Mah Jongg Mania Taking Over Gen Z: Socialization and Community Making a Comeback and We Can Help

We grandparents love to spend time with our grandchildren. My grandchildren range from age 7 to age 22, and each of the six is special in his or her own way.  Five of them  are Generation Z or “Zoomers”, between 14 and 29 years old, the first true digital generation, knowing and living with smartphones and social media attached to them at the hip, and finding anything that will grab their attention otherwise is a miracle.

Enter the miracle of American Mah Jongg! 

And auspiciously near the Chinese New Year, also known as the Spring Festival, symbolically sweeping away any ill fortune to make way for incoming good luck!

American Mah Jongg, or as we here call it just mah jongg, is the American version of a 19^th century Chinese four player strategy game, using 144-166 tiles (with dots, bamboo, characters, winds, dragons) similar to Western rummy.

Our American version of mah jongg is also a four player strategy game using 152 tiles (dots, bamboo, cracks, winds, dragons, flowers, and 8 jokers), and a yearly published National Mahjong League Card to form specific 14 tile hands.  April of each year the cards come out, so order your card soon at www.nationalmahjongleague.org The objective was and is to be the first to complete a winning hand by collecting specific combinations, delineated in categories on the card, using skill, strategy, and calculation.

And gambling! The first player to match their 14 tiles to a hand on the annual card and call “mah jongg” wins.

I play Mah Jongg with friends once a week and on line on the app “real mah jongg” daily.  I also play bridge and canasta, but there is something about mah jongg that makes it my favorite.  I think it is handling the tiles, a tactile experience. Is it gambling for quarters a hand?

What a surprise I had when my oldest grandson and his girlfriend wanted to learn and play mah jongg.  Young couples and even teenagers want to learn to play and are really getting into the game.  I had the best time sharing something I love that I now know that they also love, and teaching them tips and tricks.

Then I came upon a February 3, 2026 article by the ICSC, a member organization for industry advancement, which promotes and elevates the marketplaces and spaces where people shop, dine, work, play and gather as foundational and vital ingredients of communities, and economies.  They produce experiences that create connections and it makes sense they have chosen to highlight maj jongg in. “From Game Night to a Third Place: Is Mahjong the Next Pickleball?

The short answer is YES!  “MAHJONG’S SURGE SIGNALS A NEW KIND OF SOCIAL LIFESTYLE.

I am all for any lifestyle that does not mean our teens and young adults are not just looking down at a screen isolated from others except maybe also on a screen somewhere in the world.

How did I get hooked on mah jong? Watching my mother play when I was a child!  The camaraderie!  The fun! The conversation! The laughter!  People being together! One table of four! Many tables of four playing in a location together in a social network!

My grandson and his girlfriend are saying maj jongg is what all their friends are learning.  ICSC says Yelp recently named “mahjong nights” a top trend of 2026, that searches for mah jongg clubs surged and searches for mahjong lessons rose 819%! Even Julia Roberts and Meghan Markle talk about playing regularly with friends.

Why the next pickleball which has surged all over our communities? 

It is social.

It requires strategy.

It requires skill.

It is gambling and addictive like gambling!

It is about community and connection – and isn’t that what we grandparents promote the most!

The article even says that a cross generational opportunity has emerged.  As they say--we know everyone’s grandma knows how to play, and many grandpas too, which the article should not omit!  Our grandsons are the model for the older men that don’t yet play to play!

LET’S GO! LET’S PROMOTE THE MAJ JONGG LIFESTYLE!

If your grandchildren do not own a mah jong card, buy them one for $14.  www.nationalmahjongleague.org Teach them the card! Tips and Tricks!

Buy the family a mah jongg set for their home.   Let them pick their color covers. This is Amazon’s overall pick.

Teach them and their friends to play mah jongg.  Invite them over to watch you play. Invite them over to play with you or direct them to the real mah jong app where you can play with them long distance.

Teach a friend.

Create multigenerational family gatherings with mah jongg gaming.

We Boomers are 67 million strong, and 20% of the American population.  Let us show our strength and through mah jongg bring back the good luck of socialization and community to the next generation with

Joy,

Mema