One-Minute Dice Games

Press Pick another game for a dice game with its dice count and goal, then start the 60-second clock.

One-Minute Dice Games

  1. Back-of-Hand TowerYou need: 5 dice. Goal: hold one hand out flat, palm down, and build a tower on the back of it with the other hand. Five dice high, held for a count of three, wins. Rest your elbow on the table if you like. A breath at the wrong moment is enough to end it.
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Next step 60 everyday games with household props

How it works

These 34 one-minute dice games need a handful of ordinary dice and, for some, a plastic cup. The TV show Minute to Win It gave players 60 seconds for stunts with household objects. This page is not connected with it.

Read the full guide

Start with what is in the game box

Ten dice run every game here. Stacking dice holds 8 towers, bridges and staircases. Rolling for a target holds 9 games of luck and quick sums, and Flicking, sliding and catching holds 8 for a smooth table.

Add a cup

Dice and a cup has 9 games, and plastic is quieter than a tumbler on a hard table. Nobody has timed these games, so treat each target as a first guess.

Tips
  • Play on a tablecloth or a tray with a rim. Dice that hit a hard floor travel a long way.
  • Count the dice back into the box at the end, before small children come back to the table.

Questions and answers

Which is the dice stacking one-minute game?

Wrong-Hand Six-High is the plain one: six dice, one tower, the hand you do not write with. Stacking dice has seven more, such as Ten Dice Tall for a pair and Blindfold Dice Tower with your eyes covered.

How many dice do I need?

Ten covers the whole list. Most games use six or fewer, and Ten Dice Tall, Four-Step Staircase and Both Towers at Once use all ten. Roll, Sort, Repeat gives five to each of two players.

Which dice games are pure luck?

Five Alike, Clear the Odd Dice, Call Your Sevens and Beat My Total. They suit a mixed group, because a six-year-old rolls as well as an adult. Find a Ten in Three Dice and Four-Dice Sum Shout add quick arithmetic.

Do any of these games involve betting?

No. Nothing is staked on any roll, and no game uses chips, coins or points that carry over. Each one is won or lost inside its own minute.

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All 34 games

Stacking dice 8

  • Back-of-Hand Tower You need: 5 dice. Goal: hold one hand out flat, palm down, and build a tower on the back of it with the other hand. Five dice high, held for a count of three, wins. Rest your elbow on the table if you like. A breath at the wrong moment is enough to end it.
  • Blindfold Dice Tower You need: 5 dice in a row on the table and a scarf for a blindfold. Goal: with your eyes covered, find the dice by touch and stack all five into one tower. Say done, then take your hands away before you look. If the tower is standing when the scarf comes off, you win.
  • Both Towers at Once You need: 10 dice in two piles of five. Goal: build two towers at the same time, the left hand building one and the right hand the other, placing a die on each at the same moment. Both five high and standing wins. If one tower falls, both come down and you start again.
Show all 34 games (31 more)

Stacking dice, continued

  • Card Bridge on Dice Pillars You need: 9 dice and one playing card. Goal: build two pillars three dice high, a card’s length apart. Lay the card across them as a bridge, then stack the last three dice in a tower on the middle of the card. The whole thing stands for a count of three.
  • Column of Threes You need: 5 dice. Goal: build a tower five high in which the side facing you shows a three on every die, so the judge reads a column of threes from top to bottom. Turning a die that is already in the tower is allowed, if you can do it without a collapse.
  • Four-Step Staircase You need: 10 dice. Goal: build a staircase against the edge of a book: one die, then a column of two beside it, then three, then four. All four steps standing side by side and touching wins. The four-high column is the one that goes, so build it last.
  • Ten Dice Tall You need: 10 dice and a partner. Goal: build one tower ten dice high, taking turns to add a die, one hand each. It has to stand alone for a count of three. Square each die on the one below before you let go, because a lean at die four is a fall at die eight.
  • Wrong-Hand Six-High You need: 6 dice and a steady table. Goal: stack all six into one tower using only the hand you do not write with, the other hand flat on the table. The tower has to stand while the group counts to three. If it falls, every die goes back to the table before you start again.

Rolling for a target 9

  • Beat My Total You need: 3 dice each and a partner. Goal: both roll at the same moment. The higher total takes the round, and a tie is rolled again. First to five rounds wins. Totals are said out loud before either player touches the dice.
  • Call Your Sevens You need: 2 dice and a judge who counts the throws. Goal: before the clock starts, say how many sevens you will roll in 20 throws of both dice. Then roll. Hitting your number exactly wins. Seven is the likeliest total of two dice, because six of the 36 possible pairs add up to it.
  • Clear the Odd Dice You need: 6 dice. Goal: roll all six and push aside every die that shows an odd number. Roll the rest again, and keep going until no dice are left in your hand. The fewest rolls in the room wins, and four rolls or fewer is a good round.
  • Find a Ten in Three Dice You need: 3 dice. Goal: roll all three and look for ten: any two of them, or all three, adding up to exactly ten. Point to the dice and say the sum out loud. Four tens before zero wins. A roll with no ten in it is picked up and thrown again.
  • Five Alike You need: 5 dice. Goal: roll all five. Keep any that match and roll the rest again, as often as the clock allows, until all five show the same number. You may change the number you are collecting at any time, by picking everything up and starting over.
  • Four-Dice Sum Shout You need: 4 dice and a partner who checks. Goal: roll all four and call out the total. The partner checks and says yes or no. A right total scores, and a wrong one costs a point. Eight right before zero wins. Swap over for the next minute and try to beat the score.
  • Land on Twenty-One You need: one die and a judge who adds along. Goal: roll again and again, adding each roll to a running total said out loud. Land on exactly 21 to win. Going past 21 wipes the total back to zero. Twenty-one is also what the six faces of one die add up to.
  • Roll, Sort, Repeat You need: 5 dice for each of two players. Goal: on go, each player rolls all five and lines them up from the lowest number to the highest, touching in a row, then calls sorted. The first to call wins the round, once the rival has checked the row. First to three rounds wins the pair.
  • Totals Five to Nine You need: 2 dice, and paper with 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 written on it. Goal: roll both dice and cross off the total if it is on the paper. Keep rolling until all five numbers are crossed off. Those five totals are the commonest ones two dice can make, and the last one still takes its time.

Flicking, sliding and catching 8

  • Cliffhanger Slide You need: 8 dice and a smooth table. Goal: from one end, slide the dice one at a time so that a die stops with part of it hanging over the far edge and does not fall. One cliffhanger wins. Dice that stop short stay where they are, and they get in the way.
  • Dice in the Air, Hands Together You need: 2 dice. Goal: hold a die in each hand, toss both straight up to eye level, clap once and catch them, one in each hand. Eight catches in a row wins. For a harder round, cross your hands after the clap so each die lands in the other hand.
  • Fingertip Goalie You need: a table, one die, and two more dice set a hand apart at one end as goalposts. Goal: the shooter flicks the die from the far end. The keeper defends the goal with one fingertip, which may slide but not lift. Three goals in ten shots wins for the shooter, and fewer wins for the keeper.
  • Palm to Knuckles You need: 5 dice. Goal: hold all five in your palm, toss them up a little and catch as many as you can on the back of the same hand. Toss those up and catch them in the palm again. Finish a round with three or more in your palm to win.
  • Snipe the Top Die You need: a tower of 3 dice near the far end of the table and 6 loose dice. Goal: from the near end, flick the loose dice one at a time and knock the top die off the tower while the two beneath it stay standing. If the whole tower falls, rebuild it and keep flicking.
  • Three Off the Elbow You need: 3 dice and a clear patch of floor in front of you. Goal: raise one elbow to shoulder height with that hand back by your ear, and stack the three dice on the flat of the elbow. Whip the hand forward and down and catch all three before they land. One clean catch of three wins.
  • Toss One, Grab One You need: 6 dice, five of them scattered on the table. Goal: toss the sixth die up, snatch one die off the table with the same hand and catch the tossed die before it lands. Put the snatched die aside. All five collected before zero wins. A missed catch puts one die back.
  • Two-High Pins You need: 7 dice: six stacked as three pins, two dice high, in a row at the far end of the table, and one to flick. Goal: partners take turns flicking the loose die from the near end. Knock down all three pins in six flicks or fewer. A pin counts as down when its top die is off.

Dice and a cup 9

  • Bounce-In Die You need: a cup standing a forearm from the table edge and 8 dice. Goal: from the edge, bounce the dice off the table one at a time so that they hop into the cup. Three in the cup wins. Dice bounce at odd angles, so throw flat and soft. Collect the misses and go again.
  • Count Dice by the Rattle You need: a cup, 5 dice and a partner. Goal: turn away while your partner puts between one and five dice in the cup and covers it with a hand. Shake the cup yourself and say how many are inside, by the sound and the weight. Three right out of five wins.
  • Flip and Trap You need: a plastic cup standing mouth down with one die resting on its base. Goal: grip the cup, flip it over in one move so the die is thrown up, and catch the die in the open cup as it comes down. Three traps before zero wins. The die goes back on the base before every try.
  • Over, Under or Seven You need: a cup, 2 dice and a host. Goal: the host shakes both dice in the cup and slams it mouth down. Before it is lifted, call over seven, under seven or seven. Four right calls in eight tries wins. Calling seven is the bold one: it is the likeliest single total and still comes up only one time in six.
  • Slam and Sum You need: a cup and 3 dice each, and a partner. Goal: both shake and slam their cups mouth down, then lift on a count of three. The first to call the total of all six dice takes the round. A wrong call gives the round away. First to five wins the pair.
  • Sweep Four Into the Cup You need: a plastic cup and 4 dice in a row on a smooth table, a hand apart. Goal: hold the cup mouth down and sweep it along the row, scooping up each die in turn and keeping it inside with the swing. Set the cup down, mouth down. Lift it: all four dice underneath wins. A stack is a bonus.
  • Ten Clean Landings You need: a cup and 2 dice. Goal: toss one die from your free hand and catch it in the cup, ten times in a row. Then toss both dice at once and catch the pair, once. A die that bounces out of the cup does not count, so give a little with the catch.
  • Tumbler Layer Tower You need: 4 plastic cups and 3 dice. Goal: stand a cup mouth down, balance a die on the middle of its base, stand the next cup mouth down on the die and carry on: cup, die, cup, die, cup, die, cup. The tower stands for a count of three.
  • Twenty Pours You need: 2 cups and one die. Goal: pour the die from one cup into the other and back, 20 pours without a miss. After every fifth pour, move the cups a hand further apart, so the last five are tosses more than pours. A die on the floor starts the count again.

How this list was compiled: Written by the Game Night Generator editors for this page on 2026-10-03 from general knowledge of table-top and playground games. We wrote every description ourselves and copied no wording from a television show or from another site's list. Party games are passed around freely, so a game here may be played elsewhere under another name. Every game uses ordinary six-sided dice, most of them nothing else; a few add a plastic cup, a playing card, a book or a scarf. No game shares a name with a game on another page of this site, and none repeats a dice game from another one-minute page: no stick held in the mouth, no pencil tongs, no rolling one to six in order and no race to 50. Each was written to be playable in about a minute. The games have not been stopwatch-tested, so every target (ten dice tall, four tens, three traps) is a starting point for the host to raise or lower. The dice sums are the editors' arithmetic: the faces of one die add up to 21; two dice make 36 pairs, six of which total seven, and the totals five to nine cover 24 of the 36. Screened line by line for the clean-deck rule: no game involves a bet, a stake or money, and no die goes near a mouth. Dice are small objects: the American Academy of Pediatrics' choking prevention page asks adults to check for small objects that young children could put in their mouths (https://www.healthychildren.org/English/health-issues/injuries-emergencies/Pages/Choking-Prevention.aspx, read 2026-10-03), so the host counts the dice back into the box. Licence: own work