35 Halloween Party Games to Get You in the Spooky Spirit

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Halloween party games

Don’t let the Halloween fun stop after getting dressed up and going trick or treating. There are a ton of Halloween party games to play at your monster bashes to make them even more memorable (like Halloween bingo, for instance). And these games aren’t just for kids either. Adults will have their inner child brought to life with the festive, spooky, and overall fun Halloween games. While a few of them do require a little planning, many of these are super easy and won’t require you to complete any Halloween crafts beforehand. And if you’re still looking for the perfect theme or the best ways to put your party together, check out these Halloween party ideas that will make for a scary-good time.

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Halloween party game: The Hanging Apples

• Buy a bunch of red apples and just one green apple.
• Hang the apples on long strings from a tree branch (by twisting the strings, you disguise where the green apple is).
• For each child’s turn, blindfold him or her, untwist the apples, and set the youngster toward the branch.
• If he or she picks the green apple, he or she wins a prize (and the apple).
• Put up a new green apple and give another child a turn. Rinse and repeat. Get your whole crew dressed up this year with the best family Halloween costumes.

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Halloween party game: Pass the Pumpkin

• Have one fewer small pumpkins than players.
• Sit youngsters in a circle.
• Play Halloween music while they pass the pumpkins around the circle.
• When the music stops, the player without a pumpkin is out, but he gets to take a pumpkin with him.
• The rest of the players continue to play until there is a winner, who will get a prize. Once you’re done playing any of these Halloween games, it’s time to carve the pumpkins! Bring some laugher to the party by sharing these hilarious (and spooky) Halloween memes.

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Halloween party game: Balloon Sweep Relay Race

• Set up a course that zigzags across the yard (or playroom).
• Use colored rope tied to stakes (or chairs) to mark it.
• Divide the guests into two teams.
• Give each team a small broom and a blown-up balloon.
• Each member of a team must sweep the balloon around the course and back before the next member goes.
• The team to have every member finish the course first wins. See what everyone will be wearing this year by scouring the most popular Halloween costumes beforehand.

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Halloween party game: Pin the Tail on the Black Cat

• Hang up a large picture of a black Halloween cat without its tail.
• Give each guest a tail with a piece of sticky tape on its base.
• One by one, blindfold the guests, turn them around, and then set them off toward the cat picture and see where they put the tail.
• The guest who gets the tail closest to its rightful place wins.

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Halloween party game: Halloween Story Game

• Include the beginning of a ghost story in your party invitations and ask each child to come to the party with an ending to tell.
• Hear all the endings and let the guests vote for the funniest, the weirdest, and the spookiest. Learn about the origins of the spookiest Halloween creatures for inspiration.

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Halloween party game: Guess the Ghost

• Have one child leave the room to be “it.”
• Then let another child hide under a white sheet.
• The remaining children will change places with each other.
• Call in the missing child and see if he or she can name the ghost by figuring out who in the group is missing.
• The child who played the ghost then becomes “it” and leaves the room. These chilling and real ghost stories will make you believe in them if you don’t already.

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Halloween party game: Build a Scarecrow

• Divide the guests into teams.
• Give each team a pile of old clothes (including hats), pillowcases for heads, newspapers or hay for stuffing, ropes for tying, and markers for making faces.
• Give each team 15 or 20 minutes to make a scarecrow.
• Give prizes for the silliest and the scariest and hang them outside. These scary Halloween events that actually happened will spook you to your core.

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Halloween party game: Mummy Wrap

• Divide guests up into pairs; give each pair a roll of toilet paper.
• One team member will be the wrapper and the other will be the wrapped mummy.
• The first team to use up its roll wins.
• Or you can give each team two rolls of toilet paper and after the mummy is wrapped, he or she must wrap his partner.
• The first team to empty both rolls of toilet paper wins. Get the whole party laughing with these (candy) corny Halloween jokes.

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Halloween party game: Identify What You Feel

• Line up five opaque plastic dishes and cover them all with a black cloth.
• Let each guest stick a hand in each dish, under the cloth so that the contents can’t be seen, and try to guess what it really is.
• You can tell the guest that the first dish holds guts (the insides of a pumpkin) and see what he or she guesses.
• The second dish is said to hold brains (damp coarse sponge).
• The third is said to hold veins (cold, cooked spaghetti).
• The fourth is said to hold cut-off fingers (cocktail sausages).
• The fifth is to hold skin (pieces of a soft flour tortilla).
• The person who guesses the most actual content wins. This one could get a little messy, so make sure you know how to remove stains.

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Halloween party game: Apple Pass

• Divide guests into teams and line each team up.
• The first in line for each team is given an apple under his or her chin. Without using any hands, the apple must be passed to under the second team member’s chin and from that chin to the next until all the members of the team have held the apple.
• If the apple drops, it must start at the beginning again.
• The first team to successfully pass the apple down its row of members wins. Get the greatest of the great apples and find out the best place to pick apples in every state.

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Halloween party game: Doughnut Race

• Divide guests into teams.
• Hang as many doughnuts as guests from a tree limb or a clothesline from a string.
• Without using hands, each guest must catch and eat a doughnut.
• The first team to finish its doughnuts win.

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Halloween party game: Bobbing for Apples

• Fill a large tub with cold water and set it on the ground or the floor of a porch.
• Float some clean, stemmed apples in the tub and invite guests to try to catch an apple with their teeth—no hands allowed.
• Anyone who even tries bobbing for apples deserves a prize, but we understand if you only want to give prizes to those who manage to get one.
• To keep things safe, make sure to switch out the water and apples after one person is finished.

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Halloween party game: What Am I?

• Have the kids draw Halloween-themed pictures on a piece of paper and tape them each to a different guest’s back (without the guest seeing what it is).
• While others can only give yes or no answers, each guest must guess what he or she thinks is drawn on the paper on their back.

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Halloween party game: Spooky Bowling

• Decorate a few toilet paper rolls with circular black cutouts to mimic the face of a ghost.
• Use a small pumpkin to knock over the pins. Share some of these Halloween quotes at your next party to get everyone in the spooky spirit.

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Halloween party game: Walk the Spiderweb

• Use bright green painter’s tape to make a spiderweb on your floor.
• Place some plastic spiders in the white spaces of the web.
• Let the kids collect the spiders.
• The catch is that they must stay on the web and pick up all the spiders without falling over or touching the floor or carpet.

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Halloween party game: Pumpkin Tic Tac Toe

• Buy a few mini pumpkins in two different colors to use as X and O game pieces.
• Tie string around a side table to make the grid. It’s quick and easy to set up this game. Add some tricks to your party with these spooky Halloween riddles.

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Halloween party game: Scarecrow Scavenger Hunt

• Make a list of 12 different Halloween-inspired items.
• You can buy small, hideable toys like mini witches or black cats.
• Hide these in your house and ask the kids to find them throughout the party or for a set amount of time. Of course, offer the winner candy.

Halloween party game: Pumpkin Pick-Up

• Dump a bag of candy pumpkins on the table.
• The challenge is to pick up as many pumpkins with chopsticks as possible, in 60 seconds.

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Halloween party game: Ghost Potato Sack Race

• Take a classic kids’ game and make it into one of your new favorite Halloween games by simply adding ghost faces to white pillowcases.
• Let the kids run (or hop) this classic race with their ghostly companion.

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Halloween party game: Pumpkin Decorating Contest

• Set up a table for the kids to paint and decorate their own pumpkins.
• Have the kids vote on their favorite ones and hand out awards for the best design, the scariest design, and the funniest design. If you choose to carve, check out these pumpkin carving tips that are absolutely genius.

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Halloween party game: Witch Hat Toss

• Stagger a few large pumpkins and let kids take turns tossing witch hats on top!
• Have them play the best two out of three.

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Halloween party game: Candy Corn Catch

• You’ll need candy corn, a few Halloween buckets, and some string.
• Pair off the kids!
• One child will toss the candy corn into the bucket while the other will wear the bucket and try to catch the corn.

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Halloween party game: Tag, You’re a Zombie

• Start with one person as “it” or “the zombie.”
• Every time they tag someone else, that person also becomes a zombie.
• The last person standing who isn’t a zombie wins.

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Halloween party game: Tarantula Toss

• Buy some fake stretchy spiderwebs to spread in between a doorway.
• Have the kids toss plastic spiders!
• The first to stick their spider wins their choice of candy.

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Halloween party game: “Monster Mash” Freeze Dance

• It’s not Halloween if you don’t hear the “Monster Mash.” Let the kids play freeze dance to this classic song for a no-setup-necessary Halloween game. Even get the family dog dressed up with these dog Halloween costumes that are both hysterical and adorable.

Halloween party game: Halloween Truth or Dare

• Print out these clean, Halloween truth or dare questions from Play Party Plan.
• Split everyone up into teams.
• Have a team member choose truth or dare.
• They will have to either answer the question or perform the dare to earn a point.

Halloween party game: Find the Eyeball in the Haystack

• Get a large bucket (or you can even use an empty sand box) and fill it with hay.
• Hide a bunch of candy eyeballs in the hay and see how many the kids can find. This game is especially fun for younger children.

Halloween party game: Halloween Guess Who

• Write out common spooky characters on index cards before your guests arrive.
• Upon their arrival, tape a card on their back.
• They will have to guess what character is on their back by asking questions to the other party guests.
• Whoever guesses first gets a prize.

Halloween party game: Pass the Candy Corn

• Split the party up into teams and have each team line up next to each other.
• Each person will get a small bowl and spoon.
• The first person in the line gets a small amount of candy corn in their bowl.
• The object of the game is to move each piece of candy corn into the next person’s bowl using only the spoon. But the catch is that the spoon must be in your mouth. No hands allowed!
• The first team to move all their candy corn down the line wins.

Halloween party game: Halloween Candy Guessing Game

• Before your guests arrive, fill a clear jar with Halloween candy. Make sure to count them.
• Have each guest write their guess of how many pieces of candy they think are in the jar.
• Whoever comes closest, gets to bring the whole jar home.

Halloween party game: Halloween Movie Quotes

• For all the scary movie aficionados, write out a list of quotes from famous scary movies (or Halloween movies).
• You can either split everyone into teams or have each person fend for themselves.
• Read the quote and have everyone guess which movie the quote came from.
• Whoever earns the most points wins. Even better if you let that person pick one of these Halloween movies to watch after.

Halloween party game: Decoration Scavenger Hunt

• We probably don’t have to tell you to get some Halloween decorations for your Halloween party, but we are now giving you permission to go all out!
• Create a list of questions relating to your decorations such as “how many spiders are in the kitchen” or “what color hat is the skeleton by the front door wearing?”
• Your guests will be scrambling around the house to find all the answers.

Halloween party game: Bean Bag Toss

• This one requires a little preparation. Carve a few pumpkins before the party, but make sure they have giant holes for mouths.
• Pick up some bean bags.
• Have the player try to toss the bean bags into the jack-o-lantern’s mouth.
• Whoever gets the most in the hole wins.

Halloween party game: Pumpkin Checkers

• Set up a large checker board on one of your tables. You can tape down construction paper squares or draw the squares on a large poster board.
• Get a bunch of mini gourds in orange and white to use as checker pieces.
• People will be hovering around that table all night long!

Halloween party game: Pumpkin Relay Race

• Buy a bunch of orange balloons. These will be your pumpkins.
• Split everyone into teams.
• Have everyone on the team run across the room with a balloon (pumpkin) between their legs without popping it.
• Whichever team finishes first wins.

If you really want to get spooked after laughing over these Halloween party games, gather up the crew and head to one of the best haunted houses in America.