Party games for large groups
Games that get better the more people turn up. All 33 are free, play on a single phone that gets passed around, and need no download or account.
A big group is a different problem from a small one. Everyone has to have something to do, the rules have to survive being explained across a noisy room, and any game that needs each player to take a solo turn will die somewhere around person eleven. The games that work at fifteen people are the ones where most of the room is doing something at the same time.
These 33 games all handle groups that size and several of them actively need one. Mafia is the headline: it runs from five players to twenty, and the phone acts as narrator so nobody has to sit out and manage it. Charades, Taboo, Fishbowl and Draw It split the room into two teams, which is the cleanest way to give twenty people a job. Most Likely To has everybody point at once, and Heads Up has everybody shouting at once.
One phone is enough for all of it. For the team games it lives with whoever is describing; for Mafia it goes round for the night phase and then sits with the narrator; for the voting games it passes hand to hand. Nobody has to install anything, join a room or scan a code — which is the difference between starting a game and spending ten minutes not starting a game.
All 33 games in this collection
Imposter
Imposter is a social deduction word game for 3–15 players where everyone secretly receives the same word except one or more imposters, and the group gives one-word clues in turn until they can vote out who is faking it.
Mafia
Mafia is a social deduction game for 5–20 players in which a hidden minority of Mafia secretly eliminate one player each night while the Town argues each day over who to vote out, and the two sides race to eliminate each other entirely.
Secret Missions
Secret Missions is a party game for 3–20 players in which each person is privately dealt small social tasks to carry out during a normal evening, scoring points for completing them and for catching other people in the act.
Heads Up
Heads Up is a fast-paced guessing game for 2–20 players where one player holds a phone against their forehead showing a word they cannot see, their friends shout clues, and the holder tilts the phone down to score or up to pass before the timer runs out.
Charades
Charades is a team acting game for 4–20 players in which one player silently acts out a word or phrase — no speaking, mouthing, or pointing at objects — while their teammates try to guess it before a timer expires.
Taboo
Taboo is a team word game for 4–20 players in which a clue-giver describes a target word to their teammates without using that word or any of five closely related forbidden words listed on the card.
Fishbowl
Fishbowl is a team party game for 4–20 players in which one bowl of names is played through three consecutive rounds — open description, then a single word, then silent charades — with the same names reappearing every round and the team that guesses the most winning.
Draw It
Draw It is a team drawing game for 4–20 players in which one player draws a secret prompt on a phone screen while their own team shouts guesses against a timer, scoring more for harder prompts and for guesses that land in the first half of the clock.
Word Scramble
Word Scramble is a pass-and-play word game in which each player is shown the letters of a hidden word in a jumbled order and has a fixed number of seconds to tap them back into the right sequence.
Spelling Bee
Spelling Bee is a pass-and-play word game in which one player reads a word aloud from the phone — with its definition and an example sentence available on request — and another player spells it out loud, with a wrong spelling costing them either the round or their place in the game.
Trivia Royale
Trivia Royale is a multiple-choice quiz game for 1–20 players in which each player or team has 20 seconds to answer a four-option question, earning 100 points per correct answer and a 50-point bonus while on a streak of three or more.
Riddle Rush
Riddle Rush is a pass-and-play riddle game for 2 to 20 players in which one phone shows a riddle to the whole room, a hint is available for the price of a point, and the phone-holder awards the point to whoever solves it first.
Quick Maths
Quick Maths is a pass-and-play mental arithmetic game for 2–20 players in which each player answers timed questions on the phone’s own number pad, scoring 10 points a correct answer plus a bonus for every third one in a row.
Emoji Decoder
Emoji Decoder is a pass-and-play guessing game for 2 to 20 players in which the phone shows a short string of emoji that spells out a film, song, place or phrase, and players shout the answer before anyone takes the hint.
Mystery Stories
Mystery Stories is a lateral-thinking party game in which one player reads out a strange scenario and privately holds the solution, while everyone else reconstructs what happened by asking questions that can only be answered yes, no, or irrelevant.
Guesstimate
Guesstimate is a party game for 2–20 players in which everyone privately guesses the numeric answer to a question like "how tall is Mount Everest?", and the closest guess to the true value scores the points.
Odd One Out
Odd One Out is a quick-fire puzzle game in which four items appear on screen, three of them share a hidden category, and players race to spot the one that does not belong.
Fact or Fiction
Fact or Fiction is a party game for 2–20 players in which a claim is read out, everyone votes on whether it is genuinely true or completely made up, and the answer is revealed with the real story behind it.
Higher or Lower
Higher or Lower is a comparison game for 2–20 players in which two things from the same category are shown, one with its real statistic and one hidden, and players call whether the hidden number is higher or lower than the one they can see.
Bad Movie Plots
Bad Movie Plots is a pass-and-play guessing game for 2 to 20 players in which a famous film is described as badly and as literally as possible, in the style of a one-star review, and players race to name it.
20 Questions
20 Questions is a deduction game in which one player secretly thinks of a person, place or thing and everyone else has twenty yes-or-no questions to work out what it is.
Would You Rather
Would You Rather is a discussion game for 2–20 players in which the group is presented with two difficult options, everyone votes for one, and the split is revealed so the minority has to defend their choice.
Never Have I Ever
Never Have I Ever is a confession game for 3–20 players in which a statement beginning "Never have I ever…" is read aloud and anyone who has done it loses a life, with the last player still holding lives declared the winner.
Truth or Dare
Truth or Dare is a party game for 2–20 players in which a spinner selects a player who must choose between answering a personal question truthfully or performing a dare, with points awarded for following through and deducted for backing out.
Most Likely To
Most Likely To is a party game for 3–20 players in which a "Most likely to…" statement is read aloud, everyone points at one player simultaneously on a countdown, and each finger received is worth a point.
Paranoia
Paranoia is a whispering party game for 4–16 players in which one player secretly whispers a question to their neighbour, who must answer out loud with a name, and a coin flip then decides whether the question is revealed to everyone or stays secret forever.
Spectrum
Spectrum is a Wavelength-style team game for 4–16 players in which one player secretly sees where a target sits on a sliding scale between two opposites and must give a single-phrase clue that guides their team to dial in the exact position.
This or That
This or That is a quickfire party game for 2–20 players in which two options are put side by side — coffee or tea, early bird or night owl — and everyone commits to one, with no third option and no explaining.
Debate Club
Debate Club is a party game for 3–20 players in which two people are assigned opposite sides of a deliberately silly motion by a coin toss, each delivers a timed speech, and everyone else votes on who argued it better.
Story Chain
Story Chain is a collaborative storytelling game for 3–20 players in which each player adds one line to a shared story, alternating between lines that begin "Fortunately" and lines that begin "Unfortunately".
5 Second Rule
5 Second Rule is a fast-thinking party game for 2–20 players in which a player must name three examples from a given category out loud within five seconds, with a failed attempt passing to the next player as a steal opportunity.
Tongue Twisters
Tongue Twisters is a pass-and-play party game for 2–20 players in which each person must say a randomly dealt tongue twister out loud three times, fast, inside a 10 to 20 second timer, and the rest of the group judges whether they nailed it, stumbled, or fell apart entirely.
Minute Madness
Minute Madness is a pass-and-play party game for 2–20 players in which the group is dealt a physical challenge built from ordinary household objects, such as stacking cups or moving cookies across your face without hands, and has exactly sixty seconds to complete it while the phone runs the clock.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best game for 15 or 20 people?
Mafia, by a distance. It is designed to scale, the arguments get better with more innocent players in the room, and the narrator console means the person running it does not need to know the rules. Charades and Taboo are the best fallbacks if you want teams rather than roles.
How do teams work with one phone?
The phone is the deck and the timekeeper, not a controller. It goes to whoever is up, deals their card, runs their countdown and records the score, then tells you which team is next. Everybody else is watching the person holding it, which is the point.
Will everyone get a turn?
In the team games, yes — the phone rotates through the roster it was given and does not skip. Mafia is the exception by design: players are eliminated, but eliminated players still watch and still argue, which is half the entertainment.
Is it loud enough for a party?
Heads Up, Charades, Taboo, Most Likely To and 5 Second Rule are all games where the room shouts. If you need something quieter for the same crowd, Spectrum and Would You Rather work at any volume.
Do we need to split into teams in advance?
No. Enter everyone’s names once in Settings and the team games divide the roster for you, keeping the split even and remembering it between rounds.