanchan on 172.9 points. Adelino Santos takes second on 152.8, ahead of Duy Le on 138.8.
Justin Koh finishes 76,300 points ahead of Sergio Matos Lima. Jeroen Chen takes third in the 52-player tournament, which represented 13 countries.
Eliot Hollier wins on 175,300 points after eight hanchan. Jay Li finishes second on 155,200, ahead of Frank Lee on 136,000.
Three wins in the first four hanchan gave Keigo Iwasaki an unassailable lead. Koichi Itakura finished second, just 1.5 points ahead of Tomomi Okumura.
Finland’s Oskar Lappi finished first on 172,800 points. Guanzhou Xu and Berke Zorlu completed the podium in a 52-player field.
Joël Ratsimandresy topped the 2026 French Riichi Championship in Saint-Denis with 206,500 cumulative points. Thomy Fontaine placed second, ahead of Wilson Nathanaël Janac.
EX Fūrin Kazan claimed its second M.League title with 268.8 final-series points. KONAMI Mahjong Fight Club placed second, ahead of TEAM RAIDEN and BEAST X.
Miao Zhuang, representing Harbin, won the first ACRC ahead of Xu Xu for China Open and Li Jinqiang for Guangzhou. Organizers report 60 players from four continents.
The Riichi Dutch Open and Yakitori Open recorded 180 entries between them. Yuqiao Wei won in Oss, followed by Zongbo Bao in Berlin.
Claude Sessin finished first on 201,300 points, ahead of Anastasiia Veremenko and Junjie Sun. EMA standings list 172 players from 28 countries.
Kotaro Uchikawa won the main event with 73.5 points in the final. Portugal/Spain won the first WRC team competition.
Who organizes what, and under which rules. A practical guide before choosing a tournament or following a broadcast.
The world championship dedicated to riichi. World Riichi describes it as triennial, maintains the WRC Rules, and confirms New York for 2028 after Paris, Las Vegas, Vienna, and Tokyo.
Triennial · GlobalEMA certifies European tournaments, publishes riichi and MCR rankings, and maintains the European riichi rules. Its calendar distinguishes approved, pending, and unranked events.
Rankings · EuropeThe Japan Professional Mahjong League co-produced WRC Tokyo 2025. M.League, Japan’s professional team competition, partnered with World Riichi for the June 2026 U.S. tour.
Professional · JapanBoston awards WRC Qualification Points to the top 25%. White Rose and Graz appear as certified tournaments on the EMA calendar, with their own dates and rule options.
Qualification · LocalThe American Riichi Association runs Open Qualifiers through November 2027. Each player’s six best results form the score leading to its 2028 Invitational. The final world quota is still to be announced.
Qualification · United StatesSaikouisen, NPM, JPML, Mahjong Union, and RMU maintain distinct leagues and titles. The Saikouisen Classic and NPM Champion Road offer two concrete reference points outside M.League.
Professional · JapanReal-time ranked games, daily puzzles, and a move-by-move AI review. Free in your browser.