13 Fun Games to Play at a Restaurant

Are you looking for restaurant waiting games to play with the kids? Some ideas, perhaps, to keep them occupied while waiting for food to arrive? Here’s 13 Fun Games to Play at a Restaurant, to ensure that everyone (even the folks at the next table!) enjoys their meal out!


1. Play I-Spy

An oldie, but still loved by all kids. Perfect to while away some time while waiting for the food to arrive. For younger kids, play I-Spy with colours, so they can get involved too.

2. Play Yes/No

Objective of the game is to answer questions without using Yes/No.

The winner is usually the person who can’t be caught out, but for younger kids, maybe ask a set number of questions and if they don’t answer Yes/No for those questions, then they have won.

3.  Play Hang-Man

Child drawing headerIt is worth keeping a small notebook and pen in your bag, so that you can produce them when kids start to get impatient. If not, most restaurants will have a pen and some paper/disposable kids menus. The object is to guess the correct word, before you get “hung”.

  1. Start by thinking of a word (bearing in mind your audience)
  2. Write this word in dashes on the page (i.e. a dash per letter)
  3. The other then have to try fill in the letters by guessing a letter – if there are more than one playing, everyone gets their turn.
  4. If they guess a correct letter, write in on the correct space in word (if there are more than one of the letter they pick, put in all of them at same time)
  5. If they guess a letter not in your word, you start to draw the hang-man – and continue to draw the pieces of the picture for every incorrect guess/answer. (Note : It doesn’t have to be a Hang-Man picture – draw any picture in stages/write a word of ~10 letters)
  6. Game continues until correct word is guessed before hang-man picture completed, or hang-man is completed without anyone getting the word.

4.  Have a Pub Quiz

Mum/Dad asks the questions and the kids try to guess the answers. For younger kids, Mum/Dad could provide multiple choice options.

5. Guess People’s Names

Try and guess the names of the other people in the restaurant, and perhaps what they do. You could even elaborate on this further and try and guess what they like, if they have pets, where they live etc.

You may also like How to Survive Eating out with Kids and 21 Waiting Games to Play With Kids

6. Play Capture The Squares

  1. Draw a grid of dots – say 16/20 – and each player takes their turn to draw a line to connect 2 dots.
  2. When a player draws a line and forms a square, they write their initial in that square.
  3. When all grid is completed, you count up the #s of squares with each initial, and winner is player who has most squares.
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