Game night games and ideas

1. Codenames: two teams, 25 words on the table, and a spymaster who gives one word clues to find the team's agents. Avoid the assassin. Best with 4 to 8.
2. Ticket to Ride: collect sets of colored train cards to claim routes across a map and finish your secret destination tickets. 2 to 5 players, easy to teach in ten minutes.
3. Catan: build roads and settlements, trade resources with the table, and race to 10 victory points. The trading is where the arguments start.
4. Wavelength: one player sees where a hidden target sits on a scale like cold to hot, gives a clue, and the team turns the dial. Great for groups who like to debate.
5. Telestrations: the drawing telephone game in a box. Sketch the word, guess the sketch, pass it on, and laugh at how it ended up.
6. Dixit: the storyteller picks a dreamlike picture card and says a clue. Everyone adds a card that fits, then votes. Too obvious and nobody scores.
7. Azul: take colored tiles from the middle to fill your wall, and leave the bad leftovers for the next player. Calm, pretty and quietly cruel. 2 to 4 players.

1. President: get rid of your cards first. The finishing order decides the ranks for the next round, and the loser hands their best cards up.
2. Spoons: pass cards around the circle looking for four of a kind. Grab a spoon when you have it, and when one spoon goes everyone grabs. One spoon short, one player out.
3. Cheat: play cards face down and say what they are. Anyone can call cheat, and whoever was wrong picks up the whole pile.
4. Uno: match the color or the number, play the action cards to ruin someone's turn, and say Uno with one card left or draw two.
5. Exploding Kittens: draw cards until someone draws an exploding kitten and is out, unless they have a defuse. 2 to 5 players, rounds take minutes.
6. Monopoly Deal: the card game version of Monopoly. First to collect three full property sets in different colors wins, and it takes 15 minutes, not three hours.

1. Fishbowl: everyone writes names on slips. Two teams guess them in three rounds: describe, one word only, then act it out.
2. Scattergories: draw a letter and fill a list of categories before the timer ends. Only answers nobody else wrote score.
3. Forbidden Words: describe the word on the card to your team without saying it or the five words listed under it.
4. Contact: one player thinks of a word and gives the first letter. The others give clues to other words with that start, and if two players connect on one, the next letter comes out.
5. Charades: act out a film, a song or a book without speaking while your team guesses against the clock.

Modes in the Dronk app for iPhone. One phone, no setup.

1. Imposter: everyone gets the secret word except the imposter. One clue each, then vote. Perfect while people are still arriving.
2. The Bomb: the screen shows a category, you say an answer and pass the phone before the hidden fuse goes off.
3. The Spy: everyone knows the location except the spy. Ask questions, find the spy before the spy finds out where you are.
4. Most Likely To: read the question, everyone points at once, and the person with the most fingers on them explains.
5. $20 Draft: the viral TikTok draft game. Bid from 20 coins on picks for your team and let the app draw who wins.

1. The Quiz: a live quiz where up to 16 players join with a 4 digit pin and answer on their own phones. Fastest right answer scores most.
2. Guess the Song: a real music clip plays and you pick the right title. Good as a warm up round.
3. The Timeline: hear a real song and place it in your timeline by year. Hitster style, and the 80s round always splits the room.
4. The Board: music jeopardy with real clips. Teams pick a category and a value, then race to name the song.

1. Jaipur: a two player trading card game. Sell goods at the right moment, keep your camels, and win two rounds out of three.
2. Patchwork: two players build a quilt from oddly shaped patches and pay with buttons. Calm, clever and over in half an hour.
3. 7 Wonders Duel: a two player civilization game over three ages. Win on points, or end it early with military or science.