Christmas charades ideas, from easy to hard

Christmas charades has to work for a seven-year-old and her grandfather in the same round, and that decides which list you use. A film title tests who has seen the film. Building a snowman tests only whether you can mime it, and everybody at the table can.

So every list below runs from easy to hard, and hard means hard to act rather than hard to know. Elf is easy because the pointed ears do most of the work. It's a Wonderful Life is hard because there is nothing in it to point at. Start at the easy end whoever is in the room, and move down once the room has won a few.

There are 28 films, 30 songs, 36 things to act out, 19 characters and 23 objects and foods here. Then come lists for kids, for adults and for the office party, and 45 Christmas words for the drawing game. Why some words act easily and others die on their feet is in charades ideas, with the evidence. This page is the Christmas edition.

Christmas movie charades

A film is guessed word by word, so the actor has to signal "film" before acting anything. Draw a box in the air, then hold up fingers for the number of words and act the easiest word first. So many of these titles contain the word Christmas that it pays to agree one sign for it before you start, such as a tree drawn in the air.

The easy list has a word in every title that a body can do on its own. The harder list needs two or three ideas in a row, and a room that has already played a few.

Easy to act

1. Elf
2. Home Alone
3. The Polar Express
4. Jingle All the Way
5. The Snowman
6. Gremlins
7. Die Hard
8. The Santa Clause
9. Christmas Vacation
10. A Christmas Story
11. Arthur Christmas
12. Four Christmases
13. White Christmas
14. Fred Claus

Die Hard is on the easy list because the argument about whether it counts as a Christmas film is half the fun.

Harder to act

1. How the Grinch Stole Christmas
2. The Nightmare Before Christmas
3. Miracle on 34th Street
4. The Muppet Christmas Carol
5. It's a Wonderful Life
6. Love Actually
7. The Holiday
8. Scrooged
9. Klaus
10. Spirited
11. Noelle
12. A Charlie Brown Christmas
13. The Christmas Chronicles
14. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Christmas song charades

Signal a song by miming singing into a microphone, then act the title the way you would act a film. Sounds stay out, humming included. Hum two notes of Jingle Bells and the round is over, which makes it a different game.

Easy to act

1. Jingle Bells
2. Silent Night
3. Frosty the Snowman
4. Deck the Halls
5. Sleigh Ride
6. Let It Snow
7. Winter Wonderland
8. Jingle Bell Rock
9. Here Comes Santa Claus
10. Up on the Housetop
11. O Christmas Tree
12. The Little Drummer Boy
13. Run Rudolph Run
14. Joy to the World

Harder to act

1. Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree
2. Santa Claus Is Comin' to Town
3. The Twelve Days of Christmas
4. We Wish You a Merry Christmas
5. All I Want for Christmas Is You
6. Last Christmas
7. It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas
8. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
9. I'll Be Home for Christmas
10. Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer
11. Carol of the Bells
12. Driving Home for Christmas
13. Feliz Navidad
14. Wonderful Christmastime
15. Blue Christmas
16. Mistletoe and Wine

For a British table, add Merry Christmas Everyone and Walking in the Air. Both are fixtures of a British December, and both have a word in them that acts easily.

Christmas things to act out

These are the safest Christmas charades there are, because nobody has to have seen anything. Each one is something people do in December, or a thing with an obvious shape. They are the Christmas list in Decka's free charades generator, sorted the same way.

Easy

1. Building a snowman
2. Throwing a snowball
3. Decorating the tree
4. Opening a present
5. Hanging up a stocking
6. Making a snow angel
7. Singing carols
8. Ringing a bell
9. Reindeer
10. Eating a candy cane
11. Drinking hot chocolate
12. Catching snowflakes on your tongue

Medium

1. An elf making toys
2. Sliding down a chimney
3. Riding in a sleigh
4. Untangling the lights
5. Carving the turkey
6. A gingerbread man
7. Roasting chestnuts
8. A toy soldier marching
9. Putting the star on the tree
10. Tobogganing down a hill
11. Carol singers at the door
12. Writing a wish list

Hard

1. Pretending to love a present
2. Re-gifting a present
3. Falling asleep after the big dinner
4. The last chocolate in the tin
5. Assembling a toy with no instructions
6. Listening for sleigh bells
7. Finding the end of the sticky tape
8. A sweater that is far too itchy
9. Being on the naughty list
10. A tree dropping its needles
11. Hiding the presents
12. One mince pie too many

Get a random Christmas list from the charades generator

The generator leaves its Christmas list out until somebody ticks it, so that a charades round in June does not deal "reindeer". The link above opens it with the Christmas list alone, ready to print.

Christmas characters to act out

A character is harder than an action, because the actor has to show who somebody is rather than what they are doing. The best ones come with a prop or a walk: a sack over one shoulder, a nose that glows, a walking stick and a limp.

1. Santa Claus
2. Mrs Claus
3. An elf
4. Rudolph
5. The Grinch
6. Ebenezer Scrooge
7. Tiny Tim
8. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come
9. Jack Frost
10. The Nutcracker
11. The Sugar Plum Fairy
12. Krampus
13. Cindy Lou Who
14. A snowman
15. The three wise men
16. A shepherd
17. The innkeeper with no room
18. An angel
19. A pantomime dame

In Britain, Santa is Father Christmas, and he acts the same way. A pantomime dame is the man in a frock in a British Christmas panto, and for a British table the easiest character on the list.

The three wise men are a good group charade, and a fair one to argue about. Matthew's Gospel lists three gifts, gold, frankincense and myrrh, and never says how many wise men brought them. One actor carrying three boxes is as faithful to the text as three actors.

Christmas objects and food to act out

Objects are harder than actions unless you can hold them. A candy cane works because you can hold it and lick it. A chimney is hard because all you can do is outline it in the air. The list runs from the first kind to the second.

1. Candy cane
2. Wrapping paper
3. Christmas tree
4. Snow globe
5. Ice skates
6. Sled
7. Christmas sweater
8. Gingerbread house
9. Eggnog
10. Christmas cookies
11. Wreath
12. Tinsel
13. Ornament
14. Advent calendar
15. Mistletoe
16. Brussels sprouts
17. Fruitcake
18. Yule log
19. Mulled wine
20. Chimney
21. Christmas pudding
22. Pigs in blankets
23. Christmas cracker

The last three are fixtures of a British Christmas dinner. Pigs in blankets are small sausages wrapped in bacon, and a cracker is the paper tube two people pull until it snaps. A British table will act a Christmas jumper rather than a sweater.

Christmas charades for kids

Give a child something with a shape, never a feeling. A reindeer has antlers to show, and excitement has nothing to show at all. The kids' list in charades ideas is built on the same rule, with the evidence for it.

Easy, for younger children

1. A reindeer pulling a sleigh
2. A snowman melting
3. Opening a giant present
4. A Christmas tree with its lights on
5. A penguin on the ice
6. A jack-in-the-box
7. A wind-up toy
8. A rocking horse
9. A teddy bear
10. Shaking a present to guess what is inside
11. A puppy in a box
12. Leaving cookies for Santa
13. A polar bear
14. Putting on boots and mittens
15. Sledding down a hill

Medium, for older children

1. An elf wrapping presents in a hurry
2. Santa stuck in the chimney
3. A reindeer learning to fly
4. A snowball fight
5. Ice skating for the first time
6. Building a gingerbread house
7. A robot toy whose batteries have run out
8. Trying to stay awake on Christmas Eve
9. A toy soldier falling over
10. The Grinch stealing the presents
11. A snowman losing its nose
12. Carrying a tray of hot cocoa without spilling it
13. Peeking at presents before Christmas
14. A penguin sliding on its belly
15. A nutcracker cracking a nut

Keep rounds to sixty seconds and teams to four, and let two children act together for the first round. In a class where not everyone celebrates Christmas, the winter words carry the same round without asking anybody to. A snowball fight, a polar bear and ice skating need no festival at all.

Funny Christmas charades for adults

Adult Christmas charades are funny for one reason: they are true. Everybody watching has done every one of these, so the laugh is recognition rather than shock, and all of them are fine at a work party.

Medium, for adults

1. Testing every bulb on a string of lights
2. Wrapping a present that is the wrong shape
3. Hiding from carol singers
4. Pretending to be asleep when the kids get up
5. Carrying a tree home on the roof of the car
6. Trying on a sweater from your aunt
7. Getting the turkey out of the oven
8. Losing a board game to a child
9. Taking the decorations down
10. Burning your mouth on a mince pie
11. Reading out the joke from a cracker
12. Finding the receipt for a present

Hard, for adults

1. Writing a thank-you note for socks
2. Remembering who gave you what
3. Pretending you made the cake yourself
4. Changing the subject at dinner
5. Falling asleep during the film everybody chose
6. Explaining your job to a relative
7. Eating leftovers for the fifth day running
8. Forgetting someone on the card list
9. Regretting the second helping
10. Breaking a resolution on the second of January
11. Pretending to know the words to a carol
12. Waiting for the rest of the family to wake up

Medium, for the office party

1. The Secret Santa draw
2. Hanging tinsel on a monitor
3. A Christmas sweater on a video call
4. Turning down a third mince pie
5. The office party photo
6. Wearing a paper crown at your desk

Hard, for the office party

1. Guessing who bought your Secret Santa present
2. The last meeting before the break
3. Setting your out-of-office
4. Leaving the party before the speeches
5. A team lunch for twelve booked for eight
6. Replying to all with season's greetings

Keep the office list about the season and the building, never about anyone in the room. A word that only works because of a colleague is a word about that colleague.

How to play Christmas charades

The game is older than every film on this page. In 1881 the Girl's Own Paper printed a Christmas charade for girls to act, inside a story whose heroine calls them "fireside charades". They needed nothing a house did not already have, which is still the appeal.

The rules have settled since. These are the ones worth agreeing out loud before the first word.

1. Split into two teams. Six a side at most. Past that, the loudest guesser plays for everybody.
2. Agree the signals. The Diefenbaker Canada Centre's Victorian Christmas game sheet draws a box with the fingers for a film or TV show. It opens an imaginary book for a book and cups an ear for a phrase. Add a mimed microphone for a song, and your sign for the word Christmas.
3. Show the number of words. Fingers up for how many, then fingers again for which word you are acting.
4. No talking, no mouthing, no sounds. No pointing at the real tree in the corner either.
5. Ninety seconds a round. The team that gets it scores a point, and the other team acts next.
6. The actor decides. A nod means right, and close enough counts if the actor says it does.

Playing it with a room, on phones

Decka's Charades room runs the parts that paper cannot. Everyone joins on their phone with a QR code, and nobody installs an app. When you press Start the first round, one phone shows "Act this out" above the word. Underneath it reads "Don't say it. Don't spell it. No pointing at anything in the room." The big screen shows who is acting and the clock, and shows the word only when the round ends.

Two settings matter at Christmas. Guesses can be Typed in ("Phones race; the first correct one wins") or Shouted out ("You tap whoever got it"). A typed guess has to match the word apart from capitals and spacing, so It's a Wonderful Life is lost on its apostrophe. Use Shouted out for films and songs.

Take turns hands the next word to whoever has acted least, so nobody goes twice before everybody has gone once. Scores are kept for people rather than teams: the guesser scores, and the actor scores the same when somebody gets it. Keep team totals on paper.

For the films and songs on this page, choose My own list and type them in. For the generic list, choose The built-in bank and tick Christmas under Categories. It is the one category that never plays unless you tick it. The Christmas charades deck below already has a mix of these lists typed in, on Shouted out.

Christmas words to draw

The drawing game is charades with a pen. One person draws, their team guesses, and nobody may write a letter, much like Pictionary. A word that is easy to act is not always easy to draw. A snowflake takes seconds to draw and is close to impossible to act, and sliding down a chimney is the other way round.

So these lists are sorted by how hard each one is to draw recognisably, with a fingertip, in a minute. They are the Christmas list in Decka's free drawing prompt generator.

Easy

1. Snowman
2. Reindeer
3. Stocking
4. Candy cane
5. Ornament
6. Present with a bow
7. Decorated tree
8. Gingerbread man
9. Wreath
10. Bell
11. Sleigh
12. Snowflake
13. Holly
14. Sack of presents
15. Mitten

Medium

1. An elf wrapping a present
2. A reindeer with a glowing nose
3. A stocking hung by the fire
4. A gingerbread house
5. A sleigh flying over the rooftops
6. A snow globe
7. An advent calendar
8. Carol singers
9. A roast turkey
10. A carrot left out for the reindeer
11. A snowball fight
12. A nutcracker
13. Presents under the tree
14. A bird on a snowy branch
15. A frosty window

Hard

1. A man in a red suit stuck in a chimney
2. A present that is obviously socks
3. The lights in a knot
4. A tree that has dropped all its needles
5. A sweater nobody would choose
6. A child trying to stay awake all night
7. A reindeer who has had enough
8. A cat that has climbed the tree
9. A house with far too many lights
10. The moment the tree lights come on
11. A family photo where nobody is ready
12. An elf on strike
13. A dog that has found the turkey
14. Far too much wrapping paper
15. The walk after a big dinner

Get a random Christmas list from the drawing prompt generator

Playing it on phones

Decka has two drawing rooms, and they play different games. Doodler Decoy is the closer of the two to the classic. Teams take turns, one artist draws on their phone under "You're drawing", and the artist's team picks the real word from a list. Every other team has seen the word and written a fake answer to fool them, under "Send the decoy".

Doodler Decoy deals from the charades bank, so ticking Christmas there deals the list of things to act out above. Most of those draw well too. To draw this list instead, type it in as your own list.

Guess the Doodler is the other way round. Everyone draws the same prompt at once, then each drawing comes up without a name and the phones ask "Who drew this?". It suits a prompt that shows something about the person drawing. That is why the drawing deck on this page gives the room "Design the ugliest Christmas sweater you can", and a British office can call it a jumper.