Every game page on this site shows a difficulty rating and an average completion time. Those numbers are not guesses or copied from somewhere else: they come from playing each layout end to end before it goes live. This post publishes the full dataset for all 28 layouts, explains how we measure, and pulls out the patterns that actually help you pick your next game.
How we measure
Before a layout launches, a member of our team plays it end to end at least twice. We record the completion time of a typical solving run—not a speedrun, not a first fumbling attempt—and we rate difficulty from three inputs: the number of available pairs in the opening position, how exposed the key tiles are, and the measured average time. Ratings are reviewed quarterly, as described in our editorial policy.
The full dataset: all 28 layouts
| Layout | Difficulty | Avg clear time | Tiles |
|---|---|---|---|
| Classic | Easy | 3 min | 144 |
| Butterfly | Easy | 4 min | 144 |
| Turtle | Easy | 4 min | 144 |
| Christmas | Easy | 4 min | 144 |
| Cross | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Triangle | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Fish | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Snake | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Pyramid | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Square | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Circles | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Harmony | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Winter | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Spring | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Summer | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Fall | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Thanksgiving | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Fourth of July | Medium | 5 min | 144 |
| Multi-X | Medium | 6 min | 144 |
| Gate | Hard | 6 min | 144 |
| Halloween | Hard | 6 min | 144 |
| Bullseye | Hard | 6 min | 144 |
| Tower | Hard | 7 min | 144 |
| Blade | Hard | 7 min | 144 |
| UFO | Hard | 7 min | 144 |
| Hollow | Hard | 7 min | 144 |
| Great Wall | Hard | 8 min | 144 |
| Double Play | Hard | 10 min | 288 |
What the data actually shows
1. Stack depth beats tile count. Double Play has twice the tiles of any other layout (288) yet takes only two and a half times as long as the 144-tile Classic. Meanwhile Great Wall, with the same 144 tiles as Classic, takes 8 minutes—nearly three times as long. What makes a layout slow is not how many tiles it has, but how deeply they are buried.
2. The 5-minute wall. Fifteen of our 28 layouts cluster at a 5-minute average. That is the sweet spot of mahjong solitaire: long enough to feel like a real game, short enough that one more round is always tempting. If you only ever play the 5-minute tier, you are seeing the game the way most players do.
3. Easy really means easy. All four Easy layouts finish in 3 to 4 minutes. If a new player cannot finish Classic or Turtle, the problem is almost always the free-tile rule, not the layout—our rules guide fixes that in five minutes.
4. Seasonal layouts are friendlier than they look. Six of the eight seasonal designs sit in the 5-minute medium band. Only Christmas (4 minutes, Easy) and Halloween (6 minutes, Hard) break the pattern. The themed tiles change the look, not the underlying difficulty.
5. The frustration threshold starts at 7 minutes. Tower, Blade, UFO and Hollow all average 7 minutes, and they share one trait: a section of the board that stays locked until you clear the right tiles in the right order. That forced sequencing—not size—is what players describe as “hard”.
Pick your layout by time budget
Three minutes: Classic. Five minutes: almost anything in the medium tier—Fish, Snake and Cross are the most popular. Ten minutes: Double Play, the only layout that is genuinely a session rather than a break. If you have exactly one coffee break, a 6-minute hard layout like Gate or Bullseye gives you the most game per minute.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why do layouts with the same 144 tiles have such different times?
Because the tile set is constant but the geometry is not. A flat, open layout exposes most pairs immediately; a deep or ring-shaped layout hides the same tiles behind layers of structure. The average clear time is really measuring geometry, not tile count.
How often are these numbers updated?
Ratings are reviewed quarterly. If a layout plays differently after an update to the embedded game, we re-time it and adjust the rating on its game page.
What is the single hardest layout?
Great Wall, at an 8-minute measured average. Double Play runs longer at 10 minutes, but that is length rather than difficulty—it is two consecutive boards.
See for yourself. Every layout in the table links to its playable page, or browse the grid on All Games.