This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
Does your family enjoy playing games together? Here are more than 20 of our favorite board games (and some fun card games thrown in)!
Favorite Board Games
Whenever I think of family night, one thing that comes to mind is all the happy memories we’ve made playing board games together.
Sometimes it’s hard to know if a game is going to be good or not, so I rely heavily on recommendations from friends and family.
To us, the best games are fairly easy to understand, and fun for everyone in the family to play. These are our current favorite family games.
Ticket to Ride
My mom gave us this game for Christmas one year. It looked interesting but it took us a long time to even open it! Somehow we thought it looked hard to play.
One day I was talking to a friend at church, and she recommended Ticket to Ride to me.
I said, “We have that game, but we’ve never played it!” She assured me that it wasn’t hard to understand, and that it was one of her grandchildren’s favorites.
On her recommendation, we made the time to learn it, and now Ticket to Ride is one of our favorites!
Since we have seven people in our family, in order for us all to play at once, we often play in teams. This is also a great game for two players.
Scrabble
Scrabble is probably my all-time favorite game. Possibly because it’s one of the only games that I often win! 🙂
We often end up playing this at Grandma’s house, which is where we were in the above photo.
Farkle
This is a simple but fun game that is one of my children’s favorites.
Sequence
We love playing this game and it’s currently one of our favorites.
Jenga
We first played this over 20 years ago, and we still love it! It’s perfect for kids who like fine- motor hand activities!
Yahtzee
This game of dice has been around a long time but continues to be a hit.
Uno
The card game Uno probably gets played more often than any other at our house.
Pit
My mom introduced us to this game last year and we’ve loved playing it ever since. It’s fast paced and can get a little noisy!
John Deere-Opoly
My youngest son loved this John Deere-opoly game! It’s similar to Monopoly but with a farming theme. And the little playing pieces are really cute!
Set
This is a unique but fun card game.
Bananagrams
Similar to Scrabble, Banagrams is faster to play and more portable. It’s perfect for taking on vacations or camping trips.
Bible Trivia
This is another game we’ve had for years. There’s a newer Bible trivia version available, but I haven’t seen it in person.
Blurt
Blurt is a fun word game where you blurt out words as quickly as you can.
Quiddler
Quiddler is a fun word game that really makes you think!
Pictionary
Pictionary is the classic family drawing game.
Guesstures
We recently discovered this game. Guesstures was an instant hit on our most recent family game night! So fun to play!
Telestrations
Telestrations is a drawing game is a variation on the classic “telephone” game. It can result in some hilarious play time!
Boggle
The Boggle word game has been a favorite for years.
Dutch Blitz
This one is a classic in the homeschool community. 🙂
Some friends taught our older girls how to play it years ago, and we were surprised by how addicting it can become!
Wildcraft
Wildcraft is another game we’ve had for several years. It was one of my younger kids’ favorites.
You can learn about herbal medicine while having fun at the same time!
Games for Younger Children
If you have younger children in your home, sometimes you need some board games that are just right for them!
I wrote a whole post about the best board games for 6-year-olds. Many of those games would work well for kids a little younger or older than six.
Here are a few of the games our little ones have loved.
Connect Four
Busy, Busy Airport
Hi-Ho Cherry-O
Trouble
What Are Your Favorite Games?
Now I’d love to know, what are your family’s favorite games?
We often give games as gifts, so we’re always looking for new recommendations!
Leave a comment with your favorite board games!
Looking for some fun games for couples for a date night? Check out the best two-player board games for couples!
There is an upgraded version of uno: uno attack. It involves a dealing machine that ‘spews out’ cards when you get the card that says to push it. It can give out many cards or none, and it is so much fun! There are 4 cards to write your own actions as well, which if penciled in, can be erased and re-done each time. We all love this game, although it is frustrating to be one card away and then get 13 cards at once!!!
That sounds fun, Carol! Thanks so much for sharing—I’ll have to check that one out!
I absolutely love playing monopoly especially at Christmas time there are a few games you mentioned that I hadn’t heard of so will check them out.
Our family really enjoys the Scrambled States of America game! It is kind of hard for the non-readers though. All together we enjoy Eye Found It. It is an I spy game with cooperation. When it is time to find hidden pictures the entire family helps and everyone moves in accordance to the total number of items found. So it encourages cooperation along with competition.
I haven’t heard of those! Thanks so much for the suggestions, Laura!
My son is grown up so we haven’t played board games in a while but we always liked Monopoly and Trivial Pursuit. I like your idea of playing in teams when there are lots of people and the ticket to ride game looks like fun! Thank you for sharing this post with us at Hearth and Soul. Tweeting.
Thanks, April!
Thanks for sharing these. I see a few I need to try!
Glad it was helpful, Sherry! 🙂
We love family game night at our house! Some of our favorites are Scrabble, Sponge-Bob opoly and the Sneaky Snacky Squirrel game! Visiting from Living Proverbs 31 link up
Thanks for sharing your favorites, Jennifer! I’ve never heard of the last two—I’ll have to check those out!
Our favorite game is still Uno … even now that our sons have grown up!
Have a nice weekend ,
Franca
Oh, how fun! I think Uno will always be a favorite of ours too, no matter how old our children are! 🙂
We received Ticket to Ride as a gift last Christmas and it’s our favorite! My husband even enjoys playing! There is a junior version of this game out and my 5 year old and newly turned 8 year old can play it on their own. I’d love to try another version of ticket to ride, such as Europe, or an expansion for the original. Other games you listed we like as well. Oh, and Qwixx is another fun game we play.
I forgot there were other versions of Ticket to Ride! The Europe one sounds fun. And thanks for mentioning Qwixx—I’ll have to check that out!
Love Dutch Blitz, Ticket to Ride, & BananaGrams!! Those games are such fun to play as a family. Have y’all ever tried Catan?
We actually have Catan, and we know so many families who love it! We’re having a hard time getting into it though. Are we missing something?! I feel we must be, since everyone else seems to love it so much! Maybe we just haven’t totally figured it out yet. 🙂
Everyone loved the simpler version. After we played the Settlers of Catan, I kept begging my family members to play it. We haven’t tried it enough to get the hang of it either because it is a little more time consuming and more difficult. But I’m still hopeful! 😉
I’m thinking we shouldn’t give up on Catan! We just need to try it again with a bit more focus, I think. 🙂
Moriah, I just had to let you know—we finally figured out Catan! 🙂 I was determined to learn how to play it, and we finally succeeded last night! So.much.fun!!! I think it will now be another of our favorites!
Yay!! So glad! 😀 I’ll have to try to recruit some of my family members to try it again. 😉