Party Games From Around the World (and How to Play Them on One Phone)

Most party games are older than they look, and most of them were invented more than once. The same idea shows up in a kitchen in Copenhagen, a classroom in Buenos Aires and a dorm room in Ohio, each time with a different name. Here are some of our favorites from around the world, where they come from, and how to play each one with a single phone.

Denmark: pakkeleg, the present game

At Christmas, many Danish families and offices play pakkeleg. Everyone brings a small wrapped gift. In the first round, players take turns rolling a die, and a six lets you take a gift from the pile. In the second round, a timer starts that nobody can see, and a six lets you take a gift from anyone. When the timer rings, you keep what you're holding.

It's loud, fast and completely unfair in the best way. Play it: the Dice Gift Game rolls the die and runs the secret timer for you. For more ways to swap presents, see our guide to gift exchange games.

Everywhere: the letter-and-categories game

Pick a letter. Now write a name, a city, an animal and a thing that start with it, before anyone else finishes. In Germany it's Stadt, Land, Fluss (city, country, river). In Israel it's Eretz Ir (country, city). In Turkey it's İsim Şehir. Across Latin America it goes by Basta, Stop or Tutti Frutti, and in much of the English-speaking world it's Name, Place, Animal, Thing.

The rules barely change from country to country, which tells you how good the idea is. Play it: Name, Place, Animal, Thing spins the letter, runs the clock and keeps the score.

Russia: Mafia

Mafia is usually traced back to a psychology class at Moscow State University in the 1980s, where it was used to explore how an informed minority can outplay an uninformed majority. It spread through schools and summer camps, picked up a werewolf version along the way, and is now played everywhere from college dorms to company retreats.

The hard part has always been the moderator, who has to sit out and run the night. Play it: in Mafia, the phone narrates every night out loud, so everyone gets to play. Switch the theme to Werewolf for a spooky night.

France: charades

The word charade comes from France, where it first meant a spoken riddle: a word broken into syllables, with a clue for each part. Acting the clues out came later, and by the 1800s it was a favorite parlor game in Britain. Today it's the default party game almost everywhere.

Play it: Charades deals the prompts and keeps time. For a crowd of grown-ups, try the charades ideas for adults.

United Kingdom: Kim's game

Twenty objects on a tray, one minute to memorize them, then the tray is covered and one object disappears. What's missing? The game takes its name from Rudyard Kipling's 1901 novel Kim, where a young spy trains his memory this way, and Scout groups have played it ever since.

Play it: What's Missing? shows the items, hides them, and takes one away. It's a favorite with kids and classrooms.

United States: Paranoia and Fishbowl

Some party games don't come from a book or a box. They pass from one sleepover to the next. Paranoia is one of them: a player reads a secret question, says a name out loud, and a coin flip decides whether everyone gets to hear what was asked. It took off again on TikTok, often as a drinking game. Ours is clean.

Fishbowl, also called the salad bowl game or Celebrity, is another. Everyone writes words on slips of paper, and teams play three rounds with the same words: describe it, one word only, then act it out.

Play them: Paranoia shows the question to one player only and flips the coin for everyone. Fishbowl fills the bowl and runs all three rounds.

China: pass the flower

In jī gǔ chuán huā, "beat the drum, pass the flower", a flower moves around the circle while someone beats a drum. When the drumming stops, whoever is holding the flower has to tell a joke, sing or answer a question. Children in many countries play the same thing as hot potato.

Play it: Hot Potato hides the timer inside the phone. Answer the prompt, pass it on, and hope it doesn't go off in your hands.

TikTok: say the same word

Two players count to three and each say a random word. Then, on the next count, both try to say a word that links the two. Keep going until you say the same word at the same time. The game spread across TikTok in the last couple of years, but it's built on an improv warm-up called Convergence.

Play it: Say the Same Word counts you in, deals starting words and turns your chain into something you can share.

Make it a world game night

You can turn these into a themed evening without any planning:

1. Open with Say the Same Word in pairs while people arrive.
2. Play two rounds of Name, Place, Animal, Thing, using the name your family grew up with.
3. Play Mafia or Paranoia once everyone is settled.
4. In December, end with the Dice Gift Game and a pile of small presents.

The game night planner keeps one scoreboard across all of them, and every game runs in the browser on one phone, with no app to download and no account to make.