Best Halloween Party Games for Kids and Adults 2023

Halloween is a time of year when both adults and kids alike are excited, get to dress up, enjoy treats and candy, and play any of the games they love. People are always looking for ways to enjoy the season and get the most from fall before the winter sets in, so gatherings and parties are a hit. Every Halloween Party can use a Halloween Party Games to keep the season fun and exciting.

Halloween Games for Kids

When choosing Halloween games for kids they should be easy, safe, and not take too long to play. These can be used at parties at school or home, and fast games can even be set up for trick-or-treaters. When setting up kid’s games use bright colours, prepare for a fast clean-up by using items that will not create stains, and consider laying sheets on the ground for any of the messier tasks.

Eyeball Pong uses ping pong balls with eyes painted on to be bounced off the table into the cup for an instant win.
Halloween Hide and Seek works great when the kids are dressed up in their Halloween costumes!
Eye Spy is a great game for Halloween as they describe the decoration or costume that they see.
Pin the Limb on the Zombie is a fun Halloween version of the traditional Pin the Tail on the Donkey.
Create puzzles out of cardboard gravestones.
Witch Hat Ring Toss uses a tall witches hat on the floor to catch paper plates with the middle cut out.
Skeleton Shooting Range: put pictures of skeletons on plastic cups to be knocked over with ping pong balls or elastics.
Shoot the Skeleton: use stretchy hands or balls of slime to throw at small plastic skeletons and see how many they can hit.
Mummy Sack Race has kids wrap each other’s legs with toilet paper or streamers and then race across the finish line.
Jack O Lantern Bean Bag Toss: carve your pumpkins to have their mouths open in surprise, or fear, of various sizes and toss the bean bags in their mouths.
Pumpkin Checkers replaces the large checker pieces on a oversize board with small gourds, or plastic pumpkins.
Pumpkin Stomp requires adding candy or treats to orange balloons, with a jack-o-lantern face or without, and then adding air or whipped cream. Place them around the yard for kids to stomp on and they can keep what’s inside.
Googly Eye Hunt is a Halloween scavenger hunt where adults place googly eyes around the space, on trees or garbage cans, toys, and candy bars, and have the kids go find them.
Ghost Bowling is a great way to use a painted pumpkin with faces drawn onto toilet paper rolls for a fun Halloween bowling experience. This can be done inside or out.
Web Walk creates a spider web from masking tape on the floor, then adds cutouts of ghosts and spiders to place on the web. Kids walk on the tape to collect all of the ghosts and avoid spiders.
Pumpkin Chuckin’ is scaled down by wrapping toilet paper in orange felt and topping it with a small green stem. Throw the pumpkins into the basket to win.
Pumpkin Memory uses paper plates with black construction paper glued on to make faces, and each one has a pair. Set up pairs of plates face down and see who can make the most matches in one minute. Other shapes or Halloween-related images may also be used.
Scariest Pumpkin is fun and easy by providing orange paper plates and lots of black construction paper or felt pens. Let each child decorate their paper plate jack oh lanterns and see which is the scariest.
Pumpkin Scavenger Hunt is a fun way to get kids moving as they search the backyard for small plastic pumpkins. These can have candy, treats, games, or decorations inside or they can be empty.
DIY Haunted House: Set up a room in your house as a mini-haunted house with scary decor and music.
Halloween Craft: for little ones who don’t want to be scared or for crafty kids, embrace the idea of Halloween-themed crafts to bring some calm back to the party!
Halloween treasure hunt: Set up clues around the house and garden for the kids to solve.
Pumpkin carving: This is a favorite Halloween tradition in our house and the kids love getting involved with the pumpkin design and carving.
Halloween Charades: set up a Halloween-themed charades game.

Click here to read about our favorite Halloween Costumes For Kids

Halloween Games for Adults (and Teens!)

When planning Halloween games for adults and for older teens, they can be a bit scarier or involve more details. These games can fill an hour of a Halloween Party or be faster rounds before everyone moves on.

With adult games, it is ok to up the atmosphere and add spooky lighting, have people dress to the theme, or even create food dishes that seem scary and hard to place but are tasty and fun to eat. There are so many gems that there is sure to be one or two that are a good fit for you and your friends.

Truth or Scare puts a fun twist on the traditional truth or dare and lets each guest choose to tell the truth about a question or to be scared by someone in the group.
After Dark Scavenger Hunt gets everyone outside looking around their neighborhood for some costumes, some cars, or whatever else you want to send them looking for.
Glow Stick Scavenger Hunt lets guests search the yard or the house for glow-in-the-dark items, including glow sticks or stickers, clothing, and toys. Shut off all the lights in the room and add spooky music for a more interactive experience.
Quick Draw lets one person draw a Halloween-related image and their team has to guess what it is.
Eyeball Search by placing candy eyeballs into spaghetti with sauce for extra sensory input, then blindfolding the participant before removing the lid and having them find the eyes.
Text Scavenger Hunt lets others post pictures of what they have found and challenge others to find the same items. This game can go on as long as people are still making suggestions.
Ghoulish Recall can be done in person or via video call. Show images on the screen for a few moments, then ask questions and see who can answer them. Candy is a great prize for all ages!
Guess the Gross Food has participants eating foods and guessing what they are, is it beef jerky or a bat wing, are they drinking apple juice or witches brew?
Name That Tunes Halloween Edition plays the most popular Halloween-related songs, but only snippets, and has guests guessing what song it was.
Would You Rather can be as simple or as complicated as you want, and can cover a wide range of topics, make your Halloween version yourself or order one online.
Movie Monster Match gives you a list of monsters from movies and a list of actors for guests to match.
Werewolf is a party game that has cards handed out telling each guest if they are a villager or if they are a werewolf. The werewolf chooses someone when everyone has their eyes closed and the villagers must determine who the wolf is.
Murder Mystery is a fun party game that is especially suited for Halloween. Make your own version or pick up one from any game store or online. All the guests get a backstory and character, and the winner is the first one to determine who the killer is.
Movie Trivia, Halloween version has only Halloween movies included.
Witches Brew Pong replaces the beer in beer pong with a drink created to look like a witches brew, and has guests playing a round throughout the night.
Death Charades puts a new spin on charades by having guests act out different ways someone might die and have others guess what it is.
Forehead Detective provides each participant with a sticky note for their forehead that has a Halloween-related work or costume written on it. People can ask questions of other guests and must guess what word is on their forehead.

Click here to read about our best Halloween Costume Ideas For Families

Minute to Win It Halloween Games

Halloween-themed Minute to Win It games are a fun way to get everyone involved, and each only takes one minute to complete each round. These are great for parties or to set up for trick-and-treaters when they stop by.

Fear Factor is a great way to get people in on the fun and can be full of kid’s versions or adult tasks. Kids might eat a plate of whipped cream called spider webs, while adults can put their hands in a bucket of worms to find the candy treat.
Witches Scattergories sees each person roll a letter and then list all the Halloween-related words they can for that letter in one minute.
Mummy Wrap provides each partnership with a roll of toilet paper, a minute, and sees if they can wrap the entire “mummy” in the time limit.
Oreo Shuffleboard joins the deliciousness of an Oreo with the challenge of pushing the cookie down the table to land between the lines of tape, or Halloween streamers.
Red Eye uses ping pong balls with eyes painted on them and standing on the bottom of an upside-down plastic up, then has each guest use a paper airplane to try and knock off the ping pong ball.
Pumpkin Pong uses orange ping pong balls to bounce on the table and land in one of the cauldrons or pumpkin buckets. They can even eat the candy treat that is in the bucket they land it in.
Spider Toss uses the stretchy, sticky, spider webs that are found at Halloween stores or dollar stores. Stretch it across the space between two chairs or railings, and have them throw little plastic spiders to see how many they can make stick. This can also be done across the top of a bucket, then lay the bucket on its side.
Zombie Obstacle Course has a small obstacle course set up and has each person walk like a zombie through the course.
Spider Launch uses small plastic spiders to be placed into a cup or onto a plastic spoon and shot at a box that has a masking tape “web” across the top. See how many spiders make it into the box or how many get stuck on the web.
Guess the Candy Corn has a jar full of candy corn and each person or team gets to guess how much is in there, within a minute, and the winning team gets the candy.
Touch and Feel puts a range of items with different textures and feels into paper bags, and has each person put their hand in the bags one at a time and write down their guess of what the item is. Compare at the end to see who got the most right.
Word Response, Halloween Version takes the popular game of you say one work and the other person says the first word that comes to mind, and see how many each set of partners can get within one minute.
Bobbing for Apples is a fun and traditional game that can be played with apples floating in water in a cauldron, see who can get the most apples with just their mouth in one minute.
Spooky Bean Bag Toss uses decorated cans stacked in a pyramid with bean bags themed Halloween to be thrown at them.
Spider Race takes pretend spiders, either buy plastic or rubber from the store or make your own at home, and tie them to a string or rope that is stretched across the yard. Have guests push their spider and see which goes the furthest. A clothing line would be ideal for this.
Candy Scavenger Hunt gives each person one minute to scour the area and find as much candy as they can, allowing them to keep whatever they find makes everyone a winner.

Click here for our top Halloween Costume ideas For Couples or Friends

Halloween Party Games Final Note

There are nearly endless ideas for Halloween games for all ages and many can be done with minimal supplies, many things are already found in most homes.

By adding games to your Halloween party you can encourage guests to mingle and chat more, help create new friendships and strengthen old ones, and remind anyone that you are never too old to have fun. Choose a few games that are fast and simple like the Minute to Win it games or plan in detail an all-night affair like the murder mystery parties.

About Author

Jane Sheriff is the founder, creative director, party planner and mom of three. She started Darling Celebrations back in 2012 to share easy and beautiful ideas for celebrating the special events in life.