Stuck at home for a long afternoon with kids glued to a screen, and you’re out of ideas? Don’t worry. We’ve compiled 101 fun games and activities you can enjoy indoors with your children. No special tools, no complicated setups—just a bit of good humour, imagination, and items every family with kids likely already has: glue, markers, paper, scissors, colourful tape.

This is an extensive list of entertaining indoor games. It contains a mix of active and quiet play, memory challenges, and creative skill-building. The common thread? They’re all designed to be fun, doable at home, and require minimal space or materials. You’ll be reinventing everyday objects, upcycling, and transforming what’s right in front of you.

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Fun Indoor Games to Play with Kids

Let’s get started! There’s something for everyone here:

  1. Set up a home bowling alley using empty milk bottles (or empty soda bottles) and tennis balls.
  2. Make origami animals and shapes with coloured paper.
  3. Start a mini garden with lentils or beans on damp cotton balls.
  4. Use egg cartons to create recycled art or little characters.
  5. Invent a story together, taking turns to add a sentence.
  6. Play “Red Light, Green Light” (a.k.a. Statues or Freeze Dance), perfect for indoor spaces.
  7. Design a mini-golf course in the living room.
  8. Craft a dreamcatcher using paper plates, ribbons, and bells.
  9. Have a funny-face contest and take photos.
  10. Walk the “tightrope” made of coloured tape on the hallway floor. Add challenges like scratching your head or walking with your eyes closed.
  11. Play target toss with ping pong balls and containers of different sizes.
  12. Build a castle out of books, cushions, and pantry items.
  13. Play Hangman (for kids 7+).
  14. Make a pan flute using straws.
  15. Blend a smoothie or milkshake and blow bubbles in it with a straw.
  16. Make a bubble solution and learn bubble tricks online.
  17. Have a pillow fight.
  18. Bring a storybook to life with silly voices and made-up languages.
  19. Play “Guess the Sound” with sound clips of trains, horns, church bells, or car brakes.
  20. Have a living room picnic with your favourite snacks.
  21. Teach the kids a game you loved as a child.
  22. Throw a full party for dolls and stuffed animals—drinks, music, and party favours included.
  23. Face-paint using safe, washable paints.
  24. Ask kids to teach you their favourite game and pretend you don’t understand it.
  25. Draw and colour on the floor together.
  26. Make fun food: rainbow pasta, mashed potato faces, or pretend fishcakes.
  27. Print out favourite family photos and make a scrapbook.
  28. Turn out the lights and go exploring with flashlights.
  29. Play hopscotch using a homemade carpet version.
  30. Play hide-and-seek indoors (for older kids, only in safe spots).
  31. Make silly monsters from playdough and squish them for laughs.
  32. Decorate a T-shirt or old jeans with fabric paint.
  33. Dance wildly to upbeat music.
  34. Make crafts using toilet paper rolls.

  35. Cover the bedroom walls with a mosaic of sticky notes.
  36. Build a homemade volcano using modelling dough, vinegar, and baking soda.
  37. Tell funny childhood stories and show old photos.
  38. Create a shared playlist for road trips.
  39. Take goofy photos and send them to family and friends.
  40. Make juice popsicles in ice cube trays or molds.
  41. Set up an indoor obstacle course with pillows, chairs, and armchairs.
  42. Turn the bathroom into a kids’ spa—massages, scented baths, nail polish, and lotions.
  43. Make pasta necklaces and other dry-pasta crafts.
  44. Pretend to run a car wash in the bathroom sink for toy cars.
  45. Build the tallest tower ever using building blocks.
  46. Create a collage with magazine clippings.
  47. Do Christmas crafts—even if it’s not Christmas!
  48. Make a drum set from kitchen pots, lids, and wooden spoons.
  49. Play Hot Potato with a real potato and 4+ players.
  50. Act out a fairy tale, playing all the characters yourselves.
  51. Have a spoon-and-ball race: who goes farthest without dropping it?
  52. Dress up using clothes and props you have at home. Take pictures.
  53. Build a fort with blankets and chairs, crawl inside with a flashlight, and tell ghost stories.
  54. Take turns being blindfolded and guess what you’re eating: lemon, vinegar, cocoa, tomato sauce, egg…
  55. Bake cookies from scratch, shaping them together and eating them fresh.
  56. Use a cut apple as a stamp for painting.
  57. Make homemade salt dough and add scents or colours with kitchen ingredients or essential oils.
  58. Use your salt dough to craft mini sculptures and bake them.
  59. Build a marble track using straws and a shoebox lid.
  60. Play photo bingo: gather photos of friends and relatives, hand them out to kids, and call names like “Grandma!”
  61. Make greeting cards with glitter, glue, pasta, rice, or coarse salt.
  62. Create a cardboard city with empty cardboard boxes and toilet paper rolls. Then decorate it with markers, stickers, and toy cars.
  63. Start a storybook but stop midway—then ask: “What happens next?”
  64. Set up a sensory table with mystery items. Blindfold the child and have them guess by touch.
  65. Host a long jump competition down the hallway, marking distances with colourful tape.
  66. Play “What’s Missing?” Remove one item from a table of objects and guess what’s gone.
  67. Organize a Barbie cruise in the bathtub, with boats (Tupperware works!), towels, and sunscreen.
  68. Play pick-up sticks using coloured pencils.
  69. Build walls from plastic cups and knock them down with bottle caps.
  70. Make a mini basketball game with rolled socks and a wastebasket.
  71. Mime songs or movie scenes and guess what they are.
  72. Line up mini books like dominoes and enjoy the toppling effect.
  73. Build a catapult using spoons and nuts or small balls.
  74. Freeze a toy in a bowl of water and play “ice archaeologist” to dig it out.
  75. Cut out paper doll chains that hold hands. A great post-movement activity.
  76. Make anonymous letters from magazine cutouts.
  77. Paint using a salad spinner: place paper inside, drop washable paint, spin, and admire!
  78. Create a thaumatrope (spinning illusion toy).
  79. Make bookmarks using paper clips and small charms.
  80. Make homemade butter: beat heavy cream for 8–10 minutes, then drain the liquid.
  81. Write a secret letter using lemon juice. Reveal it by warming over a candle (adult supervision required).
  82. Be a traffic cop with a paper plate and a straw-made stop sign.
  83. Hold a tongue twister championship.
  84. Dress up a child as a mummy using toilet paper.
  85. Race around with balloon rockets and try to catch them.
  86. Play hand-drawn Battleship on paper.
  87. Make elastic band bracelets for friends.
  88. Extract colours from veggies—beets for red, turmeric for yellow, blueberries for blue, spinach for green—and paint.
  89. Style wild hairstyles with gel and washable colour sprays.
  90. Play “Mother May I”—a timeless classic for little ones.
  91. Start a leaf collection and build your own herbarium.
  92. Paint with shaving foam.
  93. Build a puppet theatre using a shoebox, old fabric, and paint.
  94. Make puppet characters using popsicle sticks and small toys. Then perform a show!
  95. Feed birds with DIY feeders: cover a pinecone in peanut butter and roll in seeds.
  96. Turn your hallway into a spiderweb with paper strips and crawl through without touching them.
  97. Draw a racetrack for toy cars using masking tape on the carpet and the couch.
  98. Learn to make shadow puppets.
  99. Play with sayings: What does “What goes around comes around” really mean?
  100. Set up a pretend grocery store using kitchen items and your laptop as a cash register.
  101. Try the silent game… Stay still and quiet—whoever moves or talks first loses! It’s a perfect way to wind down.

More Fun Games for Kids

If these 101 ideas aren’t enough, check out more posts on fun and age-specific games for kids. 

You’re sure to find the perfect activity for your kids. Have fun!