Thanksgiving Bingo (Free Printable)

On this page

1. What’s on the printable
2. Thanksgiving bingo for kids
3. How to play Thanksgiving bingo
4. How long a round takes
5. How many cards to print
6. Ways to play
7. Prize ideas
8. More Thanksgiving games to pair with bingo
9. Questions hosts ask

Bingo might be the most useful game you can bring to Thanksgiving. It needs no explaining, a whole room plays at once, and it ends the moment someone yells the word, which matters when the turkey’s resting and you have exactly twenty minutes to fill.

What’s on the printable

Each card is a 5×5 grid with FREE in the center and 24 words drawn from a pool of 46. The full list:

Turkey, Stuffing, Gravy, Cranberry Sauce, Pumpkin Pie, Apple Pie, Pecan Pie, Mashed Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, Green Beans, Corn, Dinner Rolls, Butter, Wishbone, Leaves, Acorn, Scarecrow, Hay Ride, Pilgrim Hat, Cornucopia, Harvest, Parade, Football, Leftovers, Nap, Family, Grateful, Thankful, Oven, Apron, Pumpkin, Gourd, Squash, Casserole, Whipped Cream, Table, Napkin, Placemat, Hot Cider, Autumn, November, Feast, Recipe, Candles, Pie Crust and Gobble.

Every card gets its own random mix, so no two players hold the same one. The calling sheet lists all 46 words for the host. You can also swap in your own words before printing, like the name of a family dish or a relative’s famous saying. The cards print on US Letter or A4.

Thanksgiving bingo for kids

The kids’ cards use a 4×4 grid, no free square and 36 short words picked for young readers: Pie, Corn, Owl, Hat, Hug, Nap, Acorn, Feather, Wagon, Squirrel, Scarecrow and the like. Four in a row wins. Most of the words are things a child can point to on the table or out the window, which helps pre-readers follow along.

Hold up each word as you call it so kids can match the letters. For kids under 4, use stickers or big paper squares instead of candy or beans as markers. For more ideas sorted by age, see our Thanksgiving games for kids.

How to play Thanksgiving bingo

1. Print one card per player and one calling sheet. Cut the calling sheet into slips and drop them in a bowl, or read straight down the list.
2. Hand out markers: candy corn, dried beans, buttons or a pen.
3. The caller draws a slip, reads the word clearly and sets the slip aside in a separate pile.
4. Players mark the word if it’s on their card. The center square counts from the start.
5. The first player with five in a row, across, down or corner to corner, calls out “Bingo.” (On the kids’ cards, it’s four in a row.)
6. Check their marked words against the called pile. If they match, that player wins the round.
7. Clear the cards and play again. Three to five rounds is about right before dinner.

If you’d rather not cut slips, use Play mode on a phone or a TV. It draws the words for you and shows which ones have been called, which saves arguments at a big table.

How long a round takes

With 46 words in the pool and five in a row to win, our editors ran a quick computer simulation of thousands of games. With 10 players, a typical round ends around the 16th call; with 20 players, around the 14th; with only 6, it stretches to about 18. At a relaxed pace, that’s 3 to 5 minutes a round. A blackout game, where someone has to fill the whole card, takes nearly the entire list.

The kids’ cards are about as quick: 11 to 15 calls for most groups.

How many cards to print

One card per player, plus five extras for late arrivals and cranberry spills. If you’ll play several rounds with pens, either print a fresh card per round or slip cards into clear sheet protectors and use dry-erase markers.

For 30 or more players, run the calls from a TV so the back of the room can keep up, and decide how you’ll handle ties before the first round.

Ways to play

Parade bingo

If the parade is on Thanksgiving morning, play with the TV on and only mark a word when it shows up on screen or someone says it. Parade and Family are safe bets; Wishbone is a long shot. Rounds are slow, so play for a full card over the whole broadcast.

Football bingo

Swap the words for football terms before printing: Touchdown, Field Goal, Fumble, Interception, Punt, Flag on the Play, Timeout, Replay Review, Two-Point Try and so on. Players mark a square when it happens on the field. The Detroit Lions have hosted a Thanksgiving game since 1934 (with a break during World War II) and the Dallas Cowboys nearly every year since 1966, so there’s nearly always a game on in the afternoon.

Dinner table bingo for adults

For a grown-up crowd or Friendsgiving, replace the words with things that tend to happen at the table. Say you’re hosting 12 adults: paste in a list like the one below, hand out cards before the meal, and let people mark squares as the evening unfolds. The winner gets first pick of the leftovers.

• Someone asks for the recipe
• Somebody mentions traffic
• The dog gets a scrap
• Someone gives a toast
• Seconds on stuffing
• Someone says “I’m so full”
• Someone checks the football score
• A drink gets spilled
• Somebody talks about the weather
• Someone photographs the food
• A guest is running late
• Dark meat versus white meat debate
• Leftover containers come out
• The gravy runs out
• A relative calls or video chats
• Store-bought pie appears
• The oven timer beeps
• Someone asks “Is it done yet?”
• Unrequested carving advice
• Somebody takes a walk
• A board game comes out
• Someone asks about Christmas plans
• Seconds on pie
• The wishbone gets pulled
• Someone says grace
• The kids’ table gets loud
• Cranberry sauce still shaped like the can
• Someone offers to do the dishes
• A nap happens
• Someone tells the same story as last year

Keep it kind. The squares should be about things that happen, not about any one person at the table.

For small groups

With four or five players, a single line can take a while. Give everyone two cards at once, or play a quicker pattern like four corners or any line of four touching the free space.

For a classroom

Print one card per student and a few extras. Twenty-five kids produce winners fast, so plan several rounds and have a prize bag ready. For early readers, write each word on the board as you call it, or use the kids’ cards.

For seniors and grandparents

Call slowly and repeat each word twice. A pen is easier than tiny markers for stiff hands. Our printable games for seniors have more large-print options for a senior living group.

Prize ideas

You’ll hand out several prizes, so keep them small:

• First slice of pie, or first pick of the dessert table
• A pass on dish duty
• A small bag of candy or a caramel apple
• First choice of the leftovers to take home
• For kids, stickers, a pencil or a small toy

Save one slightly better prize for a final blackout round.

More Thanksgiving games to pair with bingo

Bingo covers 15 to 30 minutes. For the rest of the day, our free printable Thanksgiving games include a word scramble, This or That cards and a fill-in-the-blank story, and our Thanksgiving games for family sorts ideas by when to play them. You’ll find everything for the holiday on the Thanksgiving games page, and when December rolls around, Christmas bingo works the same way.

Questions hosts ask

By the Party Game Book editors. Every game here is free to print for personal, classroom and non-commercial use. How we make and check our games.