How to play this charades game online
- Pick one of the 5 decks and a round length — 60, 90 or 120 seconds.
- Turn the phone sideways and hold it flat against your forehead, screen facing the group.
- Everyone else describes the word on screen. They can act, rhyme, or list examples — never say the word.
- Nod the phone down when you guess it, up to pass, then bring it back upright for the next word.
- When the clock runs out you get a word-by-word review of every hit and every pass, plus a shareable score.
The word decks
262 hand-written words across 5 decks, all generic — no film titles, no character names, nothing borrowed.
- 🤖 AI & Tech (50 words) — Standup vocabulary. Brutal for the non-engineers in the room.
- 🎬 Movie Night (50 words) — How films get made and watched — no titles, no spoilers.
- 🦩 Animals (52 words) — The easy one. Give it to the eight-year-old.
- 🤸 Actions (52 words) — Verbs only. This is where the room falls apart.
- 🥟 Foods (58 words) — Warning: everyone gets hungry by round two.
Questions
- How many people do you need to play?
- Two is enough — one guesser holding the phone and one clue-giver. It gets better at four or more, because the clues start competing with each other.
- Does it work without a tilt sensor?
- Yes. If no motion readings arrive — most desktops, and any phone where you decline the sensor prompt — the game switches to tap mode automatically: tap the bottom half of the screen for a hit, the top half to pass. Arrow keys ↓ and ↑ do the same thing on a keyboard.
- Why does iPhone ask for permission?
- Safari requires an explicit tap before any web page may read the motion sensor. Tap "Enable tilt controls" on the setup screen. The readings are used to detect a nod and are never stored or sent anywhere.
- Can a word come up twice in one round?
- No. Each round shuffles a fresh deck from the chosen pack and deals from it without replacement. If you clear the whole deck the round ends early — and that counts as a win.
Want a party game that stays quiet? Try Imposter Word, the pass-the-phone undercover game. Or browse the whole games shelf and the free tools workbench.