2026 Season · From the Eight Bam newsletter
Dragon Hands Are Winning the Daily Challenge
August 28, 2026
Every day the American Mahjong Practice Daily Challenge deals the same hand to every player. Players recorded over 74,000 winning hands over 4 months.
One thing stands out. The top three winning hands all contain dragons, and four of the top ten do.
| # | Hand | Wins |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1111 D 111 D 1111 D | 4,206 |
| 2 | FF 1111 11 1111 DD | 3,890 |
| 3 | 2468 2222 D 2222 D | 3,880 |
| 9 | 1234 DDD DDD DDDD | 2,428 |
Together these four account for over 14,000 wins — about one in five of every winning hand this season, and 45% of all wins in the top ten.
Know these four hands.
These are the hands that win most frequently. If you are deciding which hands of the 2026 card to learn first, start here. Dragons pair with numbers in several places on this year's card, which gives these hands more ways to develop — and more flexibility to pivot when you don't get the tiles you need.
Be careful with your dragon discards.
You will rarely see dragons racked. In the top three hands the dragons are singles and pairs, which never get exposed. Only the fourth — 1234 DDD DDD DDDD — puts dragons where you can see them.
It can be challenging to determine if your opponent is playing a dragon hand. Numbered tiles displayed on the rack could belong to dozens of hands on the card. But watching for exposures that would fit any of these four hands is useful. The practical rule: when what is on the table could belong to one of these hands, be careful with your dragon discards. You may never see a dragon exposed all game and still be the one who gives your opponent their winning tile.
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