Fun Challenges for Adults: 60 ideas for parties and family game night

Grown-ups need to play too, but most challenges online are about making someone look silly. Here are 60 challenges for parties, dinners and family nights: some are creative, some get you out of your chair, and others bring out the stories. Everyone can join in, and nobody gets laughed at.

Play the 60 cards

The games

Draw and do

4-20 players, As long as you like, Adults

Put the phone in the middle of the table.
Whoever's turn it is draws a card and does the challenge right away.
The table claps, and the phone moves on to the left.

Tip: Everyone can swap out one challenge during the evening.

Challenge relay

8-30 players, 20-30 min, Adults

Split the group into teams of four to six.
The teams take turns drawing a card, and each team chooses who does the challenge.
A judge gives up to three points for effort, not for the result.
The team with the most points after ten cards picks dessert or the music.

Secret missions

6-30 players, All evening, Adults

When they arrive, each guest draws a challenge and keeps it secret.
During the evening, they have to complete it without anyone noticing.
Over dessert, everyone guesses who had which mission.

Tip: Choose challenges that can be done quietly, like getting the table to name ten countries.

Beat the clock

4-15 players, 15 min, Adults

Set a timer for 30 seconds.
Whoever's turn it is has to finish the challenge before the timer goes off.
If you make it, you choose who gets the next challenge.

Swap or do

4-12 players, 15 min, Adults

Whoever's turn it is draws a card.
You can do the challenge or hand it to someone else.
If you're handed a challenge, you have to do it, but you get to give the next one away.

Family night

3-10 players, 20 min, Ages 10+

Shuffle the cards and let the grown-ups and older kids take turns.
The youngest get to be judges and hand out stars.
Whoever gets the most stars picks the movie for the night.

Tip: For little kids, the dares from truth or dare are a better fit.

The cards

Challenge:Name ten countries in 20 seconds without repeating yourself.
Challenge:Give a short speech about the host as if they had just won an award.
Challenge:Give a short radio interview with yourself about your life ten years from now.
Challenge:Tell us how you met the host, but hide three lies in the story. The table has to find them.
Challenge:Draw a map of the neighborhood you grew up in on a napkin, and show everyone the way to your favorite spot.
Challenge:Balance a book on your head while you stand up and sit back down.
Challenge:Make a new rule everyone has to follow for the rest of the evening, like saying "excuse me, Your Honor" before reaching for the salt.
Challenge:Sing a well-known pop song so it sounds like a hymn.
Challenge:Tell the plot of your favorite movie in 30 seconds so the table can guess it without the title.
Challenge:Name a song from every decade since the 1960s without hesitating.
Challenge:Have the table give you three random words, then give a one-minute speech that uses all three.
Challenge:Show a photo from your phone that you pick yourself, and tell the story behind it.
Challenge:Make the sounds of a place, like a train station or a swimming pool, and let the table guess where you are.
Challenge:Teach the table a word in a language you know, and get everyone to pronounce it right.
Challenge:Fold a napkin into an animal, and let the others guess which one.
Challenge:Find three things you have in common with the person across from you in one minute.
Challenge:Tell a story from your childhood. The table can shout "stop" and swap out one word along the way.
Challenge:Lead the table in a drum solo with your fingers on the edge of the table.
Challenge:Make the sound of something from the 1990s, and let the table guess what it is.
Challenge:Write a four-line poem for the host and read it out loud.
Challenge:Walk across the living room with an orange under your chin without dropping it.
Challenge:Give the person on your left a nickname that describes their best side, and explain why.
Challenge:Act out a job without words, and let the table guess which one.
Challenge:Choose the music for the next half hour, but every song needs a color in the title.
Challenge:Describe your first concert as if you were a newspaper music critic.
Challenge:Find five things in the room that together say something about you, and explain them.
Challenge:Make up a dance move that everyone at the table has to learn and do together.
Challenge:Find the oldest thing you're wearing and tell us its story.
Challenge:Name as many kinds of cookies as you can in 20 seconds.
Challenge:Act out your morning routine without a sound, and let the table guess what you're doing.
Challenge:Do a short news broadcast about the evening so far.
Challenge:Write your name in the air with your elbow, and let the table guess it.
Challenge:Give a one-minute thank-you speech to something nobody ever thanks, like the dishwasher.
Challenge:Describe a place you've been in one sentence so the table can guess where it was.
Challenge:Come up with a new name for the party, and a short slogan to go with it.
Challenge:Teach the table a game from your old school playground, and play one round.
Challenge:Rhyme four lines about dessert and perform them like a rapper.
Challenge:Spell the first name of everyone at the table backward.
Challenge:Give a speech about what you'd do if you ran the country for one day.
Challenge:Build a bridge between two cups out of things on the table, and see if it can hold a teaspoon.
Challenge:Tell the story of a famous movie as a comic strip on three napkins.
Challenge:Recreate a famous movie scene with the person on your right.
Challenge:Interview the person on your left as if they were famous and the table were the press.
Challenge:Name five things you're grateful for today in ten seconds.
Challenge:Draw the host's home from memory with the hand you don't write with.
Challenge:Come up with a sound for each dish served tonight.
Challenge:Invent a new greeting that everyone has to use when they come back to the table.
Challenge:Make up a story about how the decorations on the table ended up here.
Challenge:Whistle the jingle from a commercial, and let the table guess what it's for.
Challenge:Describe the best meal you've ever had so vividly that the table gets hungry again.
Challenge:Invent a game right here and now, explain the rules and play one round.
Challenge:Write a three-sentence review of the evening so far, and give it a star rating.
Challenge:Pretend you're a magician and do a trick with a teaspoon.
Challenge:Tell us about the worst advice you've ever gotten, and whether you followed it.
Challenge:Act out a short scene without words about how you got out the door this morning.
Challenge:Make up a theme song for the host's home, and get the table to hum along.
Challenge:Explain how to make your favorite dish as if you were on a TV cooking show.
Challenge:Say a word. The rest of the table takes turns finding a word that rhymes until someone gets stuck.
Challenge:Make a little quiz with three questions about yourself for the table.
Challenge:Tell us about a small win from this week, and get the table to applaud.

60 cards.

Questions and answers

Are these challenges adults only?

No. "For adults" means they suit a grown-up crowd: parties, dinners and family game night. There's nothing racy, and nobody has to do anything physical they're not comfortable with.

Which challenges work for a party with lots of guests?

The challenge relay and the secret missions work with up to 30 guests. The other games work best at a single table.

Do the challenges need props?

Hardly any. A few use a napkin, a teaspoon, an orange or a phone, but those are usually on the table already.

How do you make sure nobody feels laughed at?

Clap after every challenge, give points for effort and let everyone swap out one challenge. These challenges are written so you laugh together, not at each other.