Spider Mahjong Solitaire
About the Spider Layout
The Spider sprawls across the table like the creature it is named for. A layered, roughly circular body sits at the center, raised into a small mound of tiers, and from it eight legs of tiles radiate outward in pairs, reaching toward the corners and edges. One hundred and twelve tiles in all give it a busy, many-limbed silhouette that is instantly recognizable and a little unsettling, in the best way. Few layouts feel as alive on the screen as this one.
Rated four out of five, the Spider earns its difficulty through a clever split personality. The eight legs are long and mostly shallow, so they offer plenty of inviting early matches and lull you into a sense of easy progress. The body, by contrast, is a packed multi-tier knot where the real puzzle lives, buried beneath itself and only reachable once the limbs have been dealt with. Managing the contrast between the generous legs and the stubborn core is what makes the Spider a board with real bite.
Difficulty: Expert (4/5) | Tiles: 112
How to Clear the Spider Layout
Start out at the leg tips. Each of the eight legs is anchored to the body at one end and tapers to a free tip at the other, and those outer tiles are usually open, so they give you a wealth of immediate matches. Working from the tips inward is the natural way to retract a leg and begin freeing the body's edges.
Do not strip the legs blindly, though. Because there are eight of them, it is easy to clear whole limbs while spending suits you will need in the core. As you retract the legs, track which tiles are vanishing entirely from the surface, and leave yourself open partners for any suit you suspect is buried in the central mound.
The crux is the layered body. The center is the densest, most stacked region, and its lowest tiles cannot be reached until the surrounding legs are pulled back and the upper body tiers are peeled away. This is where games are won or lost, so treat the legs partly as a means of opening the core rather than as an end in themselves.
For the endgame, aim to reach the body's lower tiers with several legs already gone, giving you both the exposed center and any remaining leg tips as matching options at once. That breadth is your safety margin. The Spider's deep core makes lockups a real risk, so if the center seals up on you, Shuffle re-deals the remaining tiles into a fresh solvable arrangement.
The Story Behind the Spider Layout
Spiders carry a double meaning across cultures, at once the patient weaver and the lurking trap, and this layout leans into both. The radial body-and-legs form is among the most natural shapes in nature to render in tiles, its eightfold symmetry giving the board an arachnid balance, while the legs reaching into every quarter of the table evoke a web spread wide. There is a faint thrill to dismantling it, like carefully unpicking something that might otherwise catch you.
The shape is also a smart piece of puzzle design dressed up as a creature. By putting the easy material in eight long limbs and hiding the hard material in a dense central knot, the Spider sets a deliberate trap of its own: the limbs tempt you to feel ahead of the game right up until the body refuses to open. The animal's reputation for patience and ambush turns out to be a fair warning about how it plays.
Frequently Asked Questions
Where do I begin on the Spider layout?
At the outer tips of the eight legs. Each leg is free at its far end and anchored to the body at the other, so the tips give you many easy opening matches and let you retract the limbs to expose the body.
Why do I keep getting stuck even though the legs clear easily?
Because the legs are the easy part and the dense central body is the real puzzle. If you strip the limbs without watching your suit counts, you can spend tiles you needed for the buried core. Retract the legs while keeping partners in reserve for the center.
What is the hardest part of the Spider?
The layered body at the middle. Its lowest tiles stay locked until the legs are pulled back and the upper body tiers are removed, so the center is where most games are decided. Treat clearing the legs as a way to open the core.
Is the Spider guaranteed to be solvable?
Yes, every deal is built backwards from a solved board, so a full solution exists. The dense core does make dead ends more likely than on flat layouts, and if the center locks up the Shuffle button re-deals the remaining tiles into another guaranteed-solvable arrangement.
