Mahjong Christmas Holiday offers a player the festivities and warmth of the holiday season while they relax by pairing matching layered tiles across 100 levels. The white-framed tiles float in front of winter backdrops and display associated imagery, such as Christmas trees, candy and party poppers, colorful presents decorated with bows, elves in green outfits, gingerbread houses, knitted mittens, nutcracker soldiers, red brick chimneys, roaring fires, sleigh bells, smiling snowmen, sprigs of mistletoe and star toppers.
The player receives points for every pair of tiles they remove from a wintry playfield. They receive the most points and unlock another level every time they clear a field entirely. They can't remove tiles hidden beneath other tiles or stuck between two other tiles on the left and right sides.
Mahjong Christmas Holiday aids the player in various ways. It turns a selected tile green to help the player confirm their selection. It also offers several helpful pair identification tools, including a lightbulb that adds a reflective shine to a pair, a magnifying glass that reveals all available uncovered pairs at any given time, a set of crossed knives that removes at least two pairs at a time, and crossed arrows that reshuffle the tiles to reveal hidden ones.
These features become available for free every time the player fills a multiplier circle below a vertical star-rewards bar to the right of the tiles. The player must perform matches quickly to earn all three stars per level and access to the tools. With the latter, they must otherwise view advertisements for additional access.
