21 Secret Santa Games Everyone Will Actually Want to Play

The gifts are wrapped, the music is on, and everyone is standing around the tree with nothing to do but stare at the pile. That gap between arriving and opening is where a party either warms up or goes flat, and the right game fills it without anyone needing to memorise rules.

None of what follows needs a games cupboard or a craft weekend. A die from a board game, a jar from the pantry, a bag of candy canes from the drugstore: most of these cost under fifteen pounds and come together on the afternoon of the party.

Pick two or three rather than all twenty one. One swap game, one toss or guess, and one thing for people to make with their hands is enough to carry a room from awkward to genuinely loud.

This post contains affiliate links. If you buy through them, I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

Gift-Swap Dice Games

This is the one everyone actually came for: the moment the gifts stop sitting under the tree and start moving round the room. A die and a hand-lettered board turn a polite handover into the loudest ten minutes of the night.

Roll a Gingerbread Dice Board to Keep, Pass or Steal

Nobody wants to be the one standing there holding a badly wrapped gift while everyone else already knows what they got.

A rules board fixes that in one go: paint six actions onto a sheet of card in a shaky gingerbread-man script, one per die face (keep it, pass left, pass right, steal from anyone, swap with the person opposite, roll again), prop it against the gift pile and let people take turns rolling.

Works for 6 to 20 adults and runs about fifteen minutes if you cap it at two rolls each. Call the steal action a swap, not a grab, so the person who loses a gift gets the stealer’s old one instead of standing there with nothing.

The board itself costs almost nothing: a piece of card, a marker and a die you already own; skip the paint pens if you’re short on time and just write it in thick marker.

Spin an Oversized Die for Faster Group Steals

If the first board feels too slow for a loud crowd, size up the die instead of the group. A soft four inch die with faces for stealing the gift on your right, passing everything two seats along, and freezing the round keeps the whole table moving rather than waiting on one roller at a time.

Use the same gift pool as any dice swap game: everyone brings one wrapped gift within an agreed budget, and the round ends the moment every gift has changed hands at least once.

Whoever is holding a gift when the timer goes off keeps it. A plush die runs about ten pounds and survives being tossed across a crowded table, which a wooden one does not.

Dress a Tinsel Dice Board and Cap Everyone at One Roll

Some groups genuinely do not have twenty minutes to spare on stealing gifts back and forth all night. Dress the same dice rules board in a thin strip of tinsel and two or three miniature wrapped boxes glued along the bottom edge, then add one line underneath the rules: one roll each, no exceptions.

This version suits any size group because the length of the game no longer depends on headcount; one roll per person means a party of thirty finishes in the same ten minutes as a party of eight.

The only real risk is someone arguing for a second go once they see their gift swapped away, so say the one-roll rule out loud before the first roll, not after.

Play a Chip-Swap Dice Game With Tiny Wrapped Treats

Run this one before the real exchange, as a warm-up round that uses nothing more valuable than candy. Give each player three small wrapped chocolates or mini candles to start.

Everyone rolls three dice at once (use three regular dice or a set marked with letters): roll a letter matching pass-left, pass that many treats left; pass-right sends them right; a third roll sends treats into a shared center pile; any other result means keep what you rolled.

Players drop out once they run out of treats, and the last person still holding any wins the whole center pile. It plays in under ten minutes and works for 4 to 12 people. Swap the chocolates for small coins or buttons if anyone in the group is avoiding sugar before dinner.

Mixer Icebreaker Games

Before anyone touches a present, get people out of their chairs and talking to someone other than the person they arrived with. These need no equipment beyond a sheet of paper or a bowl of candy, and they are over in under ten minutes.

Hand Out a Statement Sheet So Matching Guests Swap Gifts

Half the room still hasn’t spoken to the other half by the time the gifts come out, and that’s the actual problem this fixes. Print a short sheet of statements (wearing something red, has already watched a Christmas film this week, baked something this month) and read them out one at a time.

Anyone the statement is true for stands up, and standing guests swap gifts with each other, not with anyone still seated. If only one person stands for a line, skip it and move on.

Needs no dice and no prop beyond the printed sheet, so it costs nothing beyond paper, and it works for any group size from six up to a full office floor.

Match Striped Candy Canes by Color to Find a Swap Partner

This one quietly assigns swap partners without anyone having to ask who wants to trade with whom, which matters more than it sounds like it would in a mixed group of coworkers and partners.

Buy candy canes in four or five distinct colors (traditional red and white, plus green, blue and pink striped ones), snap enough in half for every guest to get one piece, and mix the halves in a basket.

Each guest pulls a half-cane and finds the person holding the matching color and pattern; the two who match become swap partners for whichever gift game comes next.

Suits kids and adults together, and a bag of mixed candy canes runs under ten pounds. If you only have the classic red stripe on hand, tie a different colored ribbon around each pair instead.

Toss Mini Beanbags at the Christmas Characters Before Gifts Open

A quick round of this clears the awkward first ten minutes while people are still arriving and taking off coats. Stand three or four cardboard cutouts of a snowman, a reindeer and a gingerbread man against a wall, each with a round hole cut at chest height, and give everyone two small beanbags.

Each guest throws from a line marked on the floor about two metres back; land a bag through any hole and that guest gets to pick their position in the gift-swap order that follows, which is a genuinely useful prize since going first or last changes how a steal game plays out.

Suits kids and families best, and the cutouts can be flattened cardboard boxes painted rather than bought.

Target and Toss Games

Something to aim at and something to aim with: these are the games people line up for twice. Keep them near a wall or at the end of a clear hallway, well away from the gift pile and the drinks table.

Fish Candy Canes Out of a Tray With a Candy Cane Hook

Low, slow and strangely satisfying: this is the one guests go back to between rounds of the louder games. Fill a shallow tray with crushed white sugar or shredded paper and stand a dozen or more candy canes hook-up in it, then tie a string to a spare candy cane so it dangles like a fishing rod.

Give each player thirty seconds to lift out as many canes as they can using only the hook, no hands. Most canes lifted in the time wins, and the tray can be refilled for the next player in seconds.

Suits kids and mixed groups, runs under ten pounds in candy canes, and the only real snag is a tray set too deep, which buries the hooks; keep the layer shallow enough that the hooked ends stay visible.

Putt a Candy Cane Ball Into a Gingerbread House Door

Build a small gingerbread-style house (real or a painted cardboard model, roughly knee height) with a wide striped opening cut where the front door would be, and set it at the end of a clear run of floor. Each player gets three putts, using a candy cane turned handle-down as the club and a small white ball.

A putt that goes clean through the doorway scores a point, and whoever has the most points after three rounds each gets first pick from the gift table before the swap game begins.

Takes up more floor space than most games here, so it suits a living room with a clear run of at least ten feet rather than a tight apartment; shorten the run and use a soft foam ball if space is limited.

Toss a Snowball Into a Triangle of Red Cups

The classic cup-toss shape, rebuilt for a family room instead of a dorm. Arrange about ten red cups in a triangle at each end of a long table, fill each with a splash of water rather than anything stronger, and leave the middle of the table clear as a no-go zone.

Players alternate tossing a ping pong ball from opposite ends; land it in a cup and that cup is removed from play. First team to clear every one of the other side’s cups wins, and the losing side does the first round of present-unwrapping cleanup.

Needs about twenty cups and one ball, under five pounds total, and the only real hazard is string lights hanging low over the table, so route them well clear of the throwing lane.

Feed Santa a Soft Cookie Through His Mustache

A standing Santa cutout with a wide felt mustache and a generous gap cut underneath it turns feeding the big man into an actual sport. Mark a throwing line about two metres away and give each player five soft fabric or foam cookies to lob at the gap.

Count how many land through cleanly out of five throws; most through after everyone has had a turn wins a small prize, and ties get one sudden-death extra throw each.

The whole setup packs flat afterward, which matters if you’re hosting in a small flat and need the floor space back for dinner. Keep the cookies soft (felt or foam, never anything hard) since they’ll be thrown at head height more than once.

Run a Candy Cane Putting Course Down the Hallway

If the living room is already full of chairs and gift bags, take the golf game out into the hallway instead, where there is actually room to swing. Set the same gingerbread house target at the far end, mark a starting line with washi tape, and run players through one at a time rather than in a crowd.

Three putts each, closest to the door without going in scores a point, actually through the door scores three. Keep everyone not currently playing out of the lane entirely, since a hallway offers no room to step back from a swing.

This version needs nothing extra beyond what the living room version already uses, just a longer, straighter stretch of floor.

Guess-the-Jar Games

Low effort, high payoff: fill a jar, let people guess, hand out one small prize. These run themselves in the background all evening and need almost no supervision.

Guess How Many Marshmallow Snowballs Fill the Jar

Count a batch of white mini marshmallows into a clear glass jar beforehand and write the true number down somewhere nobody can peek, then tie a wide red ribbon and a small gold bell around the jar’s neck. Set it out early with a stack of blank slips and a pen beside it.

Guests write their name and a guess as they arrive, before any games start, and the slip closest to the true count without going over wins the jar itself plus a small bonus like a chocolate orange.

Costs almost nothing, suits any size of group, and the only thing that goes wrong is guests shaking the jar to count by sound, so set it somewhere slightly out of easy reach.

Count the Candy Before Anyone Guesses the Bottle

Same idea as the marshmallow jar, run with a mix of wrapped chocolates and hard candies instead, which photographs with a lot more color variation on the shelf.

Fill a tall glass bottle with a loose mix of foil-wrapped sweets and striped hard candy, count the exact total as you go, and label the bottle with the party’s name rather than the number.

Closest guess on the slip wins the full bottle to take home, which doubles as a party favor for the winner.

Works for any group, costs roughly the price of two bags of mixed sweets, and the common mistake is packing the candy too loosely, which makes the count look smaller than it is; press it down gently as you fill so the bottle reads full.

Estimate the Mini Ornaments Packed Into a Glass Vase

A third version of the same guessing game, built for a group that has already seen the marshmallow jar at every other party this season. Pack a wide glass vase with small glass ball ornaments in two or three sizes, in cranberry red and gold, and set it where the light catches the glass.

Count them as you load the vase, then run the same slip-and-guess system as the other two jars: closest guess takes the vase and its contents home as a centerpiece.

This one costs more than a bag of candy since it uses actual ornaments, so only run it if you already own a spare box of plain glass balls, or swap in cheap plastic ones instead.

Unwrap-to-Win Games

For the group that wants one big, slightly ridiculous centrepiece moment rather than lots of small games. Build it once, set it on the table early, and let the dice decide who gets to dig in.

Roll Doubles to Unwrap the Giant Clear-Wrapped Prize Ball

This is the centrepiece game, the one that photographs as a whole event rather than a single prop, so build it early in the evening and let it sit on the table while other games run around it.

Wrap small treats, scratch cards and a few folded bills into the center of a ball shape using layer after layer of clear cellophane, winding tightly so nothing shifts loose, and finish with a wide ribbon bow holding the outer layer in place.

Players sit in a circle and take turns rolling two dice; whoever rolls doubles puts on a pair of oven mitts and unwraps as fast as they can (mitts make it clumsy on purpose) until the next person rolls doubles and takes over.

Whatever falls free during someone’s turn is theirs to keep. The ball can take twenty minutes to build the first time, so make it a day ahead rather than on the morning of the party.

Pass a Layered Parcel Until the Music Stops

A smaller, quieter cousin of the prize ball, better suited to a party with younger guests mixed in among the adults. Wrap one small prize in several layers of paper, taping each layer separately, and pass the whole parcel around a seated circle while music plays in the next room.

Whoever is holding the parcel when the music stops peels off exactly one layer and the parcel keeps moving. The person who peels away the final layer keeps whatever is inside.

Keep it to six or seven layers so the game actually finishes before everyone loses interest, and if there’s no one to control the music, set a phone timer instead and stop it at random intervals.

Decorating Stations

The quietest games on this list and often the ones people stay at longest. Set these up as a side table rather than the main event: they work while the gift games are happening, not instead of them.

Decorate a Giant Gingerbread Man for a Funniest-Face Prize

Set one oversized gingerbread cookie at every place at the table, along with a small piping bag of white icing and shared muffin trays of toppings (red and white candy buttons, silver dragées, mini chocolate chips) running down the center. Give everyone ten minutes with no instructions beyond decorate.

Once time is up, walk the table and vote out loud on categories like funniest face and most colourful outfit; the host hands out one small prize per category rather than a single overall winner, which keeps more people happy.

Suits 6 to 12 guests comfortably since the icing bowls need to reach everyone without a long wait, and oversized cookies run a few pounds more than standard size, so order them a day ahead from a bakery if baking isn’t on the cards.

Trim a Mini Tree for a Best-Dressed Prize

Hand each guest a small tabletop tree, bare, along with a shared bowl of mini ornaments, ribbon offcuts in two or three colors and a handful of tiny bows. Give a firm five minute limit, since an open-ended decorating challenge tends to run long once people start swapping ornaments across the table.

At time’s up, guests vote for the best-dressed tree by placing a single token coin in front of their favorite, excluding their own; most coins wins a small prize.

Works for any group size as long as there’s one tree per person, and the common problem is a tree so small it tips under the weight of a few ornaments, so weight the base with a handful of pebbles or dried beans before anyone starts.

Build a Candy House, Then Guess Everyone’s Secret Theme

Give each guest a small cracker-box house, an upturned ice cream cone for a roof, and a tray of toppings split into tiny bowls. Before anyone starts, have each guest write a secret decorating theme on a slip (an elf’s house, a house underwater, the messiest house in town) and fold it away unseen.

Once every house is finished, slips get read out loud one at a time and the group guesses which house matches which theme; the guest whose theme is guessed fastest wins a small prize, and the slowest theme to guess gets a joke prize instead.

Needs one tray per guest, so it suits a table of 6 to 12 rather than a very large party, and light the table with flameless candles rather than real ones so nobody leans a sleeve over a flame mid-build.

Pipe Icing Onto Cookies From a Rainbow Sprinkle Bar

A simpler station for the end of the table, good for guests who decorated their gingerbread man early and want something quick to do with their hands while the gift games finish up.

Lay out plain round or star sugar cookies, small bowls of icing in white and one or two colors, and sprinkles split by color into tiny paper liners (pink, blue, orange, purple) so nobody’s spoon ends up in someone else’s bowl.

There’s no scoring here, just a steady supply of cookies for people to decorate and eat as they go, which makes it the one entry on this list that works as a quiet fallback rather than a competitive round.

Costs very little since sprinkles and plain cookies are cheap even close to the holiday, and the only real fix needed is restocking liners partway through, since one enthusiastic sprinkler can empty a cup in minutes.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many people do you need for Secret Santa games?

Three is the technical minimum for a name draw, but most of these games need at least six to feel full, and the dice-swap and jar games scale comfortably up to twenty or more.

What’s the difference between Secret Santa and White Elephant games?

In Secret Santa each person draws one name and buys specifically for that person, while White Elephant has everyone bring one gift that anyone can unwrap or steal on their turn.

How many times can you steal a gift in these games?

Most groups cap stealing at two or three times per gift before it freezes with whoever holds it, which keeps the round moving instead of looping the same gift back and forth all night.

What’s a good Secret Santa budget for games and prizes?

For the main gift most groups land on 20 to 35 dollars, while small game prizes (the jar winner, the cup-toss winner) usually stay under five dollars each so they don’t outshine the real exchange.

How does the Secret Santa dice game actually work?

One die face corresponds to one action, such as keep, pass left or steal, and players take turns rolling and following whatever the die shows until everyone has had an equal number of rolls.

Can kids and adults play the same Secret Santa games together?

Toss, fishing and jar-guessing games suit mixed ages well, while the dice-steal games work best kept to an adult-only round so the stealing rule doesn’t upset a younger player.