Learning by playing with others is a really great way to remember what you learn, and there are a lot of board games that can be used to learn English. Some are great for learning new vocabulary, while others are a good way to practice using the vocabulary you already know.
Below is a list of 10 great board games to get you started. Gather your friends, grab some board games and you will be learning English in no time.
No English learning game list can be complete without the classic Scrabble game!
To play Scrabble
you have to arrange letters into words on a playing board. Letters earn you points, and special tiles on the board give you extra points. The goal of the game is to beat your opponent(s) by writing the best words and putting them in the best place on the board.
You may be thinking that you probably need to know a lot of words before you can play the game, but here’s the best part: Scrabble games are often played with dictionaries close by.
You will start to get a great sense of how English words look and feel once you have played a few times, and you start to see the letters in a different way. You might see the letters L, E, E and R, and wonder if Leer is a word. Look it up in the dictionary and you will learn that it is a word, and that it means “to stare at someone in an unpleasant way.”
Scrabble is also great because you do not need to get a big group of people together to enjoy it: It is a perfect two-player game.
Also try:Words With Friends. This is basically Scrabble online. You can play against any of your friends anytime, no matter where they are.
Every card in Taboo
shows one main word. Below the main word you will find a list of words that are similar to the main word, either synonyms (words which have the same meaning) or words which are closely associated with the main word. Your task is to describe the main word to someone without using any of the words underneath it.
For example, if your card’s main word is “elbow,” the words under it would be “joint,” “arm,” “bend,” “knee” and “macaroni.” In this case you cannot say “it’s like a knee on your arm,” or “it’s a kind of macaroni that bends.”
How would you describe an elbow without using any of those words?
As you can see, this game is much harder than it sounds at first. It makes you think in creative ways. Thanks to Taboo, you will discover that you know a lot more words than you think you do.
Also, if you play with a dictionary you will have a chance to learn not just one new word, but any word that is listed under it as well. Taboo can be played with any number of people, using teams or just going one-by-one. However you want to play, it is still fun and you will still learn something!
Also try: Taboo for iOS or Android. You still need a group of people to play it, so save these games for the next time you have a party.
To play Apples to Apples
every player except one “judge” puts a card down face-down that is best described by a special card on the table.
The judge turns the cards over and chooses the best card. Whoever placed that card down wins a point, and someone else gets to be the judge in the next turn.
It is a very fun game that is also very funny, since the card combinations can sometimes be ridiculous. A card like “Loveable” might end up with results like “Butterflies” or “My Bathroom.”
It is also a great game for learning English.
The words on the cards are all either nouns or adjectives. Best of all, you don’t even need to play this game with a dictionary—the definitions are listed right on the cards. Adjective cards like “frightening” have synonyms like “scary.” Nouns like “Octogenarian” have definitions that are sometimes funny, like “A person who is between 80 and 90 years old. They do not have eight legs.”
You do need a big group of people to play this game—4 people is fine but more than 5 is recommended. Also keep in mind that some nouns have famous peoples names or some popular culture items, so they might not be familiar to you.
Once upon a time…there lived a monster, or a king, or maybe a princess? You decide.
Once Upon a Time
is a card game that lets you and your friends tell a story. Everyone gets some cards that have story elements and one card that has an ending.
One narrator (the person telling the story) gets to start telling the story, trying to use the cards in their hand and lead the story to the ending they have. Other players can interrupt by placing down their own cards and continue the story with different ideas instead.
It is a really fun game where no one really “wins”—the point is to tell an interesting story and entertain yourself and your friends. You can use the game as it is or make your own cards with words that you want to learn. Have fun trying to include as many vocabulary words in your story as you can.
Atlas Games, the makers of Once Upon a Time, has actually put the full instructions and list of cards for the game on their website! That way you can practice alone or create your own game to play with friends.
Also try:Writing Challenge app for Android or iOS. While slightly different, both of these apps are a great place to start if you like the idea of practicing storytelling and creative writing.
Scattergories
is a game that makes you “think outside the box”—or in other words, think creatively.
You are given categories—like “color” or “things that are cold”—and you have to think of words that fit those categories. Before each round, you roll a die to choose a letter. Then the timer starts and everyone races to be more creative than the others by thinking of words that begin with that letter and fit the categories.
You score more points for writing things that no one else wrote. So if your letter is “I” and your category is “things that are cold,” instead of writing “ice cream” you might write “igloo.”
This is a fantastic game for anyone who’s just starting out with English and wants to practice vocabulary words. It pushes you to think of more uncommon words and their definitions. It is even better if you play with a native so you can learn new words from them.
Scattegories is actually pretty easy to play without needing to buy anything. Choose your own categories, set a timer on your phone and—there you have it! You are ready to play. You can even challenge yourself by playing it alone.
Can you arrange all your letters into words? Make words that are 2-6 letters long with the tiles that you are given. Dabble
is similar to Scrabble but gives you freedom to create whatever words you want, without needing to connect them to anything on a board.
Dabble will make you think hard about how to use your letters to make the most words. It uses anagrams, which are words that have rearranged (mixed up) letters.
To learn the most from Dabble, try playing with an anagram solver like this one: just put in the letters that you have left and you will see what words you can create with them. Look up any words you don’t know, and you will be learning new vocabulary.
Also try: There are many anagram games for mobile. If you liked Dabble, try Anagram Twist on iOS. This game uses categories to make things a little easier for you.
A bunch of vocabulary words right at your fingertips! In Funglish
you have to get others to guess words by using tiles with descriptive words on them.
Each card you get has six words on it. You have three minutes to get everyone else to guess as many of these words as they can. You describe what the words definitely are, might be and are definitely not.
For example, if you wanted to describe the word “cat,” you might say it isdefinitely “furry,” it might be “fat” and it is definitely not “scaly.”
Before you even start playing, it is a good idea to look through all the words and look up the ones you don’t know. One way to learn well from this game is to eliminate the time limit and look up words in the dictionary as you play. Repeated usage of vocabulary words helps you remember them, so playing Funglish will teach you more than a few new words.
Also try: Word search apps like Word Search for Android can introduce you to new words while playing. The key is to look up any new words you don’t know!
Boggle
is a game where you have a special set of dice with letters on them in a little tray.
You shake the 16 dice and they show different letters. Your task is to find words with the letters that are shown, but to create a word, the letters have to be touching each other in any direction.
The words have to be at least three letters long and you can’t use a die more than once for one word. You can choose to use the timer or not, it’s up to you! Once the time is up, everyone reads their list of words. If one word is used more than once by two or more people, it no longer counts. The longer your unique word is, the more points you get.
You don’t necessarily need to buy the game to play. You can make your own version with paper and a pen. Draw a 4×4 grid and put random letters in it. Then, set a timer, and you’re ready to play!
Boggle is a great way to learn new words and practice English. Grab your friends and family, put on your thinking hats, and enjoy the exciting word adventure of Boggle! It’s a game that makes learning fun, helps you find new words and lets you show off your creativity.
In Bananagrams
you’ll find yourself racing against others to create your very own word grid. Each player starts with a bunch of letter tiles, and as soon as the game begins, everyone works independently to arrange their tiles into a personal crossword-style grid.
The challenge is to connect your letters and create real words. There’s no need to wait for your turn. You can rearrange your grid as much as you like until you find the perfect word placements. It’s like your own little word puzzle!
The best part? There’s no board, no waiting and no scoring during the game. The goal is to be the first to use up all your tiles by forming valid words that intersect and connect with each other, just like a bunch of bananas all linked together.
The game’s portability is a real plus! The tiles come in a cute banana-shaped pouch, making it easy to take Bananagrams with you wherever you go. Play it at home, in the park or even on a long journey. Bananagrams is a great way to improve your vocabulary, spelling, and word-building skills while having a bunch of fun.
In Rewordable
you’re given a set of letter cards that have one or more letters on them, each worth a different amount of points based on the card’s color. Your task is to use these cards to construct words.
But here’s the twist: you can add cards to words created by other players to form new words, allowing you to “steal” the words and get the points. It’s a game that’s all about flexibility and creativity.
The goal is to make the largest collection of words, using the available letter cards. And don’t worry if you’re not familiar with long or complicated words. In Rewordable, it’s not just about finding big words—even short and simple words can earn you valuable points!
What makes Rewordable truly exciting is the special “reward tokens.” These cards give you bonus points for fulfilling certain criteria, such as stealing a word, using only one color for an entire word and so on.
Rewordable is perfect for language learners, as it challenges you to experiment with different letter arrangements and discover new words along the way. It’s a fantastic opportunity to expand your vocabulary, improve your spelling and boost your language confidence.
Thanks to these great board games you will not even realize that you are learning English.
You will just be playing around with your friends—or your smartphone.
But remember that you don’t always need board games and friends around to make English studies exciting. You can actually get a lot of interesting learning done all by yourself.
For self-studying, you can use language learning tools, like FluentU, that can teach English in engaging ways.
FluentU takes authentic videos—like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks—and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.
You can try FluentU for free for 2 weeks. Check out the website or download the iOS app or Android app.
It’s always a great idea to supplement your regular English learning routine with engaging activities like apps, videos and board games. This keeps you motivated and makes your learning experience feel more like play than work.
If you want to watch it, the FluentU app has probably got it.
The FluentU app and website makes it really easy to watch English videos. There are captions that are interactive. That means you can tap on any word to see an image, definition, and useful examples.
FluentU lets you learn engaging content with world famous celebrities.
For example, when you tap on the word "searching," you see this:
FluentU lets you tap to look up any word.
Learn all the vocabulary in any video with quizzes. Swipe left or right to see more examples for the word you’re learning.
FluentU helps you learn fast with useful questions and multiple examples. Learn more.
The best part? FluentU remembers the vocabulary that you’re learning. It gives you extra practice with difficult words—and reminds you when it’s time to review what you’ve learned. You have a truly personalized experience.
