Christmas Light Bingo: 96 Sightings for the Drive or Walk: how it works
Christmas light bingo has no caller: each passenger holds a different card and marks what the houses show. The 96 sightings run from icicle lights to a ditto sign, and the free center is HOME, marked in the driveway.
Print Christmas lights bingo for every seat
Set How many cards to one per passenger and print before dark, with a pencil each. A sighting counts once someone calls it aloud and a second person sees it. First line of five wins, and HOME counts. For a short loop, switch Grid to 3 × 3 and Cards per printed page to 4.
Save the rare finds for a second lap
The last 24 lines are the hard ones: a ditto sign, luminarias, a Moravian star, a house that clicks off while you watch. For an easy first lap, open Word list, one per line and delete every line from Tune in to this station sign down. For the second lap, press Back to the Christmas lights list and deal again.
Tips
The driver never holds a card. The driver judges close calls and picks the streets.
No printer: press Share these cards, send the link to the back seat, and each passenger picks a different card number.
Add your own street's landmarks as new lines: the house with the train, the corner that goes all blue.
Questions and answers
What counts as a sighting in Christmas light bingo?
Anything on a square that a second player can see before the car moves on. One house can fill several squares at once, and the same decoration can be marked on every card that holds it. Rules for tricky squares print under the cards.
Does this work on a walk instead of a drive?
Yes. A walk is slower, so play for two lines or a full card. Phones beat paper in the cold: tap a square to mark it. Close-up squares, such as paper snowflakes in a window, are easier on foot.
What are luminarias and Moravian stars?
Two of the rare finds. Luminarias, also called farolitos, are paper-bag lanterns weighted with sand and set in rows on Christmas Eve, a New Mexico tradition. A Moravian star is a many-pointed star lantern, first made in the 1830s at a school in Germany.
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Big old-style colored bulbsThe large screw-in bulbs sold as C7 and C9. The C stands for cone, the shape of a candle flame, and the number is the width in eighths of an inch.
Chimney wrapped in lights
Curtain of lights on a wall
Every window outlined
Falling-snow light tubesTubes where the light runs downward like a drip.
Garage door framed in lights
Giant lit wreath up high
Glowing balls hung in a tree
House lit in one color onlyAny single color counts, as long as nothing else is mixed in.
Icicle lights along the eavesStrings that hang in uneven drops from the gutter line.
Lights along a fence
Lights around the front door
Lights on a balcony rail
Lights on a mailbox
Lights that chase in a rowThe glow runs along the string like a wave.
Lights that slowly fade
Lights up the porch columns
Red and green lights only
Shed or playhouse lit too
Slow color-changing lights
Star on the roof peak
Tall tree lit to the topA real tree, taller than the house beside it, with lights all the way up.
Tree of lights on a poleStrings run from the top of a pole down to a ring on the ground.
Show all 96 squares (72 more)
Figures in the yard 24
Angel with a trumpet
Animal figure in a Santa hatA dog, a bear, a pig, a goose: any lawn animal dressed for the season.
Arch of lights over a driveway
Giant lollipops or gumdrops
Giant wrapped presents
Glowing plastic snowmanA hollow molded figure with a bulb inside.
Inflatable gingerbread man
Inflatable penguin
Inflatable polar bear
Inflatable snow globeA clear bubble with a fan blowing fake snow around inside.
Inflatable taller than a door
Life-size nutcracker
Light-up train
Nativity with a star above it
North Pole signpost
Oversized ornaments on a lawn
Plastic choir singers, lit
Reindeer that moves its headThe wire-frame kind with a small motor in the neck.
Santa driving something oddA tractor, a plane, a boat, a motorbike: anything but a sleigh.
Santa stop here sign
Snowflakes staked in the lawn
Snowman family of three
Toy soldiers by the door
Wire-frame deer, three or moreCount the herd. Two is not enough.
Doors, windows and the street 24
Big red bow on a gate
Church or hall lit up
Dark house between bright ones
Dog in a holiday sweater
Family walking the lights
Front door wrapped like a gift
Garland around a doorway
Holiday flag by a door
Just one string of lightsOne strand, alone on the whole house. It counts.
Lanterns on porch steps
Lit tree in a town square
Mailbox for letters to Santa
Neighbor still decorating
Other cars doing the same lapA car crawling past the same houses as you.
Paper snowflakes in a window
Santa hat on a statue
Shop window display
Sled propped by a door
Town snowflake on a poleThe big lit shapes a town hangs on its lamp posts and utility poles.
Two neighbors who matchSide-by-side houses with the same colors or the same figures.
Two trees in one houseTwo lit trees seen through the windows of the same home.
Window painted with a scene
Wreath on a car grille
Wreath on every windowEvery window on the front of the house, no gaps.
Rare finds for the second lap 24
Bubble lights in a windowGlass tubes of liquid that bubble over a warm bulb, popular in the 1950s.
Countdown to Christmas sign
Deflated inflatable on a lawnA heap of fabric waiting for its fan. It counts only while flat.
Dinosaur in a Santa hat
Ditto sign aimed next doorA lit arrow or the word DITTO pointing at the neighbor's bigger display.
Flamingo in a Santa hat
Food drive bin at a display
Kinara lit in a windowThe Kwanzaa candleholder: three red candles, three green and one black.
Laser dots all over a houseA stake projector that throws green and red specks. They caught on in 2015.
Light tree taller than a houseA cone of light strings on a pole that clears the roof.
Lights on a boat or trailer
Lit palm tree or cactus
Luminarias lining a walkPaper-bag lanterns weighted with sand, also called farolitos: a Christmas Eve tradition of New Mexico. Electric copies count.
Menorah lit in a windowThe nine-branched lamp of Hanukkah, which adds one light on each of eight nights.
Moravian star on a porchA many-pointed star lantern. The first were made in the 1830s at a school in Germany.
Peace sign or dove in lights
Projection on a garage doorMoving pictures or falling snow thrown onto a flat door or wall.
Santa climbing a ladder
Santa legs out of a chimney
Snowman made of real snow
Someone waving in a Santa suit
Timer clicks a house offA display that goes dark while you watch.
Tune in to this station signA yard sign that gives a radio station for the display's music.
Tunnel of lights you walk in
How this list was compiled: Own work by the editors, written for this site on 2026-09-19: 96 things to spot on decorated houses, in four blocks of 24 (lights on the house, figures in the yard, doors, windows and the street, and rare finds for a second lap). Nothing was copied from another spotting card. Every square is a sighting from a car or a sidewalk; no square is a brand, a store or a character from a film, show or book, so every figure is a generic one (a snowman, a penguin, a nutcracker). No square repeats a square of any other bingo list on this site (checked by script on 2026-09-19 against every dataset); the Christmas word bank lives on the Christmas bingo cards page, and this list adds sightings only. Facts in the lines beside the squares were checked on 2026-09-19: C7 and C9 bulb names (C for cone, the number in eighths of an inch), laser projectors becoming common in 2015 and bubble lights in the 1950s against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holiday_lighting_technology; light sculptures hung by towns on lamp posts and utility poles, and wire-frame deer with a motor that moves the head, against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_lights; luminarias and farolitos against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luminaria; the Moravian star against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moravian_star; the Hanukkah menorah against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanukkah_menorah; the kinara against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinara. Every other line beside a square is the editors' what-counts rule, not a fact. The win rule on the page (a row, column or diagonal, with the free center counted as filled) was checked against https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bingo_(American_version) on 2026-09-19. Licence: own work