Games to play with friends
Here are 30 games to play with friends at home, sorted by what you have: nothing at all, a deck of cards or some paper, one phone, music, or enough people for two teams. Every game comes with the rules in one line, so you can start playing in the time it takes to read them.
Charades
Act out a film, song or show without a word while your team races to guess it.
Full rulesNo cards in the house? Switch that kind off and the deck only draws games you can play right now. The same 30 games are listed below with their rules.
Not sure what to play? Draw a card and let the deck decide. Switch off the kinds of game you can't play right now, and it only picks from the rest.
- Games
- 30
- Friends
- 2 to 20
- Sorted by
- What you have
30 fun games to play with friends
None of these need a board game or a shopping trip. The first group needs nothing but the people in the room, the rest need at most a deck of cards, a pen or a phone.
Games with no equipment at all
7- Charades: act out a film, song or show without a word while your team races to guess it.
- 21 Questions: one player thinks of something, the rest have 21 yes or no questions to work out what it is.
- Two Truths and a Lie: say three things about yourself, one of them made up. Everyone votes on which one is the lie.
- Would You Rather: read two impossible choices, everyone picks a side at the same time and defends it.
- Contact: one player gives the first letter of a secret word. The others hint at words with those letters, and when two of them say the same word at once, the next letter is revealed.
- Mafia: a narrator secretly makes a few players the mafia. At night the mafia choose a victim, by day everyone argues and votes out a suspect.
- Ghost: take turns adding one letter to a growing word. Whoever finishes a real word, or can't name the word they are building, loses a life.
Games with a deck of cards or paper
6- Spoons: pass cards around the circle and grab a spoon when you hold four of a kind. There is one spoon fewer than players, so someone always ends up empty handed.
- Kemps: pairs agree on a secret signal. Collect four of a kind and give the signal, and your partner has to shout Kemps before the others catch on.
- Cheat: play cards face down and say what they are. Call cheat on a liar and they pick up the pile, call it on an honest player and you do.
- Crazy Eights: match the suit or the number of the top card, eights are wild, and the first player with no cards left wins.
- Salad Bowl: everyone writes names on slips of paper. Teams guess the same slips three times: first described in words, then in one word, then acted out.
- Telephone Pictionary: write a sentence, the next player draws it, the next writes what the drawing shows. Unfold the paper at the end and watch the sentence fall apart.
Games you play on one phone
6- Imposter: everyone gets the secret word except the imposter. One clue each, then vote out whoever is faking it.
- The Spy: everyone knows the location except the spy. Ask each other questions until someone gives themselves away.
- The Bomb: the phone shows a category, you say an answer and pass it on before the hidden fuse runs out.
- Pandora's Box: everyone answers the same question anonymously, and the answers are read out without names.
- $20 Draft: the viral TikTok draft game. Everyone bids with 20 coins, and the app draws the result.
- Friendship quiz: one friend answers ten questions about themselves, the others guess, and the phone keeps score.
Music games
6- Guess the Song: a real music clip plays, and you pick the right song title before anyone else does.
- One Second: guess the song from a split second of it. Harder than it sounds, and a new round every day.
- The Timeline: listen to a real clip and place it on your timeline in the right year.
- The Board: music jeopardy for teams. Pick a square on the board and name the song from a real clip.
- Song Association: someone says a word, and the next player has ten seconds to sing a line of a song with that word in it.
- Finish the Lyric: sing the first line of a well known song and stop. The first player to sing the next line correctly scores.
Competitive team games
5- The Quiz: live trivia where everyone answers on their own phone at the same time, and the fastest correct answer scores most.
- Trivia night: teams of two to five, a host reads the questions, and the team with most right answers after the last round wins.
- Forbidden Words: describe the word on your slip to your team in one minute without saying the three most obvious words that go with it.
- Minute challenges: teams take turns at one minute tasks, like stacking ten cups into a pyramid or keeping a balloon in the air using only your heads.
- The Draft: take turns picking football players for your team, then watch the app simulate the matches.
Which game for how many friends
The number of people in the room decides more than anything else. Some games need a crowd to work, others fall apart once there are more than six of you.
| Friends | Best games | Why |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | 21 Questions, Crazy Eights, One Second, Ghost | Quick turns and nobody waits |
| 3 to 5 | Imposter, Contact, Song Association, Telephone Pictionary | Small enough that everyone talks every round |
| 6 to 10 | Mafia, Salad Bowl, The Spy, Charades, Spoons | Enough people to hide behind and enough suspects to vote on |
| 10 to 20 | The Quiz, trivia night, Kemps, Minute challenges | Teams keep a big group in one game |
How to plan a game night with friends
A good game night is mostly about rhythm: short games while people arrive, one big game in the middle, and something silly at the end.
- Warm up with a quick oneTwo Truths and a Lie or Would You Rather work while people are still taking their coats off. Anyone can join halfway.
- Pick one main gameChoose by group size from the table above. A trivia night, Mafia or Salad Bowl can carry an hour on its own.
- Make teams that mix peopleSplit up couples and best friends. It keeps the teams even and gets people talking who don't usually sit together.
- Change the energy every 30 minutesAfter a thinking game, play something loud. After a loud one, play something where people sit down.
- End on something funnyCharades or Telephone Pictionary are perfect last games, because they end in laughter instead of a winner and a loser.
The funniest games to play with friends
If the goal is laughing until someone cries, these five do it most reliably.
- Telephone Pictionary. Nobody can draw, and that is the point. Reading the chain out loud at the end is the best part of the night.
- Imposter. Watching someone bluff a clue for a word they have never heard is funny every single round.
- Salad Bowl. Round three, where you act out names nobody can act out, gets louder every time.
- Pandora's Box. Anonymous answers mean people say what they really think, and the table tries to guess who wrote what.
- Song Association. Ten seconds of panic singing, usually the wrong song, always confidently.
The game friends ask for again
In Dronk's Imposter, everyone gets the secret word except one player, who has to bluff their way through one clue each. Then the table votes. 3 to 20 players on one phone, with lots of categories to pick from.
Get Dronk free on iPhone
Questions people ask
What are fun games to play with friends at home?
Charades, Mafia, Salad Bowl, Two Truths and a Lie and Imposter are five of the best. None of them need a board game, and all of them work with four to ten friends.
What games can you play with friends with nothing?
21 Questions, Two Truths and a Lie, Contact, Ghost, Mafia, Would You Rather and Charades need nothing but the people in the room.
What is a good game to play with just two friends?
Try 21 Questions, Ghost or Crazy Eights. With a phone, One Second is a good two player music game, because you can compare scores on the same daily round.
What are funny games to play with friends?
Telephone Pictionary, Imposter, Salad Bowl, Pandora's Box and Song Association get the most laughs, because they depend on people getting things gloriously wrong.
What games can a big group of friends play together?
Mafia, Kemps, Salad Bowl and a trivia night work with ten or more. For up to 16 players on their own phones, The Quiz in the Dronk app runs a live round with a pin code.
Keep the night going
Updated