40 games
Checked October 2026

80th Birthday Party Games

Games to play at an 80th birthday party, or a 70th or 90th, with four generations in one room.

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Eighty Passes1. The guest of honor sits at one end of a table, and a child sits at the other.2. They roll a soft ball back and forth along the table while the room counts every pass aloud.3. At each ten, a different child takes the far chair.4. The room cheers at eighty, or at seventy or ninety if that is the birthday. A ball that rolls off the table costs nothing: pick it up and keep counting.Noise: medium. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 4 to 40. You need: a soft ball and a table.
Put Their Jobs in Order1. With the family, write every job the guest of honor ever had on separate cards, paid or not: a paper route, a farm summer, a first office.2. Give each table a shuffled set.3. Tables lay the cards in order from first to last.4. The guest of honor reads out the true order, with a sentence about each job. One point for each card in the right place.Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a set of job cards for each table.
Trade a Word1. The guest of honor teaches the children one word or saying from their own childhood that the children have never heard, and says what it means.2. The children teach the guest of honor one word of theirs.3. Each side has to use the new word in a sentence.4. The room judges by applause whether the word was used properly. Trade three words each way.Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 3 to 40. You need: nothing.

Next step Party games for a room of seniors

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Short games played from a chair 8

Count to Eighty, Stop Where a Story Is 1. The room counts aloud from one to eighty, one number a guest, starting with the youngest. For a 70th or a 90th, count to that. 2. The guest of honor raises a hand at any number that was an age worth a story: 9, 23, 41. 3. The count stops there for one sentence about that year. 4. The guest of honor says the last number, and everyone claps on it. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 6 to 60. You need: nothing.
Did You Have One at Ten? 1. The children take turns naming one thing they have at home: a fridge, a bicycle, a television, a phone, a pet. 2. The room votes with thumbs up or down on whether the guest of honor had one at the age of ten. 3. The guest of honor answers, and says what they had in its place. 4. Guests keep their own score. The child whose question surprised the most people asks one more. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 6 to 60. You need: nothing.
Hands Up If You Have Too 1. With the family's help, the host lists ten things the guest of honor has done: ridden in a sidecar, milked a cow, slept on a ship, sewn their own coat. 2. Read them one at a time. 3. Guests who have done the same raise a hand. 4. If only one hand goes up, that guest says in a sentence when and where. If none goes up, the room turns and applauds the guest of honor. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: a list of ten things, agreed with the family.

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Short games played from a chair, continued

Sounds of Their House 1. Before the party, someone records eight sounds on a phone at the guest of honor's home: the back door, the kettle, the clock, the garden gate. 2. Play them one at a time. 3. Tables write down what each sound is. 4. The guest of honor rules on every answer, and each right one scores. A sound that the guest of honor gets wrong scores double for any table that had it. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: eight sounds recorded on a phone, a speaker, paper and pens.
Story Bingo: Mark It When They Say It 1. Before the party, the family lists nine things that turn up in the guest of honor's stories: the old truck, a dog's name, a town, "in those days". 2. Print them as a card of nine squares for each guest. 3. The guest of honor tells any two stories they like. 4. Guests mark a square each time they hear its words. The first full row calls bingo quietly and names the story it came from. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a card of nine squares and a pen for each guest.
Things They Always Say 1. Each table agrees on the saying it hears most often from the guest of honor and writes it on a card. 2. The host reads the cards out. 3. The room claps for the one it knows best, and the youngest guests say the winner aloud together, in their best copy of the voice. 4. The guest of honor says where the saying came from, or denies ever having said it. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a card and a pen for each table.
What Do You Call Them? 1. The host calls out, one at a time, every name the room has for the guest of honor: a first name, Mom or Dad, Grandma or Grandpa, a great-grandchild's name for them, Aunt or Uncle, an old nickname. 2. Guests raise a hand for the name they use. A child counts the hands. 3. The group with the fewest hands explains its name: who started it, and when. 4. The guest of honor may say which name they heard first in their life. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: nothing.
Whisper Down the Generations 1. Guests sit in a line or a circle in order of age, with the youngest child at one end and the guest of honor at the other. 2. The youngest child whispers a birthday wish of one sentence to the next person. 3. The wish passes up the line in whispers, once each. 4. The guest of honor says aloud what arrived. Then the child says what was sent. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 30. You need: nothing.

The oldest and the youngest play together 8

Eighty Passes 1. The guest of honor sits at one end of a table, and a child sits at the other. 2. They roll a soft ball back and forth along the table while the room counts every pass aloud. 3. At each ten, a different child takes the far chair. 4. The room cheers at eighty, or at seventy or ninety if that is the birthday. A ball that rolls off the table costs nothing: pick it up and keep counting. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 4 to 40. You need: a soft ball and a table.
The Elder Directs, the Child Builds 1. Pair each child with an older relative. The guest of honor pairs with the youngest. 2. Behind a propped-up book, the host builds a small model from six cups or blocks. Only the elders may look at it. 3. Each elder tells their child how to build the same thing, using words only and no pointing. 4. The first pair with a matching model wins. Then the children look and the elders build. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 4 to 24. You need: six cups or blocks for the host and for each pair, a large book.
Family Faces Pairs 1. Print two small copies of twelve family photos and stick each on a card. 2. Shuffle the cards and lay them face down on a table. 3. The guest of honor and a great-grandchild play as one team against another pair, such as an aunt and a cousin. Each turn, one partner flips a card and the other flips the second. 4. A matched pair is kept, and the team says who is in the photo. Most pairs wins. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 4 to 8. You need: two prints of twelve family photos, stuck on cards.
Guess How the Story Ends 1. The guest of honor starts a true story from when they were small, and stops just before the ending: "And when I opened the barn door". 2. Each child says how they think it ended. 3. The guest of honor tells the real ending. 4. The child who came closest asks for the next story by naming a subject: a pet, a teacher, a storm. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 3 to 30. You need: nothing.
The Messenger 1. Each table picks a child as its messenger. The guest of honor's table picks its youngest. 2. The host reads a quiz question to the room. 3. Each table whispers its answer to its messenger, who walks, never runs, to the host and whispers it on. 4. The first right answer to arrive scores two points, and every other right answer scores one. The guest of honor never leaves the chair. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 8 to 60. You need: ten quiz questions.
Portraits of Each Other 1. The guest of honor and the youngest child who can hold a crayon sit facing each other across a small table. 2. Each draws the other for three minutes. No peeking at the other sheet. 3. Both sign and date their drawings. 4. Hold the two up side by side for the room, then put them in one frame. Other pairs of oldest and youngest at each table can draw at the same time. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 2 to 40. You need: paper, crayons or pencils, a frame.
Trade a Word 1. The guest of honor teaches the children one word or saying from their own childhood that the children have never heard, and says what it means. 2. The children teach the guest of honor one word of theirs. 3. Each side has to use the new word in a sentence. 4. The room judges by applause whether the word was used properly. Trade three words each way. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 3 to 40. You need: nothing.
Two Chairs: Oldest and Youngest Against the Room 1. The guest of honor and the youngest child who can write sit side by side at the front. 2. The host names a category: a sweet, a toy, a chore, a playground game. 3. Each of the two writes one from their own childhood, hidden from the room. 4. The room gets two guesses at either answer. If both guesses miss, the two chairs score. Play six categories. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 60. You need: two pads and two pens.

Tribute and memory games that leave a keepsake 8

A Hand From Every Generation 1. Roll a long strip of plain paper down a table. 2. The guest of honor lays a hand flat in the middle, and a child traces around it. 3. Every guest traces a hand somewhere on the strip and signs inside it. The smallest children trace theirs inside the guest of honor's. 4. When the strip is full, the children hunt for the hand nearest in size to the one in the middle. Roll the strip up to go home. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 80. You need: a long strip of plain paper and markers.
A Page Each for the Memory Book 1. Give every guest a loose page that starts "I remember when you". Children may draw theirs. 2. Each guest finishes the page and signs the back. 3. The host reads six pages aloud with no names. The guest of honor guesses which generation each writer belongs to, then who it was. 4. Put all the pages in a ring binder and hand it over at the end. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 80. You need: a page for each guest, pens, crayons and a ring binder.
The Group Photo They Direct 1. The guest of honor sits in the middle, where the photo will be taken. 2. They place every guest by rules of their own, called out one at a time: everyone I taught to drive on my left, everyone who has slept at my house kneeling in front, everyone who beats me at cards at the back. 3. A scribe writes the rules down. 4. Take the photo. Print it with the rules on the back, one copy for each household. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 8 to 80. You need: a camera or a phone, paper and a pen.
One Word Each, One Recording 1. The family writes a birthday message with as many words as there are guests, give or take a few. 2. Hand each guest one word on a slip, numbered in order. 3. Pass a phone down the numbers. Each guest records only their own word. 4. Play the whole message back to the guest of honor in all its voices. If the room is small, go around twice. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: a message on numbered slips and a phone.
Show What They Taught You 1. Guests think of one thing the guest of honor taught them to do: whistle with a blade of grass, shuffle cards, tie a tie, peel an apple in one strip. 2. One at a time, each guest shows the skill without saying what it is. 3. The guest of honor names the skill and tries to remember when they taught it. 4. Someone writes the list down: who learned what. It goes in the card. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 40. You need: nothing.
Story Requests by Title 1. Each guest writes on a card only the title of a story they want to hear again: "The Goat on the Bus", "The Night the Lights Went Out". 2. The guest of honor reads through the titles and chooses three. 3. They tell each one, or hand it to the guest who asked for it. 4. Someone records the three stories on a phone. Keep the unused cards for the next visit. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 5 to 60. You need: cards, pens and a phone to record.
Tag the Keepsakes 1. The family brings five things from the guest of honor's home that have a story: a clock, a tin, a medal, a tablecloth, a tool. 2. For each, tables guess where it came from. 3. The guest of honor tells the true story. 4. A scribe writes it on a luggage tag in two or three lines and ties the tag to the thing, so the story stays with it. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 5 to 40. You need: five keepsakes, luggage tags, string and a pen.
Three Relatives Write the Recipe From Memory 1. Choose the dish the guest of honor is known for. 2. Three relatives each write the recipe from memory on a card, with no talking and no looking. 3. The guest of honor reads all three and marks them like a teacher, with ticks, crosses and remarks in the margin. 4. The best card is corrected in the guest of honor's own hand and copied for every household. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 5 to 40. You need: three recipe cards and pens.

Quizzes the family fills in beforehand 8

Every Front Door: Match the Home to the Clue 1. List every home the guest of honor has lived in, by town or street. 2. Write one clue for each on a separate slip: "the one with the plum tree", "two rooms above a shop". 3. Tables match clues to homes on a sheet. 4. The guest of honor gives the answers in the order they lived there. The table with the most right matches wins. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a matching sheet and a pen for each table.
The Guest of Honor Sets the Quiz 1. A week ahead, a grandchild sits down with the guest of honor and writes ten questions that only the guest of honor is sure to know: the name of the first family dog, who was best man, what stood where the supermarket is now. 2. At the party, the grandchild reads the questions. 3. Tables write their answers. 4. The guest of honor gives each answer and has the final word in any dispute. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: ten questions written with the guest of honor, paper and pens.
Name the Pets in Order 1. The family lists every pet and farm animal the guest of honor has ever named, with one line about each. 2. The host reads the lines, not the names: "ate a whole Sunday roast", "followed the school bus". 3. Tables write the name that goes with each line. 4. The guest of honor gives the names in the order the animals came. A point for each right name. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a list of pets with one line each, paper and pens.
Put Their Jobs in Order 1. With the family, write every job the guest of honor ever had on separate cards, paid or not: a paper route, a farm summer, a first office. 2. Give each table a shuffled set. 3. Tables lay the cards in order from first to last. 4. The guest of honor reads out the true order, with a sentence about each job. One point for each card in the right place. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a set of job cards for each table.
Their Life Story With Ten Gaps 1. The family writes the guest of honor's life in ten sentences and leaves one gap in each: the town, the street, the make of the first car, the name of the ship. 2. The host reads the story and stops at each gap. 3. Tables write their guess for the missing word. 4. The guest of honor fills each gap aloud. The best table keeps the written story. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a ten-sentence story with gaps, paper and pens.
Them or a Descendant? 1. Collect childhood photos of the guest of honor and photos of their children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren at about the same ages. 2. Show them one at a time, in black and white if possible, so the print gives nothing away. 3. Guests hold up a card: THEM or SOMEONE ELSE. 4. For each photo that is someone else, the person in it stands up. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 6 to 80. You need: printed photos or a slideshow, two cards for each guest.
Which Age Liked What? 1. Ask the guest of honor for a favorite food, a favorite pastime and a favorite song at four ages: 8, 18, 48 and now. 2. Write the twelve answers on a sheet in a jumbled order. 3. Tables sort each answer under the age it belongs to. 4. The guest of honor reads the true lists. The table with the most answers under the right age wins. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: judges. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a sheet of twelve favorites and a pen for each table.
Who Got It From Them? 1. Before the party, the family lists eight habits of the guest of honor that someone else in the family shares: whistling while cooking, reading the last page first, humming in the car. 2. The host reads a habit. 3. Tables call out which relative has the same one. 4. That relative stands and takes a bow. Tables score a point for each right name. Noise: lively. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 60. You need: a list of eight shared habits.

Table games for the birthday meal 8

A Fact at Every Place 1. Write a different fact about the guest of honor inside every folded place card: "learned to drive in a milk van". 2. During the meal, guests swap facts with neighbors and with other tables. 3. At dessert, the host asks ten questions whose answers were all on the cards. 4. Guests answer alone, on paper. The guests who talked to the most people win. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 10 to 80. You need: a place card with a fact inside for every guest, paper and pens.
A Menu From Their Life 1. Name each course on the menu card after a dish from the guest of honor's life: Station Cafe Soup, Wash-Day Stew, the Wedding Cake That Slid. 2. As each course arrives, tables guess the story behind the name and write one line. 3. The guest of honor tells the true story in a few sentences. 4. The closest table scores. Guests take the menu card home. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 6 to 60. You need: a menu card for each table, paper and pens.
The Best-Of Ballot 1. Print a ballot with five categories about the guest of honor: best dish, best saying, best story, best holiday, best piece of advice. 2. Tables fill in one ballot together, and the youngest writes. 3. Collect them before dessert and count. 4. Read the winner of each category aloud. The guest of honor may add a word on any of them. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: a ballot and a pen for each table.
The Chair Beside Them 1. Keep one empty chair next to the guest of honor. 2. Guests take turns in it for the length of one song, and each brings one thing: a photo, a question or a piece of news. 3. A child keeps the list and fetches the next guest when the song changes. 4. By the cake, every guest has had the chair once. The guest of honor has not had to cross the room. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: tells or answers. Players: 8 to 60. You need: one spare chair, music and a list of guests.
One Candle a Table, Carried by the Youngest 1. Give each table one unlit candle. The table agrees on one wish for the guest of honor. 2. When the cake comes out, the youngest person from each table carries the candle up and sets it in the cake. 3. That child says the table's wish aloud. 4. An adult lights the candles when every wish has been said, and the room sings. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: one cake candle for each table.
Pass the Album Page 1. Take the pages out of a spare album, or print a sheet of photos, so that every table has one. 2. Each page comes with three things to find on it: a hat, a car, somebody laughing. 3. When a table has found all three, it passes the page to the next table and takes a new one. 4. Stop when the pages are back where they began. Tables say which photo they would ask about. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 8 to 80. You need: album pages or printed photo sheets, a card of three things to find for each.
Place Mat Quiz, Read by the Youngest 1. Print eight questions about the guest of honor on a paper place mat for every seat, in large type. 2. Between the first two courses, the youngest reader at each table reads the questions aloud. 3. The table agrees on its answers and writes them on one mat. 4. Before dessert, the host reads the answers. Tables mark their own mat. Noise: quiet. Guest of honor: only watches. Players: 6 to 80. You need: a printed place mat for every seat and pens.
Youngest Asks Oldest at Every Table 1. Put a card of five questions on every table, such as "What did you want to be when you were nine?" and "What was your first job?" 2. The youngest person at the table asks the oldest person the first question. 3. Then the oldest asks the youngest the same one. 4. Go down the card. At the end, each table reports the answer that surprised it most. Noise: medium. Guest of honor: plays. Players: 6 to 80. You need: a card of five questions for each table.

How this list was compiled: Our suggestions, written for this site for a family party for a 70th, 80th or 90th birthday, with children in the room. The wording, the noise levels and the player counts are ours. Every entry says how loud the game is and what the guest of honor does in it, and in every one the guest of honor can stay seated; that screen is our own rule. The facts about a life come from the family. Nothing here is a joke about age, and nothing is about health. The list states no rule or history of a traditional game, so no outside source was needed. Licence: own work

How it works

At an 80th birthday the room holds great-grandchildren and the person they came for. Each game says how loud it is and what the guest of honor does: watches, tells, judges or plays. In every one, they can stay seated.

Read the full guide

Ask the guest of honor how much they want to do

Some people want to tell stories all afternoon, and some would rather watch. Ask beforehand, then choose by what each game says of the guest of honor. Ten games need nothing from the guest of honor but to watch, such as Who Got It From Them? and Pass the Album Page.

70th birthday party games and a 90th: the same list

Only two games carry the number. Count to Eighty, Stop Where a Story Is and Eighty Passes work the same way with seventy or ninety. The quizzes under Quizzes the family fills in beforehand need a week of notice, because the family supplies every answer.

Print anything the guest of honor reads in large type, and hand it over before the game starts.
Give the children jobs: reader, messenger, candle carrier. A child with a job stays at the party.

Questions and answers

What games can you play at an 80th birthday party?

Seated games such as Story Bingo: Mark It When They Say It, family quizzes such as Put Their Jobs in Order, keepsakes such as A Page Each for the Memory Book, and games for the youngest with the guest of honor, such as Eighty Passes.

What are good games for a 90th birthday party?

Ones where the guest of honor chooses how much to do. What Do You Call Them? asks only for a show of hands, and Story Requests by Title lets them choose three stories and tell each one or hand it to the guest who asked.

How do you include children at an 80th birthday party?

Pair them with the guest of honor. In Guess How the Story Ends, the children guess the ending of a true childhood story. In The Messenger, a child carries each table's quiz answer to the host.