Library of teambuilding games & icebreakers

Alternative Application is the game that challenges players to think outside the box—you’ll be surprised by the innovative ideas your employees will come up with!

Great for: Creative thinking

Duration: 5-10 minutes

Players: 4+

You’ll need: Various office items (at least one per player)

How to play Alternative Application

Setup: Before play begins, gather a variety of random office objects (at least one, preferably two, per player). Objects might include a stapler, flipchart, kitchen kettle etc.

To play: Taking turns, pass one of the objects to a player and ask them to mime an alternative use of that object. Meanwhile, the other players try to guess what action is being mimed.

For example, the player with the flipchart might stand it on its legs, drape a sheet of paper over their head, and mime taking a photograph on a vintage view camera. Once somebody guesses correctly, play moves to the next player.

Step up for a cause and embark on an Environmental Quest for Sustainability. In this expedition, your team isn't just exploring; you're on a mission to make a positive impact. Navigate through eco-conscious challenges that shed light on pressing environmental issues. From picking up litter to creatively repurposing materials, you'll not only learn about sustainability but actively contribute to a cleaner planet. This offsite activity isn't just about teamwork; it's about leaving a green footprint in the world.

Instructions

• Form teams and provide each with eco-friendly tools.
• Design challenges related to recycling, conservation, or green initiatives.
• Teams execute tasks that contribute to a cleaner environment.
• Document before-and-after results to showcase your impact.
• Reflect on the experience and brainstorm further sustainable actions.

TV gameshows are not just for the TV! In this adaptation of the classic show Family Feud, your employees will be able to showcase their quick decision making skills, as well as their general knowledge and intelligence.

How to play:

1. Divide into two teams.
2. One team member is chosen to compete as the captain.
3. The two captain are shown a survey question and must guess the top answers. Fastest “buzz in” first.
4. Points are awarded based on how many people in the survey chose that answer.
5. The team with the most points at the end of the game wins.
   

Surveys could be taken internally or taken from national survey websites to involve a whole range of different topics.

How to play Freeze

Slightly different from the drama-freeze game above, this exercise encourages more individual participation. Two people act out a scene, and then someone yells "freeze," and another person comes in and takes over the scene. It’s best to do this in an orderly fashion where the next participants are in a circle that you move around (or a line that you run down).

How to play Don’t answer that

Fun and laughter are guaranteed with Don’t Answer That. A verbal exercise this time, all participants have to do is stand in a circle asking each other questions! As you’d expect, though, there’s a caveat…

You don’t answer the questions directed at you.

The person standing to your left does it instead. For example, imagine that James asks you, “What’s the most embarrassing moment of your life so far?” You’d have to stay silent while Jeanette – the person to your left – claims it was when you got drunk at the last Christmas party and told the CEO you loved her.

The idea isn’t necessarily to be truthful (although it isn’t a rule that you can’t be!). The goal is simply to have a good time, make people laugh, and lift the mood.

It’s one small drop for an egg, one giant leap for team creativity.

The premise of an Egg Drop Challenge is to build a structure that stops a raw egg from cracking when dropped from a height.

In a large group, it feels like part science experiment, part creative brainstorm (while being fully entertaining to watch). This simple but surprisingly strategic team activity is perfect for developing some of the key skills you need in the office. 

It’s a fast and creative way to watch teams plan, test, and occasionally mourn their brave little eggs in the name of innovation. 

Let’s break down the challenge for you:

What you’ll need

The Egg Drop Challenge doesn’t require any fancy equipment, just a few common materials and the courage to watch your creation fall from the sky.

• Raw eggs: One per team for the main challenge, but 2 to 4 eggs should be used for design iterations

• Plastic straws: These will be the main frame for the protective shell

• Tape (masking or duct): This is the glue that holds the fate of the raw egg

• Scissors: Needed for trimming straws down into the perfect shape

• A timer: Teams should be working to a set time (20 minutes design time works best)

• Paper or card: Optional, but great for cushioning and creativity

• Measuring tape: Well, you need to make sure the drop height is fair, don’t you?

• Step ladder or balcony: Your official drop zone

• Tarp or sheet: This will save your floors from looking like hell’s kitchen

How to play (step-by-step instructions)

Follow these steps to set up the challenge, brief your teams, and watch as their creativity takes flight:

1. Introduce the challenge and set the scene

Announce the mission loud and clear: each team must design a device that will protect their raw egg from cracking when dropped from a set height. Tell them they’ll need to combine planning and construction, both against the clock, as they’re working to a countdown. The 

2. Form teams and give out materials

Depending on the number of people, create your teams of equal size. We tend to find four to five works best. Give each team the same supplies, so the playing field is completely even (no last-minute swap-outs or sneaky bubble wrap here!)

3. Build the best egg-protection device

Tell your teams they have 20 minutes to plan, test and build their structure. You could encourage teams to quickly sketch their designs first, before getting hands-on. Any method is allowed; wrapping, suspending, cushioning, just as long as it's made with the given materials (you’ll probably hear a few debates on gravity and air resistance here)

4. The drop test

Now comes the fated drop test. Choose your drop zone; a stairwell, balcony or step ladder will do the trick. Get everyone around and start the countdown. Each team gets just one shot to drop their creation. Here you could add a drumroll, or mock space-launch music if you want to turn up the tension.

5. Check for survivors

Once every egg has made its descent, it’s time for the grand reveal. Unwrap each structure carefully to see which designs survived and which ones got scrambled. Applaud the survivors, console the fallen, and don’t forget to take a photo of the mess (thankfully on the top of your tarp sheet).

Facilitator tip:

Make a point for teams to test early and adapt quickly. The most successful designs usually come from trial and error, not from overthinking. 

And one pro move could be: don’t reveal the exact drop height until the building time is over. A slight surprise element means designs need to be a bit flexible, and you’ll add a touch of suspense, too.

Variations and twists

Once your teams have mastered the standard version, try mixing things up with a few fun twists:

• Limit team materials: Reduce the number of straws or the amount of tape to force creative problem-solving under pressure.

• Higher stakes: Use multiple rounds, and increase the drop height for each round to raise the tension.

• Blindfold build: One teammate can’t see, relying entirely on verbal guidance from others.

• Remote/virtual adaptation: If you’re working with remote or hybrid teams, you can still run it online. Each person can build their design at home and record their drop for a team reveal.

Debrief: What was learned through the game?

On the surface, the Egg Drop Challenge looks like a lighthearted game, but beneath the laughter and flying tape is a perfect snapshot of teamwork in motion. After the cleanup (and any tears for fallen eggs), take a few minutes to reflect on what teams practiced:

• Collaboration under pressure: With time and materials limited, success will hinge on clear communication and shared decision-making.

• Creative problem-solving: Teams get to practice experimentation and are encouraged to think outside the box.

• Iteration: Trial and error will beat overplanning, as every cracked egg offers feedback for the next.

• Celebrating as a team: No matter if the landing was smooth or scrambled, the game is built on the foundation of teamwork, humour and collective pride.

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Wrap up by asking teams how these lessons mirror their day-to-day projects (because, much like the egg, good ideas also need careful handling).

FAQs:

What are the rules for the Egg Drop Challenge?

Teams must use only the provided materials to build a device that protects a raw egg from breaking when dropped from a height. Each team gets one attempt, and a surviving egg means victory.

What’s the best way to protect the egg for the drop?

Generally, soft padding will best absorb impact. On top of that, a structure that is designed to slow the fall can help, meaning you could try folding card as a material, too.

How high should you drop the egg?

Start with a moderate height (around 1.5 metres) and raise it after each round for more challenge. Outdoors or high ceilings give you more flexibility (and less chance of keeping the egg in one piece!).

Can you run the challenge indoors?

You absolutely can. You just need to make sure you’ve got enough space and protective sheets (for the inevitable eggsplosions). If you’re limited for space, go for lower drops or use a stairwell.

By challenging your team to guess the answer to a secret question in under 20 inquiries, you'll encourage communication, collaboration, and strategic thinking. Plus, it's a great way to sneak in some team building without resorting to trust falls or awkward trust exercises.

How to play:

1. Think of an object, person, or place.
2. The other player(s) will have 20 questions to ask about your chosen item.
3. They can only ask yes or no questions.
4. After each question, you can only respond with yes, no, sometimes, or I don't know.
5. The players must try to guess what the object is before they run out of their allotted 20 questions.
6. If they successfully guess the object, they win.
7. If they run out of questions before they guess correctly, the player who chose the object wins.
8. If the game ends in a tie, you can play again to break the tie.

To supercharge the fun, try to set a theme for the game to boost the fun factor and creativity, while also allowing employees to learn more about each other. Make sure to check out our other question based games if this tickled your fancy!

How to play Virtual bingo

Bingo in a virtual setting can be just as fun as doing it in person. Lots of online virtual bingo cards have cropped up over the last few years, with fun boxes to tick, like family members walking in the background and dogs heard barking on the mic.

Virtual bingo is a great virtual teambuilding activity that adds a light-hearted touch to your remote meetings.

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Put on your thinking caps for code breakers! Teams are given a series of cryptic riddles and challenges to solve, with each solution leading to the next clue. It’s a mental race to crack the final code and declare victory.

This team-building game is perfect for testing problem-solving skills and teamwork. Plus, there’s nothing like the thrill of solving that final puzzle before the other teams.

How to play:

• Give teams a series of riddles and cryptic challenges to solve.
• Each solution leads to the next clue.
• First team to crack the final code wins!

How to play Ping Pong Tournament

As open office plans became more popular, more companies started setting up breakout rooms where employees could decompress by grabbing a coffee or playing ping pong. If you already have a ping pong table in the office, this is an ideal game to add to the Office Olympic games—a ping pong competition works well with individual players and teams.

While there is the classic two-person setup for table tennis, there are numerous games, like playing with two balls at a time or a group game that gets smaller as people must step out if they miss their turn to hit the ball.

Explanation:

Each team member describes themselves using traits from a famous movie or book character, without saying who they are. The rest of the team has to guess the character based on the clues.

This game is perfect for hybrid teams! Whether remote or in the office, everyone gets a chance to participate. Each person describes themselves using personality traits or quirks of a famous character via video call or chat, and everyone else guesses who they are. It’s an easy-going virtual icebreaker that gets people laughing, thinking creatively, and learning more about each other.

How to play Sentence mish-mash

It’s often necessary to present straightforward information without much activity. However, you can liven things up a bit using this method. Start by reviewing your training materials and pulling several sentences out. Write these sentences on pieces of paper that you tape up to the wall next to where you’re giving your presentation.

Proceed with your slides, and then at the end, have people say where these sentences should have gone in the presentation. It’s a great way of helping people to put facts into context and also to encourage active listening.

The perfect game for the artists on the team, Back-to-Back drawing encourages play and communication and would be an excellent activity for a company retreat.  This team-building exercise is less about problem-solving and relaxing and getting the chance to get to know one another.

How to play:

Have players split into two teams and face away from one another. One player gets a picture, and the other receives paper and drawing materials. The person with the image describes what and how to draw the image without identifying it. After ten minutes, players swap roles.

After each team member has described the object and produced an image, they can compare their work and see who made the most accurate drawing.

Materials you’ll need: Art supplies and simple images (think flowers, cars, etc.)  taken from a magazine or printed online.

How many people: Small to mid-sized teams (8-16 people)

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Explore more team bonding activities to spark creativity and strengthen communication within your team.

The next game is Mirror Image Drawing, a delightful activity that challenges your communication skills in the workplace.

How to play

1. Find a partner in the group. One of you will be the "drawer," while the other becomes the "instructor."
2. The instructor's task is to describe a unique abstract image or scene. Be creative, but keep it abstract enough to encourage interpretation.
3. The drawer's role is to listen carefully to the instructor's descriptions, without seeing any reference or the instructor's drawing.
4. Instructors must provide instructions verbally only; they can't draw alongside the drawer or use gestures. Be clear and concise.
5. Drawers must translate the instructions into a drawing on their paper. The goal is to recreate the instructor's mental image as accurately as possible.
6. Once both partners are done, compare the drawings. Discuss the challenges faced and the effectiveness of communication.
7. For a well-rounded experience, switch roles and try again.

How to play Name that product

Remember the memory games that you used to play as a child? A variation of this activity can help new hires to learn about your product offerings. You don’t need anything besides a pen and paper! Begin by making a list of the products that your company sells. On the same page, list product features and price points. Then, on separate papers, write a short product description for each of the items. Have sales reps match the products with the short descriptions. Or, as another variation, instead of descriptions you can use customer needs or wants, or another indicator that would help people to better understand your product breadth and keep them straight.

How to play Jump over the imaginary ball

This is a warm-up game for many theater groups. It involves leaping over an imaginary ball. Everyone should stand in a circle and the leader will throw “the ball” to a participant. They jump over it and pretend that it rolls to another person for them to jump over. The game goes until everyone has had a chance to jump.

How to play Share your superpower

Another easy variation on an icebreaker is to share what your superpower would be. As everyone stands and introduces themselves, ask them to include some information on the special talents that make them unique. They can use their imagination for most desired superpowers like teleporting, or they can list some actual talents such as speedy present-wrapping or fantastic filing. It’s a nice way to learn a bit more about the people around you and what makes them special (plus, you might learn about who you can go to when you need some help with certain tasks).

Explanation:

‍Office workers create physical art while remote team members work on digital designs. Then, both pieces are merged into a single, collaborative masterpiece.

In the hybrid version, office workers can get hands-on with paints, paper, or any materials lying around the office to create their part of the art piece. Meanwhile, remote team members work their digital magic—whether it’s on Photoshop, Canva, or even just a doodle on Paint. The real fun comes when both pieces are combined and displayed on a shared platform like Teams or Slack. The end result is a cool, hybrid art collage that blends physical and digital creativity. It's a fun way to bring both worlds together and see how different styles come together!

While not a group activity per se, this technique is great for allowing employees to practice goal setting in their own working time. The Pomodoro Technique is a disciplined time management method that encourages working in focused, concentrated bursts, separated by short breaks. Here's how it works:

• Choose a task you want to work on. Set a timer for 25 minutes (this is one "Pomodoro").
• Focus solely on the task at hand until the timer rings. Avoid any distractions or interruptions during this time.
• After 25 minutes, take a short break of 5 minutes. Use this time to stretch, take a walk, or do something enjoyable.
• Repeat the process. After completing four Pomodoros, take a longer break of 15-30 minutes.

The Pomodoro Technique is like your best friend for productivity and discipline. It can start to feel like a game, especially when you’re racing against the clock, meaning that it may not even feel like work sometimes. Plus, it’s a game that gives rewards! Those short breaks are vacations for your brain and great incentive to get work done.  So, if you're aiming for setting and reaching goals at work, Pomodoro is the technique for you!

Werewolf strategy is a hidden role card game where some players secretly take on the role of werewolves, and the rest must work together to figure out who they are before it’s too late. Bluffing, strategy, and teamwork are key as everyone tries to survive—or deceive!

This game is a fun way to mix logic with social interaction, and it often leads to hilarious accusations and unexpected alliances.

How to play:

• Players are secretly assigned roles as werewolves or villagers.
• Villagers work together to identify and eliminate the werewolves.
• The game continues until all the werewolves are eliminated, or they outnumber the villagers!

Discover more team building activities for small groups to keep your team engaged and collaborating.

Here’s another easy, energizing, ice-breaking, and amusing activity that brings teams together and helps co-workers learn more about each other.

How to play My first job was…

To play My First Job, start by handing out a pen and a post-it note or scrap of paper to each participant. Next – and without showing anyone else – they have to write down whatever their first job was, before folding up the paper, and placing it in a hat/box in the center of the room.

From there, teammates take turns selecting a post-it from the pile, reading the role to the group and then guessing who wrote it. If they get it wrong, the rest of the team can jump in, working together to decide who had the job. Expect friendly banter, laughter, and all sorts of revelations to ensue!

Top tip: My First Job can be played in remote teams too. You’d simply ask people to send their jobs to you – the moderator – privately beforehand, then plug them into an online tool such as Wheel Decide. Employees can then spin the wheel and guess the owner of whatever job they land on.

This one's all about sharing stories! In this activity, we'll open up about our real-life workplace conflicts and learn a bunch of cool stuff from each other.

Why it's awesome for learning conflict resolution

Real-Life Drama: So, imagine this: We're sharing the nitty-gritty details of actual conflicts we've faced at work. No made-up stuff here! That means the lessons we learn are totally relatable to our daily grind.

All Walks of Life: We've got a mixed bag of folks here, from different departments and roles. That means loads of different perspectives. Hearing stories from all angles makes the learning super rich.

Feel the Empathy: When we listen to each other's tales of workplace woe, it's like putting on someone else's shoes (not literally, though). We start to get how our colleagues feel in those tough spots.

Listening is a huge part of communicating, and it’s hard to step back and hear what others say when we get stressed at work. This group exercise encourages teams to practice their listening skills, allowing others to speak and respecting their voice.

How to play:

‍Team leaders will choose a topic that will be discussed in subgroups, ideally of two, with an assigned speaker and listener. After the speaker is done, the listener will summarize what they said and subsequently switch roles.

Afterward, the group gets back together to review the process and talk about what it felt like to speak without interruption and what positives came out of that experience. Listeners are also encouraged to give feedback on how it affected them.

Materials you’ll need: Just your team and various seating areas to break them up into groups and a stopwatch/timer.

How many people: Small to large teams (8 to 25+ people)

5-minute energizers don’t get much better than this one. Got Your Finger is fun, fast-paced, suitable for groups of all sizes, and sure to lift the mood. Oh, and it requires no prior planning or preparation either.

Here’s how to play:

Ask the team to stand in a circle, close together, and face inward. Next, tell each participant to stick their right hand out with their palms facing the ceiling. They then have to put their left index finger on the open palm of whoever’s standing to their left.

Now the fun can start! When you shout “Go”, each participant must try to close their hand around their partner’s finger before they escape. It’s multi-tasking at its finest – trying to stop the colleague to your left from catching your finger, while simultaneously trying to grab whoever’s on the right.