Best Camping Board Games
Pitch the tent, roll out the sleeping bag, and start a fire — we’re going camping!
Board games aren’t just for rainy days indoors. Camping trips make for a great place to take out a board game. With no phones to distract, playing a board game while sipping a cold beer around the campfire can be a perfect setting for a bonding session.
On our list, you’ll find games that are fun for all ages and levels of players. We all know how full the car gets so we’ve made sure these games are also travel-friendly for your convenience!
Here are our top 10 best camping board games!
🏆 Our Top Picks for Best Camping Board Games
In a hurry? Take a quick peek before you go.
Hive or Hive Pocket
Players: 2
Playing time: 20mins
Hive — A game crawling with possibilities.
Hive is an abstract strategy game for two, made up of hexagon pieces. The pieces have a variety of different creatures, each with a unique way of moving.
It’s a board game with a difference, there’s no board! Instead, pieces are added to create a board. When more pieces are added the game gets feistier as players fight to see who will be the first to capture the opposing Queen Bee.
Hive Pocket is the same fantastic game but in a compact version making it perfect for a trip away! All the pieces fit into a small cloth bag plus the Pocket edition includes a “Mosquito” and a “Ladybug” piece that expand the game and add extra hours of fun!
Carcassonne
Players: 2- 5
Playing time: 30- 45 mins
Develop the landscape of a medieval fortress one tile at a time.
Carcassonne has become a modern classic as it’s simple but has varied gameplay. In this tile-placement game, players fill the countryside around the medieval fortified city. There are many different tiles like roads, cities, monasteries, and field tiles that’ll expand the board.
Once a tile is placed, players work to place followers on the boards. Knights, monks, farmers, and even thieves will help gain more points.
There’s a lot of strategy to the game as you’re faced with decisions of whether to expand your city, block another’s growth, or connect with your opponent’s road and the share points.
There are many different expansion packs like Abbey & Mayor, Inns & Cathedrals, and Traders & Builders that only add to the fun. If you’re camping with kids, there’s also My First Carcassonne which was made to introduce young players to the world of Carcassonne.
Sushi Go!
Players: 2- 5
Playing time: 15mins
If you haven’t played Sushi Go! at a gathering just yet, it’s a pick and pass card drafting game where players are trying to collect the most points by selecting the best combinations.
It’s a quick and easy game that some more experienced players may look down on, but the cute little cards can be deceiving. The game’s simple mechanics lead to intense competition. You’ll need to be clever at the speed of light.
Sushi Go! Isn’t just for camping, it’s also the ultimate party game and can be played by all making it a great investment overall. There’s also Sushi Go! Party that caters to larger groups of sushi enthusiasts.
Mr. Jack
Players: 2
Playing time: 15mins
In the foggy streets of London, The Ripper lurks. Will he slip away into the night? Or will justice prevail?
The portable version of Mr. Jack, Mr. Jack: Pocket Edition takes you into a game of cat and mouse along the streets of London.
Players take on the role of the detectives as they search for Jack the Ripper. The detectives move around the board trying to locate the Ripper while the Ripper player attempts to move about unseen.
The game is played over a maximum of eight rounds and the detectives must solve the killer’s identity to win. There are various action tiles that you can play too that’ll switch tiles and rotate the city.
The game only takes 15 minutes, so if you’re a fan of solving mysteries or putting on a poker face, Mr. Jack: Pocket Edition is right up your alley.
Love Letter
Players: 2- 4
Playing time: 20mins
The princess needs a partner to help her rule. Will she choose you?
Love Letter is a competitive game where the aim is simple. Send your love letter to the princess before the other suitors. In a game of risk and deduction, players start with only one card in their hand. With each play, a player can draw one card and play one card.
Exposing your opponents is key and there’s a fine balance between powerful cards making you a target, and weaker cards tossing you out of the game.
It’s a great game for camping as it’s easy to learn, easy to set up, and takes a maximum of 20 minutes so you can play multiple times, changing up your strategy. The new edition comes in a nifty little bag making it travel-friendly.
Gloom (2nd Edition)
Players: 2- 4
Playing time: 60mins
A game of suspicious incidents and grave consequences.
Gloom is a card game where players control the fate of an eccentric family of misfits. Think Addams family, but more tragic.
What makes Gloom really quite gloomy, is that the goal of the game is sad but simple. Players want their characters to suffer the greatest most devastating tragedies before passing on to a much-deserved rest in peace.
To lighten things up, tragic cards are quite funny like, “Pursued by Poodles” or “Mauled by a Manatee”. These cards will lower your character’s self-worth throughout the game.
Positive points are detrimental, so cards like marriages and happy occasions are best inflicted on your opponents. At the end of the game, the player with the lowest total Family Value wins.
The cards are beautifully made and have great imagery that’ll help ignite a backstory, which is half the fun.
A unique combination of masochism and sadism, Gloom might not be for all but it’s one hell of a scary campfire story starter.
Dice Masters
Players: 2
Playing time: 15- 35 mins
Battle in a head-to-head game of character dice!
If you haven’t played a Dice Masters game before, it’s pretty simple to learn but rather difficult to master. Two players take on the role of masterminds directing the actions of a team of powerful supers. These supers are represented by dice, and the two teams battle each other for victory.
It’s worthwhile giving Dice Masters a go because if you like the mechanics and style of the game, you’ll have many different versions to try out. A few favorites are Dice Masters and Warmhammer’s collab Battle for Ultramar Campaign, Dungeons & Dragons Dice Masters: Trouble in Waterdeep Campaign, and Marvel Dice Masters: Avengers.
Bananagrams
Players:1- 8
Playing time: 15 mins
If you like Scrabble, you’ll go bananas for Bananagrams!.
A game that’s fun for everyone, Bananagrams has friends and families race against each other to build crossword grids. In this fast-paced word-building game speed wins, not points.
Players race to build joined-up words using all of their tiles. When a player has, they shout “PEEL!” and every player has to take a new tile.
What’s great about the game is that it can be easy or challenging, depending on your opponents. If you’ve got a group of wordsmiths for friends, you’ll find the game will get heated.
Bananagrams is perfect for camping as it comes in a fun banana-shaped case so, the word pieces stay together. While the game is easy to play, it’s also a great educational tool for learning if you have kids.
Yahtzee (National Parks Edition)
Players: 1+
The classic game of Yahtzee has an awesome National Parks edition that takes the game to a new level, as well as your camping trip.
Travel from Yellowstone to the Grand Canyon, and beautiful national parks in between, and learn about the history and wonders of the great outdoors.
Yahtzee (National Parks) has unique pictures instead of numbers on the dice. Roll a hiker, deer, canoe, tent, binoculars, hat, or pine tree, just to name a few, and adventure across America’s favorite national parks.
The game comes in handy when camping as it all fits into the Yahtzee dice cup. You can also help support the National Park Service as a certain amount of proceeds benefit the National Park Foundation!
Camp: Travel Edition
Players: 2- 8
Playing time: 15 mins
What better game to play when camping than Camp, the board game?
Camp is a fantastic game for the whole family because it starts off relatively easily and then becomes increasingly more difficult. Everyone can play and learn about nature together.
Camp has quite a few more pieces to keep track of so, be sure to get Camp: The Travel Edition as its travel size and has a resealable travel bag. In the Travel Edition, there are all-new outdoor trivia cards with vibrant full-color pictures about the 50 states, a spinner, and a compact board.
More Camping Games
Wrap-Up
We hope you’ve enjoyed our round-up of the best camping board games around! Whether you’re wanting to play a camping-themed game or looking for the perfect travel-friendly game for your next trip, there are some fantastic options for all things camping!
Which of these board games is your favorite? Drop us a comment below and let us know what you think! We’d love to hear from you.
