Let’s face it: hotel rooms may be amazing, comfortable, high-end, luxurious, swish, fancy, and any number of other adjectives… and yet still boring. Sure, you might have a TV. Maybe some guides about the local area. Not much else.

After all, even the nicest hotel room is kind of generic. It’s designed to be comfortable for the broadest range of people possible, not to cater to your specific tastes. That’s fine, but if you’re going to be in there for more than a few hours, having some activities you can swap to is absolutely key! We’re always looking for ways to improve our lives, and ensuring that your downtime at the hotel is truly relaxing – whether you’re travelling for work or pleasure –can make all the difference.

So, games. That’s where our focus turns. But what games can you play in a hotel room that won’t fill your suitcase, make too much noise and disturb the other rooms, or use up your probably limited brain power? Let’s take a look.

Live Casino Games

Want the energy of a night out… without the actual “out” part? It used to be impossible, but now, it’s really simple to achieve this. You simply have to log into a live casino online, and you’ve got games galore at your disposal. Poker, blackjack, baccarat, roulette, and more, the kinds of games that you once had to don your finest threads and embark on a trip to the casino for.

But why are we specifying live casino games? Well, really, because of the atmosphere. Sure, you could play an RNG version, and you’d still enjoy yourself, but the dealer adds a little something special, an extra piece that would otherwise be missing. Watching them stream from a high-quality studio and knowing that the players around you are equally deeply immersed just takes the game up a notch and creates space for moments like this.

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There’s a special piece de resistance sensation to playing with a live dealer, and these games have many advantages as hotel fare – they’re quiet, they’re low-energy, and you can drop in and out of them whenever you want.

Physical Card Games

A pack of playing cards should be a staple in your travel equipment. Why? Because for a few square inches of packing space, you get almost unlimited gaming fun at your disposal. It’s thought that there are about 6-10 “genres” or types of card games, depending on how you classify them, but when it comes to the actual number of individual games, there are endless varieties.

And when we say compact… well, even a bulging backpack usually has space for a deck of cards. That’s not bad for a tool that will let you play almost endless games, both solo and with others. Add a handful of dice to the bag, and you’ve got millions of game options at your fingertips, and you’ve lost approximately the space that a pair of socks would take up. Not a bad deal, in our opinion!

There’s also something rather magical about playing with the physical versions, rather than depending on your phone (although you certainly can go digital if you want). There’s a nice sort of slowness to it, a tactile satisfaction, that can make it easier to unwind and enjoy yourself. After all, we’re all looking for simple ways to reconnect with ourselves; this could be a wonderful opportunity to do so in the chaos of travel.

Word Games

Maybe you didn’t pack any cards or dice, and you’re already at the hotel. Never fear! You don’t need a single bit of kit for these games. Most word games are best played with a small group of people, but you can be flexible here, and don’t worry; we’re not going to suggest I Spy in a space where “suitcase” and “sheet” might be the only potential “S” clues on offer.

Instead, try one-word stories – a great game for all ages, and you can make it as silly or serious as you want. Every person in the room gets to contribute one word, and you build up an exciting adventure story as you go. It’s easy to stop when you get bored or tired, and this is an activity everyone can engage with.

Would You Rather is another classic where you figure out what your fellow players would rather do – fight with a giant centipede or eat pickles and pudding for every meal forever? Line up in a queue that never moves or have to watch your child’s favourite show on repeat for eternity with no breaks? Only speak in verse or have to tell lies to every other person?

Get as silly and inventive as you like – this is a fabulous game for anybody to enjoy, and as long as your fellow travellers are inventive, you can have a blast.

Or go for a quick round of Last Letter, First Letter – where the last letter of your chosen word must be the first letter of someone else’s. It sounds easy, but quickly builds in complexity if you don’t allow repeated words. You can introduce other caveats too, like subject limits, names only, nouns only, etc. Get as creative as you like!

You’ll soon find your time in the hotel passes fast, and you finish feeling far more relaxed and satisfied than if you’d just scrolled through social media the whole time.