Party Games for Big Groups and Family Nights

What counts as a party game

A party game is built for a crowd. The rules fit on one card or one page, turns are short or everyone plays at once, and the fun comes from the people at the table more than the pieces in the box. Most party games are about talking: guessing, describing, bluffing, voting or drawing badly on purpose.

That covers a wide shelf. On this page you'll find social deduction games, where someone at the table is secretly working against you. Prediction games, where you try to think like the group. Drawing games, trivia, word games and a couple of murder mysteries that take a whole evening. The table above lists the party games we track on Amazon US with the biggest stated player count first, because head count is the first question at any party.

Adults-only party games, like the ones listed for 17+, are on their own pages, such as Cards Against Humanity. Most of what's here is for families, teens or mixed crowds, with the age on each listing.

Here's the short version of what separates them, from the listings:

• Players: from 1 up to 25 on the box
• Age: from 6+ to 18+
• Play time: 15 to 150 minutes, where a listing gives one
• Kind of game: social deduction, prediction, drawing, trivia, word guessing, music
• Extras: an app or device on two, expansion packs on three

What to look at before you buy a party game

Minimum players, not just the maximum

The maximum gets the attention, and it's real. In our data, the Werewolf Extreme box from Bezier Games lists 3 to 25 players. Herd Mentality lists 4 to 20, and so do Funko's two Party Hack games, Heist Night and Summer Camp. Goliath's Bunco Dice Party Game lists 2 to 16.

The minimum is the number that ruins game night. The Party Hack games need at least 6. The Resistance: Avalon and the Plaid Hat Games Crossfire need 5. Murder Mystery Party: A Taste for Wine lists 6 to 8. Telestrations, Herd Mentality, Sounds Fishy and the Codenames packs start at 4. A game with a minimum of 6 is a shelf ornament on a night when four people show up.

My one opinion for this page: buy for your usual group size, not the biggest number on the box. A game that seats 25 needs 25 people to say yes to the same Saturday. I've never seen a group text pull that off.

Lucho's take: "Twenty players is forty opinions about the rules. Pick the game with the shortest rulebook."

Age on the box

Party game ages spread wide. Twangled from MindWare and Spin Master's Beat the Parents list 6+. Disc Cover lists 7+. A long list starts at 8+: Werewolf Extreme, Sounds Fishy, Rough Shapes, Hues and Cues, Match Me If You Can, the Sushi Go Party Chef's Special and Bunco Party in a Box. Apples to Apples Junior lists 9+.

Then the teen boxes. Herd Mentality, both Telestrations second editions, Who's Best? and the Codenames packs list 10+. Apples to Apples Party Game and Decrypto list 12+. The Party Hack games, Avalon, Murder Phone and the POP Scream Party Game list 13+. The Chameleon, Clue Conspiracy, Sounds Like You, Hard to Get, Goliath's Bunco and Schitt's Creek Love that Journey list 14+. Murder Mystery Party: A Taste for Wine lists 18+.

A few listings leave the age out, like Do You Know Your Peeps?, Detective Club and That's Not A Hat. A dash in the table means we don't know, not that it suits everyone. This site doesn't suggest a game for a child younger than the age on its listing.

Play time

Most party game listings don't give a time, and the ones that do run short. The Chameleon, That's Not A Hat and the Codenames packs list 15 minutes. Love that Journey and POP Scream list 20. Detective Club lists 30 to 45, Clue Conspiracy lists 45, and Werewolf Extreme lists 30 to 60.

Two listings sit far outside that: Lucky Egg's MMC Area 51 and MMC Times Square each list 150 minutes. That's not a game you play between dinner and dessert. That's the plan for the evening.

The publisher's page for Herd Mentality says about 20 minutes, with its FAQ allowing 20 to 30. When a listing gives no time, plan from the kind of game: a round-based guessing game ends whenever you stop, a mystery ends when the case is solved.

Kind of game

Our data tags each game with a kind, from the listing:

• Social deduction: hidden roles and votes. Werewolf Extreme, The Resistance: Avalon, The Chameleon, Clue Conspiracy, Murder Phone, Detective Club, Crossfire.
• Prediction or consensus: guess what the group will say. Herd Mentality, Do You Know Your Peeps?, Sounds Like You, Who's Best?, Love that Journey.
• Drawing: Telestrations, Rough Shapes.
• Trivia: Sounds Fishy, Beat the Parents.
• Word guessing: Decrypto, Hard to Get.
• Music: Disc Cover.

Some listings don't name a kind, so the table leaves it blank. Pick the kind first. A table that hates lying won't enjoy social deduction, no matter how good the box looks.

Prompt and card counts

A few listings give a count, and it tells you how long before the cards start repeating. Both Telestrations second editions list 2,000+ prompts. Who's Best? lists 80 person cards, 80 activity cards and 50 write-in cards. That's Not A Hat lists 110 cards. The two MMC cases count something else: 47 and 40 pieces of evidence.

A bigger count isn't a better game. It just means more rounds before your regulars have seen everything. If you host the same crowd every month, that number matters more than it looks. If you host a different crowd every time, almost any count will do, because the cards are new to everyone at the table.

Write-in cards, like the 50 in Who's Best?, are a quiet bonus. They let you add prompts about your own crowd: the friend who's always late, the cousin who brings the same dish every year. That's where a party game stops being generic.

Expansions and editions

Three listings in our data are expansions: the Codenames Sci-Fi, Cute Critters and Fairy Tales Expansion Packs from Czech Games Edition. Each lists 4 to 8 players, 10+ and 15 minutes. An expansion needs the base game, so check your shelf first. Our Codenames page covers the base boxes.

Editions are different. They're complete games with a twist: Telestrations comes in an 8-Player and a 12-Player 2nd Edition, Herd Mentality has a Travel edition for 2 to 8, Apples to Apples has a Junior edition and Hues and Cues has a Multilingual listing.

Devices and electronics

Disc Cover from Blue Orange Games is listed as needing an app or device. Spin Master's Murder Phone is listed as electronic. Everything else on this page plays with cards, pencils, boards or dice. If your crowd keeps phones in a basket during game night, those two aren't for you.

Kinds of party games, and when to pick which

Social deduction games

Some players have a secret role, and the table argues its way to the truth. These are loud, they reward a poker face, and most start at 13 or 14 on the listing. Pick them for a crowd that enjoys a friendly accusation. Werewolf Extreme is the biggest in our data at up to 25, and Avalon needs at least 5. Our social deduction games page goes deeper.

Prediction and consensus games

Everyone answers the same question and tries to match the group, or to guess one person's answer. Big Potato's page for Herd Mentality says it plainly: answers matching the majority win a cow token, and the one player left out gets the Pink Cow, which blocks a win until someone else is the odd one out. First to eight cows wins. These are easy to teach, and nobody has to know any trivia.

Drawing games

Telestrations and Rough Shapes are the two listings tagged as drawing games. Pick these when your crowd laughs at bad art, including their own. Telestrations and Pictionary have their own pages.

Trivia and word games

Sounds Fishy and Beat the Parents are tagged trivia; Decrypto and Hard to Get are word guessing. Beat the Parents lists 6+ and splits a family down the obvious line. Decrypto lists 12+ and suits a table that likes codes. Our trivia games page has more.

Murder mystery nights

Murder Mystery Party: A Taste for Wine (18+, 6 to 8 players) and the two MMC cases (1 to 10 players, 150 minutes) are the long-form end of the shelf. Plan them like a dinner, not like a round of cards. See murder mystery games.

Dice parties

Bunco is a dice game that's usually played as a party. Goliath's box lists 2 to 16 and 14+, and University Games' Bunco Party in a Box lists 2 to 12 and 8+. Our Bunco page covers how it runs.

Who should skip party games

Skip party games if your group is two or three people most nights. Almost every box here is built for four or more, and many need five or six to work at all. A two-player card game or a strategy game will get more use.

Skip social deduction if anyone at your table hates being lied to, even in a game. Skip drawing and acting games for people who freeze when everyone is watching. And skip any game for a player younger than its listed age. The 13+ and 14+ labels on the social deduction boxes are there for a reason, and Murder Mystery Party: A Taste for Wine is listed 18+.

Related party game pages

• Codenames: the base game for the three expansion packs here
• Hues and Cues: color guessing for 3 to 10
• The Chameleon: a 15-minute bluffing game
• Apples to Apples: the Junior and Party editions
• Charades and Catch Phrase: no-reading guessing games

Brands in the table include Spin Master, Blue Orange Games, Czech Games Edition, Funko, MindWare, Ravensburger, Mattel, Hasbro and Gamewright.

Read the bottom number on the box. That's the party you need.