3K Shares Inside: Get those boring preschool board games out of your house and play these kid-approved (and parent-approved!) board games for preschoolers instead. My preschooler’s favorite time of day isn’t a mealtime or going to the park on nice days. It’s not even when I let her watch an old rerun of during her little sister’s naptime so I can get some work done. Her absolute favorite time of day is after her little sister goes to bed at night because that’s when we bust out a board game or card game to play as a family. There’s just one problem.
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The games specifically designed for preschoolers are kind of soul-sucking. The people who invented, and must have had some deep-seated hatred for parents of the world because playing those preschool board games will slowly kill off every brain cell that sleep deprivation hasn’t already taken care of. Those typical preschool board games require no strategy.
They’re all chance and no thought, and at best they prepare your kid to understand the concept of a lottery ticket. And yet as much as I’d love to groom my preschooler into a ruthless whiz, some of the best family games are just too advanced to be board games for 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds. But You Don’t Have to Suffer Through Candyland Ever since my oldest daughter reached board game maturity many years ago, we’ve been on the hunt for the best board games for families.
The ones that won’t make you want to gouge out your eyeballs with a junky plastic game piece. Over the years, we’ve discovered that the world has a ton of absolutely delightful preschool board games to offer families. It’s just that Candyland and its ilk have infiltrated the mainstream psyche as the quintessential board games for preschoolers, so you don’t hear about most of the awesome preschool board games that you’ll actually enjoy playing with your kid.
In our family, we play a board game nearly every night, and we even cleared out our pantry in the kitchen to devote to storing our family board games. It ain’t pretty, but it should give you some idea of how nuts we are about board games and now I’m realizing we still need to donate our copy of Candyland! Board games and card games are one of the best ways you can after a busy day, but if you play a mind-numbing game like Chutes & Ladders, it can have the opposite effect. You’ll be bored out of your skull, and your preschooler will pick up on that. Instead of reconnecting and laughing together, you’ll be anxious for the game to end, leaving your kid to wonder why you don’t want to play with her.
Related: 20 Awesome Preschool Board Games That You’ll Love, Too Get those boring preschool board games out of your house and play these kid-approved (and parent-approved!) board games for preschoolers instead. Because life is too short to be pulling out your hair when you could be giggling with your preschooler. Use this list of fun board games for 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds to beef up your family game collection, and you won’t be sorry. This list grew out of our own experience of being on the hunt for the best family board games and card games for many years. Plus, we researched on Amazon and Google to find all the top suggestions of preschool board games for 4-year-olds and 3-year-olds, then market-tested them with our own crew.
Not only will your preschooler love these board games and card games, but you will too. If you need more ideas after you check out this list, head over to because most games on that list are preschooler-friendly too. But First, a Warning When my preschooler was three years old, she that got stuck in her throat. One emergency room visit, one surgery, and one five-figure hospital bill later, I can tell you firsthand that choking hazards are nothing to take lightly.
And we were lucky that we caught it in time. Some of these games – even the games marketed specifically for preschoolers – contain game pieces that are the perfect size to be choking hazards. Please always keep a close eye on your child when she’s playing with a game that has small pieces. And if you have younger kids, make sure they’re sleeping or otherwise occupied so they don’t find a fallen game piece and pop it into their mouths. Now for the list of the best preschool board games 1.
Time to Play: 5 minutes Number of Players: 2 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds can understand the basic concepts in order to play, but 4-year-olds will do better with the strategy Get It: This preschool board game is like tic-tac-toe with a twist. Just like in tic-tac-toe, you line up three of your pieces to win. But in this game, your piece can also gobble up another person’s piece (or even your own piece) because the game pieces are like nesting dolls. You can also move any pieces you already placed on the board.
While it can get boring to play tic-tac-toe with a preschooler over and over again, this game shakes things up enough to make it fun for all ages in the family. The game is over quickly, which is a plus for a preschooler’s attention span.
My 9-year-old and 4-year-old will sit and play game after game together because they’re having so much fun. The kids don’t even realize they’re building critical thinking, memory skills, and spatial awareness skills while having fun!
One quick warning though: Be sure to get this wooden version of this game, not the newer plastic version. The Amazon reviewers who accidentally ordered the plastic version were bummed because the plastic edition isn’t nearly as sturdy. If you like this game, the same company also makes another board game for preschoolers called that’s on our wish list and has great reviews. Time to Play: 5 minutes Number of Players: 2–8 Minimum Age: Even 2-year-olds can play this one, so it’s a great fit for preschoolers as young as 3 Get It: This is a matching game, but what keeps it interesting for older kids and adults is the competitive twist – you have to be the first one to notice a match and snag it before someone else does.
That sounds like a simple enough task, but our kids actually snake a match out from under our noses more often than you’d think. (I’m blaming chronic parental sleep deprivation.) 3. Time to Play: 20 minutes Number of Players: 2–4 Minimum Age: 4-year-olds can understand the concepts, but older preschoolers tend to enjoy it more Get It: The box says this card game is technically for ages 5 and up, but my preschooler can’t get enough of this game. In this matching game, you can steal piles of matches from other players, and that’s when the real fun begins.
If you don’t have 20 minutes for a full game, it’s easy to shorten it up by playing to a smaller number of points instead of the recommended 77 points. Quick tip: We put a box of tissues in front of our preschooler’s hand so she could lay her cards out on the table without everyone else being able to see them. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 2–6 Minimum Age: Some 2-year-olds can play this, so it’s a great fit for 3-year-old preschoolers and up Get It: This stacking game is a bit like Jenga, except it’s a cooperative game where all the players work together towards a common goal.
Cooperative games like this are great for building teamwork skills, plus younger kids so cooperative games are a refreshing change of pace for them. Even if the tower topples and you “lose” this preschool board game, kids still giggle like mad because knocking stuff over is funny stuff. As your little one gets familiar with the rules, the game rules include a couple variations to keep things challenging and fun. Time to Play: 10 minutes Number of Players: 2–5 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds will need a little help to remember all the rules, so 4-year-old preschoolers and up are an even better fit Get It: This is another card game that’s technically for older kids, but our preschooler has been playing this game since the age of three. Of all the preschool board games and card games in this list, this one is her absolute favorite and our number one go-to as a family. The rules are simple enough for our preschooler to understand, but the game still keeps everyone on their toes.
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We really and truly never get tired of this one. Plus, you can play a whole game in about 10 minutes, which is perfect for getting in a dose of family connection before sending little ones off to bed. By the way, when you’re playing card games with little ones, is a must have. Your child can hold it, or she can set the holder down on the table and easily see all her cards. (This particular card holder has stood the test of time, as opposed to other more flimsy card holders we’ve tried.) 6. Time to Play: 10-20 minutes Number of Players: 2–4 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds can understand the concepts, but 4-year-old preschoolers and up will do best with the strategy Get It: Whereas some preschool board games are all luck and no strategy, this game gives younger kids a fun introduction to thinking strategically.
And of all the games in this list, this game is on my own personal short list of my favorite preschool games to play with my kids – along with, and (see below). To play, you place tiles to build streets in the city of Carcassonne, so the road-building aspect is fantastic for growing spatial intelligence.
If this preschool board game is your first introduction to the world of Carcassonne, be sure to check out the main version of for ages 7 and up when you’re ready to graduate. Time to Play: 5-15 minutes Number of Players: 2 or more Minimum Age: 2-year-olds can play this one (even if their stories don’t make a lot of sense!), so this is a great fit for 3-year-olds and up Get It: This simple card game for preschoolers is a great way to foster your child’s imagination and build literacy skills.
The game has several variations, but our favorite is this: Each player takes turns picking a random card. The first person starts a story with “Once upon a time” and then on the next turn, the next person uses their card as inspiration to add to the story. The stories we come up with as a family always leave us giggling. Even my toddler loves to play! What’s especially great about this game is you have several versions to choose from, and to kick it up a notch you can even mix different sets together:. This one also makes for a fun travel game to take along on road trips or plane rides.
Time to Play: 20 minutes Number of Players: 2-4 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds and up can understand and enjoy this game Get It: We started out with the regular game, but it was a bit of a stretch for preschooler when she was three, so we got the version and it’s perfect for now. Sometimes though, we’ll invite her to join mom or dad’s team so we can play the regular version. What’s cool about this game is that you’ll notice your kids start thinking ahead a couple turns instead of just playing the second they find a match.
To work on letters with your preschooler, is a fun alternative. If you want to give your older kids’ brains a workout, try.
Time to Play: 30 minutes Number of Players: 2–10 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds can understand the matching part of the game, but this is an even better fit for 4-year-old preschoolers and up Get It: The box says this classic card game is for ages 7 and up, but our preschooler has been playing it for a while. When you think about it, Uno is mostly a matching game. And preschoolers love matching games!
When we first started playing, she needed a little help understanding the “special” cards, but after playing it a few times, she’s learned the meaning of the different symbols. And she knows exactly how to unleash the wrath of the Wild Draw Four card on her poor mother. To simplify this game for your little ones, you can skip keeping score at the end of each hand. Bonus: If your kids love Uno, be sure to check out for an extra dose of giggles. It’s impossible not to laugh when you’re playing with those giant cards! Or by HABA Time to Play: 15 minutes for Hoot Owl Hoot; 10 minutes for Orchard Number of Players: 2–4 for Hoot Owl Hoot; 2-8 for Orchard Minimum Age: Both games are a great fit for 3-year-olds and up Get It: or When it comes to cooperative games for preschoolers, these two are our favorites aside from above. But because the game play for these two games is so similar, I would recommend picking either Hoot Owl Hoot or Orchard, but not both.
My kids prefer Orchard, and the wooden game pieces are awfully nice. But they also love Hoot Owl Hoot, so if the wooden Orchard game is a bit outside your price range, Hoot Owl Hoot is a great alternative. We also ended up receiving a similar cooperative game as a gift:. That one was fun too, but it isn’t a go-to for us in the same way that Orchard and Hoot Owl Hoot have been. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 2–6 Minimum Age: Even toddlers can play this one, so it’s an excellent pick for 3-year-olds and up Get It: This preschool game is similar to the regular version of but simplified for younger kids with larger images and fewer images on each card. My favorite part of this matching game is that it’s so portable. I can throw it in my purse when we’re heading somewhere the kids will have to wait a bit, like the doctor’s office or to a restaurant.
The small tin holding the cards also makes this game a great fit as a. If your preschooler loves this game, you can also check out. Time to Play: 30-45 minutes Number of Players: 2–4 Minimum Age: Best for older preschoolers aged 4 and up Get It: or This game took a little practice for our preschooler at first, so take it slow and end the game early when you’re first teaching young kids. To speed up the game, we skip keeping score and put the focus on matching the colors and patterns. You can play a whole game in about 30-45 minutes, and then after the game our preschooler will extend the fun by building towers with the tiles.
This game is also available as a, so we keep it in our suitcase and take it with us wherever we go. Time to Play: 20 minutes Number of Players: 2–6 Minimum Age: The matching concepts are a good fit for 3-year-olds and up Get It: or (cards and companion book) Playing this classic card game with your kids when you’re exhausted levels out the playing field. I don’t believe in letting my kids win, but our 9-year-old and preschooler beat me and my husband on a regular basis. We have a couple sets of this game – one that helps our preschooler work on letter recognition, and another set and other artists. Our kids get exposed to art, and we get to hear our preschooler say “Van Gogh,” which is pretty much the cutest thing ever.
(If you like the idea of the art edition of Go Fish, they also have a set with and another for.) 14. Time to Play: 60 minutes Number of Players: 2–4 Minimum Age: Some 3-year-olds can understand the concepts of this game, so it’s an even better fit for 4-year-olds and 5-year-olds Get It: or This is supposed to be for ages 8 and up, but our preschooler was still able to understand the rules after one practice game when she was three. Several Amazon reviewers have said their preschoolers get into this game as well. Plus, it’s great reinforcement for kids who are learning to recognize numbers. If you can, go for the of this one to make it even easier on young kids to tell the difference between the numbers. Time to Play: 20 minutes Number of Players: 2–5 Minimum Age: The game includes variations for players as young as 3 Get It: You probably won’t find this game on most lists of preschool board games and card games because the box says ages 6 and up.
But because this game is really just a matching game, preschoolers catch on quickly. Plus, the instructions come with different variations for different ages as young as three, which makes it easy to modify the game to fit the people playing.
You play the cards kind of like – which can be a fun preschool board game itself! – and match up different patterns to the cards already on the table. This is a game my husband and I love to play after the kids are in bed (with the most advanced variation on the rules!) so it’s a cost-effective and flexible addition to your family board game collection. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 2-5 Minimum Age: 4-year-olds can understand the basic gameplay, but 5-year-olds are a better fit for the strategy Get It: My family’s top go-to card games are and this quirky little card game.
My kids will happily sit and play this for an hour or more – round after round after round. To play, you pick one card from your hand to keep, then pass your cards to the next person. Everyone keeps doing this until all the cards are picked. Then you score points based on which cards you picked to keep: Did you get the most maki rolls? Did you dip your nigiri in wasabi to triple its value?
When my preschooler was three, she loved this game, even though she didn’t get the strategy of which cards to keep. In fact, she didn’t care who won because she had so much fun just picking her favorite cards and passing the rest along. Now that she’s older, she’s starting to pick up on the strategy – and her 3-year-old younger sister is now in that “having a blast picking cards” phase. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 1-4 Minimum Age: 3-year-olds can play this with a little help, so it’s an even better fit for 4-year-olds and up Get It: This preschool board game is like but for 3-year-olds and 4-year-olds. A fox stole a pot pie, and you have to figure out which fox it was before they escape into the foxhole.
My kids will regularly play this cooperative whodunnit game independently, and I love watching them work together as a team to solve the mystery. This is a fun little game to build preschoolers’ logic and deductive reasoning skills.
The Best Preschool Board Games for Kids to Play Independently All the preschool board games in the first part of this list are enjoyable for a wide range of ages, from preschooler to parent and everything in between. But a few preschool board games are lots of fun for kids but may not necessarily be your top pick as a parent. If you have more than one child or your child likes to play board games with friends or kids in the family, consider the preschool board games in the next section of this list. You’ll likely want to play with the kids the first couple of times to help them learn the rules, but after that you can peace out and let the kids play independently while you sneak a catnap on the couch. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 2-4 Minimum Age: Some toddlers can play this one, so this is a great pick for preschoolers age 3 and up Get It: This preschool memory game lets kids pretend play they’re at the grocery store filling their cart with everything on their shopping list. My preschooler absolutely loves this game, which is probably an indication that I should put her to work at the grocery store more often.
My toddler loves to join in on this one too, but her attention span doesn’t last for a whole game. If your child loves this game, you can get expansion packs for and for. Time to Play: 15 minutes Number of Players: 2-4 Minimum Age: Even toddlers get into this one, so it’s excellent for 3-year-olds and up Get It: This is one of the preschool board games you see recommended often, and preschoolers definitely tend to enjoy it. But I prefer my kids to play this one independently because it’s almost 100 percent based on luck with very little strategy. Still, young kids have fun with this game, as you can see from the reviews. If you do get this game, just make sure to pick up a couple other preschool board games from this list so you’ll have something you enjoy playing with your kids.
Time to Play: 30 minutes Number of Players: 2-4 Minimum Age: Toddlers can play this game with a little help, so 3-year-olds and up are a great fit Get It: Like or, this falls into the category of cooperative preschool board games, and my preschooler loves playing this one too. But game play takes about twice as long for this game, so it’s not as appealing as the other cooperative games we own. The part that keeps this game interesting for us as parents is the “I Spy” component of looking for little details on the game board.
Still, this game isn’t our first choice to play with the kids. We encourage them to play independently, and they have just as much fun! 6 More Preschool Board Games That Come Highly Recommended These preschool board games and card games come highly recommended from friends and family (and those lovely souls who write helpful Amazon reviews!), but we haven’t taken them for a test drive with our preschooler quite yet. If the above list didn’t give you any new ideas, try these preschool board games next.
I’ll update this post as we make our way through testing the rest of these with our kiddos:. – This popped up again and again in my research of the best preschool board games. As part of this interactive game, kids get to move their bodies and practice yoga moves. – In this memory game, you find matching eggs hidden under the penguins. After preschoolers get a handle on the basic rules, you can amp up the strategy with a variation where you’re allowed to steal eggs from other players.
– I first heard about this game on the radio, where they described it as a coding board game for preschoolers. Although kids won’t realize it, as they play they’ll be learning the fundamentals of programming.
Sneaky educational fun!. – This memory game is more interactive than a standard matching game. Plus, it has sturdy wooden pieces that will stand up to little kids playing the game lots. – Reviewers say this game is even fun for adults to play, and it’s a great way for kids to practice counting and math skills. – This is a stacking game like Jenga but more fun for preschoolers. Reviewers appreciated the durable wooden pieces, unlike some other stacking games for preschoolers made with low-quality plastic. This one comes from the same company who makes, which my kids love.
Download my FREE cheat sheet as a bonus for joining my newsletter: Want More? For more awesome game ideas, check out because most games on that list are preschooler-friendly too. Your Turn Which are your favorite preschool board games? Share in a comment below! This came to my inbox today and was so well timed! As a child, I remember family board games being fun as well as teaching lots of skills, but I was already in school when those memories were formed.
With 8, almost 5 and almost 2 year old daughters, we’re ready to throw out Ker-plunk, kids monopoly and ludo. Out the window, hard. We’re UK so yet to check if we can get all of these here, but this will now form our present request list I think. With 2 kids birthdays in Aug and Sept, then the Read more ». What a great list! I’ve been keeping my eye out for good board games for our Family Game Nights and so glad these are road tested!
I am putting ALL of them on my wishlist! One game that my 6 yr old and 3 yr old like to play together (does require reading) is Silly Street. The game board is a puzzle to put together first then the cards to advance are interactive with the board and each other.
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Another one we love is Go Go Gelato. Who doesn’t like playing with ice cream?! Thanks again for taking Read more ».
Great list!!! We actually own many of these games My 5 year old’s current favorite is Rat a Tat Cat by Gamewright.
I really like how the rules can be adapted for an “easy” and “hard” version of the game giving the game more longevity. She also loves to play Outfoxed, Crazy Eights, Go Ape, and Busytown. She’ll be getting Sleeping Queens this Christmas!! I would love for her to get into RPG such as My Little Pony Tails of Equestrian, but I think she might be too young for that still. I have Sushi Go but haven’t tried it Read more ».
It is still uncertain if Jeremy Lin will play today or not since Lin has caught cold from the China trip. Coach Clifford will continue to experiment with different lineup for the rest of preseason games but it’s comforting to know that JLin has aced his assignments with the 1st and 2nd unit. Coaches will certainly consider his unique ability to make everyone better in the Hornets system, especially during crunch time in the 4th quarter to win a game. The playmaking of Kemba, JLin and Batum will certainly create unpredictability to keep opposing teams on their heels and help them win a lot of close games. If JLin plays, let’s hope we see Kemba/Lin/Batum lineup to continue growing their chemistry.