Proto-mahjong › Chinese classical › Shanghai / Hong Kong new style › Hong Kong old style › Nanyang variants › Vietnamese classical
Vietnamese classical
160 tiles, 8 jokers
Descends into
- Vietnamese modern — 176+ tiles, 24+ jokers
Cross-comparison
corroborated — two or more independent sources agree on the facts that define this variant
| Source | Tiles | Hand | Flowers | Scoring | Payout |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| [1] | 160 | 13, out on 14 | includes flowers/seasons, 8 kings/queens, and 8 jokers | based on the 19 ways of going Out | winner only |
| [2] | 160 | — | eight specialised jokers and eight extra flowers | — | — |
- [1] no books in English
- [2] independently gives the same 160-tile total the chart and Sloperama give
Reading it
Two independent sources give 160 tiles built from eight jokers and eight extra flowers, matching the chart exactly. Sloperama adds the eight kings and queens and the nineteen ways of going out, which is the feature that ties the classical and modern forms together.
Sources
Sloper, Tom. "FAQ 2b: Identifying a Mah-Jongg Variant." Sloperama. canonical checked 2026-09-18
Tile counts, hand sizes, flower handling and scoring for roughly 50 named variants. Primary source for most leaf nodes in this chart.
https://www.sloperama.com/mjfaq/mjfaq02b.html
Also cited on: Chinese archaic, Chinese pre-classical, Chinese classical, Shanghai / Hong Kong new style, Hong Kong old style, Modern HKOS and 43 more · bibliography #1
Wikipedia. "Mahjong." cross-check checked 2026-09-18
The main article's regional-variations section, which describes most branches of this tree independently of the chart's own sources.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahjong
Also cited on: Chinese classical, Hong Kong old style, Taiwanese style, Singapore style, Filipino style, Vietnamese modern and 6 more · bibliography #54