Everyone should know how to play pen and paper games! They make great icebreakers, waiting games, quick boredom busters, and fun activities for gatherings with friends or family.
And best of all? All your need is a pen or pencil and paper to play!
Fun pen and paper games come in several types. There are drawing games for one or more players, two player games of strategy and logic, of which the most well-known is tic-tac-toe (a.k.a. noughts and crosses), and paper games that can be played with two or more players. So whatever situation you find yourself it, there is a pen and paper game for every occasion!
Single Player Pen and Paper Games
Most of these pen or pencil and paper games are suitable for more than one player as well! Children can collaborate on the activity with another person, or they can play them side by side.
Blind Drawing. Grab a pencil and paper, take a look around you and pick one object. Close your eyes and try to draw it without picking up your pencil!
Word Flip. Click here to read the full instructions for the funny flips game. This is a fun pen and paper game to practice grammar skills and make you laugh. When you're done, pass the game off to another person if possible and have them put together sentences with your creation.
Drawing Game. Based on the game exquisite corpse, this is a flip picture game. While it can be played by just one person, getting another artist into the action to alternate drawing the body parts will increase the fun. Watch the video below to see how it is done.
Two Players
These pen and paper games require two players. Some of the games require that players have pens of different colors.
Dots and Boxes. You can't go wrong with this classic pencil and paper game! You can use graph paper, but it's not necessary; simply plot out dots in an array. Watch the video below to see how to play!
Hangman. This game needs no explanation, but I'll give it to you anyway. One person thinks of a word and draws dashes along a paper to represent each letter in the word. Above the dashes he draws platform and stand. The other person guesses one letter at a time. If the letter is in the word, the first person fills in the blank(s). If not, the incorrect letter is written below and the first person draws one body part at a time. If the person guesses the word before the body is completed (head, torso, 2 arms, 2 legs), he wins, if not -- well, he loses.
Apple Tree. This is a less-macabre version of the old favorite, Hangman. One person thinks of a word and draws dashes along a paper to represent each letter in the word. Above the dashes he draws a tree with 7 apples. The other person guesses one letter at a time. If the letter is in the word, the first person fills in the blank(s). If not, the incorrect letter is written inside one of the apples. If the person guesses the word before all the apples are filled, he wins, if not -- well, he loses.
MORE: 8 Variations on Tic-Tac-Toe
Bridges. Begin by drawing an abstract shape and dividing it into sections, 30-50 sections is ideal. (see photo below) Taking turns and using different colors, players build bridges by starting in one section, crossing a second, and ending in a third section. Players may not start, cross or end in a section that has previously been used. Players alternate building bridges until no bridges can no longer be built. The last player to build a bridge wins.
Nim. Nim is a very old game that is usually played with stones or tokens. But it's also a game that can be played with pen and paper. Draw 1, 3, 5, and 7 marks in the shape of a pyramid as shown in the illustration. The objective is to force your opponent to cross out the last remaining mark. Players alternate turns crossing out as many marks as they wish on each turn. However, they can only cross out marks on one line per turn.
I have a variation of a Nim subtraction-type game here, or watch the video below:
Sim. Click here to read the full Sim instructions. Draw six dots as the vertices of a hexagon. Players alternate drawing lines from dot to dot in their own color. The first person who is forced to draw a triangle formed from their own color and three of the vertices loses.
Lasso. Draw a grid of dots on paper, as many or as few as you want. You can experiment to see how many dots you prefer. Taking turns players start at one dot, draw a line to any other dot and circle it. Lines must stay within the confines of the grid. You may only circle a dot that has not yet been used and your line may not bisect any other line. You may start on a dot that has already been used as a starting point. When there are no available moves left, the last person to draw a lasso wins.
Tandem Drawing. This is a very enjoyable, low-stress way to connect with your child. Watch the video to see how it's done!
Two or More Players
These pen and paper games work well when you have more than two players. Potentially, you could try playing Bridges and Lasso (see above) as three person games.
Unscramble. Write a list of 10 words, but instead of spelling them correctly, mix up the letters and challenge your opponent(s) to unscramble them. To make it a little more fun, select all words from a single category. For example: kcae, kieooc, epi, ssertde, eci mreac become cake, cookie, pie, dessert, ice cream. The first player to unscramble all the words wins.
Words Within A Word. Write out a long word on a piece of paper or a white board if you have one. Set a timer for 3-5 minutes and everyone tries to find as many smaller words as they can using only the letters in the designated word. (See photo below for an example.)
What pen and paper games will you play today?
More games here:
Leslie Guhl says
Wonderful ideas! Thank you for compiling them.
Sam L says
I cant play spelling game with my kid she cant spell from a leaning problem, and most of these you need 2 or more players or need to spell!! Next time think of game for all people. Not to sound rude though i thought the games you have seen fun and easy!! I just wish there were more games for people like my son.
Amanda Walkers says
Is your kid a girl or boy because you said "she cant spell from a leaning problem" and then you said " I just wish there were more games for people like my son."
Teacher says
I think the person was just complaining. There was only one game that involved spelling, AND that would be a good one to practice that skill. ;D
Casey Capella says
There are lots of options that don't involve spelling. My sister was paralyzed. Does that mean these games should not be available because she was unable to hold a pen to put to paper? No, accommodating everyone is a perfect world scenario, but in a world with different abilities, someone is bound to be excluded. Take advantage of the ones you can play and accept that others may enjoy the rest, even though you can not.
Sophia says
Thanks for these pen and paper games, we love it! For short, we call them PP games.
Mrs. Clark says
I am a virtual teacher for a large inner city urban district. I am always encouraging my students to get off the computer and these games will help! I always tell them to go look outside at the weather. Or go see if the sun is shining? They spend too much time just sitting and getting. So we do a lot of brain breaks and movement breaks.
Thank you for putting these together! I appreciate you and your hard work.
Erica says
So glad you found the games useful!
S. says
I love these games!!!!!
Thank you for sharing!
Anuradha Joshi says
Thank you so much for these games... I'll definitely play this with my child...
R.Rose says
very nice! I was playing the blind drawing game a lot and I was a lot of fun!
R.Rose says
I was Having*
Colin says
Thank you for sharing all this games! 💖 So kind of you!
Rick Nordal says
I have created a paper folding game called the 'Origami Snowflake Game'. Game rules:
It is a game of strategy and fast paper folding. Enjoy!
Rick Nordal says
The Trxilt game can be played with pencil and paper. The game combines some elements of Dots and Boxes.
Safitri Ristagitania athar says
hi, I cant see any videos or link to it. Can you help,please?
Norma Wiley says
I have enjoyed looking at your games. As a family we often play a game on a paper you list - boy -girl -fish -fruit -flower- town -country- river -animal -colour. Some one choses a letter and everyone list the answers.we don’t bother with time limits. Nice sitting down game for a granny like me who can’t walk about.
This can be any combination depending on who’s playing. With my 10 year old grand daughter involved playing with adults, parents, grand parents, older brothers and sisters we adapt it. To just 6 such as boy - girl - fruit or veg - flower or tree - colour - animal, bird, fish or insect -
Spellings don’t matter because when you’re all finished you shout out your answers. Scoring is 10 if just you chose the answer, 5 if 2 the same 3 if 3 the same, 2 if 4 the same, then if lots the same just 1 point each.
Keep an eye on the cheaters peeking on I phones for answers but we do allow younger children to run off to ask grandad or someone in another room for help.
If children can’t read or write a similar game is just adult completes the list with their answers then the child is told the first catagory and to say the answer the adult then read out their answer and puts down the scores.
My granddaughter and I sometimes play thinking of girls names for every letter of the alphabet. Then boys names she likes this because it helps her when we play as a family.
Erica says
Sounds fun! Thanks for sharing.
William says
Have you considered Sprouts? One of the inventors was the famous mathemtician John Conway. The game is very easy to play, but hard to play well. It's very deep. The rules are simple (rules taken from Wikipedia):
The game is played by two players,[ starting with a few spots drawn on a sheet of paper. Players take turns, where each turn consists of drawing a line between two spots (or from a spot to itself) and adding a new spot somewhere along the line. The players are constrained by the following rules:
*The line may be straight or curved, but must not touch or cross itself or any other line.
*The new spot cannot be placed on top of one of the endpoints of the new line. Thus the new spot splits the line into two shorter lines.
*No spot may have more than three lines attached to it. For the purposes of this rule, a line from the spot to itself counts as two attached lines and new spots are counted as having two lines already attached to them.
The winner is the last player to make a legal move.
You cannot touch a dot twice with one line then connect it to another.
Erica says
I've read about Sprouts, but I've never tried it myself. It does sound fun!