10 Best Zoom Games to Play with Colleagues
The shift towards remote-first practices in the workplace is becoming more prevalent nowadays. The development and maintenance of effective virtual teams are becoming an integral part of the workplace culture.
A remote workspace can help your organization attract top talent from all corners of the globe, making it easier for them to work remotely. This work culture also reduces expenses and improves the mental understanding of the workers.
Remote businesses have long struggled with solving one issue, and finding a solution is difficult.
What does that challenge look like?
Building a strong corporate culture and motivating employees.
Team building involves giving your employees clear instructions on doing their job, but it goes further. It would be best to create an organizational culture that caters to your employees’ emotional needs.
The pandemic and lockdown caused people to be unable to leave their homes. As per the stats, 16 percent of companies worldwide are entirely remote, which has increased people’s anxiety levels.
The best way to eliminate anxiety and make employees stress-free is to play a game. Games aren’t just for fun; they also boost employee engagement, productivity, and team morale. The variety and convenience of zoom plans let your team immerse in the fun.
12 Best Zoom Games
Here are the 10+ best Zoom games for coworkers that you can play virtually on Zoom to help you release stress and have fun.
Table of Contents
Solitaire
The objective of Solitaire is to arrange all cards into foundation piles, sorted by suit and in ascending order, which requires strategic thinking and careful planning. It’s an excellent game for solving collaboratively with colleagues and friends over platforms like Zoom, offering a fun way to engage in team-building and problem-solving.
Solitaire games, including various versions, can be played online at Solitaire Bliss, providing a user-friendly and accessible platform for both individual and group play.
Spades
The gameplay of Spades involves four players forming two partnerships, with the objective being to accurately predict the number of tricks each team will take in each round. It’s a dynamic and engaging game for playing with colleagues and friends both in person or over Facetime and Zoom, as it encourages strategic thinking, communication, and teamwork within pairs. Spades can be played online at Spades.co.
Lightening Scavenger Hunt
Lightning scavenger hunts are best-known for their effectiveness as company team-building exercises. It can be played in either a small group or a large one by using Zoom. During this game, your team members become energized and motivated for the rest of the meeting.
Ensure that your team is prepared with a list of items they’ll need in their homes before starting the game. There are no restrictions on your chosen items, but you may select a theme, such as “items beginning with the letter R” or “blue items.” Adding an incentive offers a prize to anyone who gets the objects back the fastest.
Bet on the Crowd
This game allows people to test their knowledge of their coworkers and is a great example of team building. Teams can utilize the Poll feature on Zoom to ask questions to be answered by the rest of the team.
Once the polls are completed, every member will have to predict the final results. The preference will be revealed, and everyone who guesses correctly gets the point. The member who ends up with the most accurate predictions once all the rounds are completed will be crowned the winner.
Person, Place, Animal, and Things
This is probably a game that most would be familiar with during school days. But what’s to say something you enjoyed as a kid won’t be as enjoyable as a professional? This game works exceptionally well as a team bonding exercise. To start things off, pick a letter randomly or go in the order of the alphabet. The person who can shout out the name in the quickest possible time wins the game.
Every name must start with the letter which was announced at the beginning. Also, make sure not to allow just any name in that category. The name should be of someone famous or someone from your office itself.
Would I Lie To You?
Play this hilarious Zoom game with your coworkers. It’s based on the popular British show Would I Lie to You? It’s a bit like Two Truths and a Lie, but slightly more involved.
Here’s how it works.
- Divide the attendees of your virtual event into two groups. Then you’ll need to use Zoom’s breakout room feature to allow the two teams to talk privately.
- Each team will have to work together to create an outrageous and unbelievable story to share with the other. This can be a completely made-up story or a true story.
- Return to your main Zoom session once both teams have decided on their story (and a time limit has been set).
- Next, go back and forth between teams, with each player asking one question to see if the other team’s story is credible.
- Return to the breakout rooms after each person has asked their question so that the teams can discuss whether or not they believe the other team’s story.
- Finally, return to the main room and cast your vote. Each correct guess earns a point, and you can play as many rounds as you want.
Something in Common
Playing Something in Common on Zoom is one of the best ways to break the ice. Through this game, employees will be able to connect with others who share similar interests.
- As a team, try to identify the things you have in common the most.
- As a team, you should search for the unique thing among your teammates without considering the physical characteristics of places.
- As your team moves onto round three, you should have them find the unique thing in a specific category, like high school.
Zoom’s breakout room feature is one of its most powerful game support features. Split your group into four or five breakout rooms to make this game more exciting.
Charades
Everyone knows and loves charades, a classic family party game. It’s also ideal for virtual team-building activities. Despite this, due to the limited view provided by the camera, the game can become significantly more difficult.
When you play charades online, you can prevent cheating (which is all too common in the traditional game) by asking the performer to mute their microphone before you begin. A watch, pen, and paper are all you need to get started. Charades is a simple game that will improve your team’s communication skills.
Virtual Werewolf
You know how much fun and energy it can bring if you’ve ever played a werewolf in person. Virtual werewolf is a similar concept, but it takes place entirely online. To play, players must send private messages identifying their roles. Werewolves, medics, hunters, seers, and villagers should be among the roles. Gather your coworkers into a Zoom room as soon as everybody knows who they are.
As everyone closes their eyes, they declare that night has fallen. You should let each round consist of the werewolf eating someone, the medic trying to save someone, and the seer guessing who the werewolf is. Werewolf, medic, and seer should reply through private messages if you want the mystery to be alive. Then reveal if the werewolf succeeded after the sun had risen. Everyone can speculate on who the werewolf is, and in each round, players can vote them out. Only the strongest werewolf will stay alive until the end.
Online Murder Mystery
Online murder mystery events are an excellent way for employees to have fun and socialize. You can hire an experienced third-party organizer to upgrade your virtual meetings. Companies like Escapely involve live actors to enhance the experience.
Murder mysteries have become a popular team-building activity because they improve teamwork and problem-solving skills.
To make the experience more immersive, encourage players to dress up and gather props to match the event’s theme. Also, don’t forget to utilize the background features on zoom for added realism.
Hypothetical Situations
Hypothetical Situations is one of the most popular and effective games, particularly in stages of employee onboarding, large groups of workshops. Let’s imagine you are training your customer support team to handle difficult refunds. You can present various situations and ask them to develop ideas on how they would tackle them.
This activity allows your team to work together and use their skills to tackle any problems. It also shows how your team works under pressure and their steps to stay cool, calm, and collected.
Codenames
If you’ve ever played Codenames in person, you know how much fun and energy it can bring. Don’t worry if you haven’t. It’s a great Zoom game to play with your coworkers. And, best of all, Codenames is available for free online.
Codenames is a game in which two teams compete to see how many words in a set are related to a hint word given by a teammate (known as the spymaster). Begin by dividing your teams – the red and blue teams.
While playing, have one of the players share their screen. The player who is sharing their screen should not be a snoop. Send the groups to separate rooms to give them time and space to finalize their strategies. The game is won by the team that correctly guesses the color of all cards first.
Conclusion
Virtual team members can feel isolated from their peers if proper measures do not improve communication and human interactions. They require regular informal interpersonal interactions with their colleagues to feel connected to their company.
They are more likely to trust each other and seek assistance when they have a genuine sense of belonging and bonding.
In order to build a productive remote team, encouraging interactive sessions and playing virtual video games on Zoom can be extremely beneficial. They’re excellent ways to make meetings more interesting and engaging.