The pandemic has displaced office minions to their WFH habitats, resulting in teams migrating to Zoom and Google Meet for their rendevouz. We see the impact of this as Zoom was downloaded a whopping 485 million times last year.
But what about team bonding?
Well fear not, as we compiled our coolest list of fun Zoom icebreaker games you can try with your team*. So grab your paper party hats, leave your formalities at the door, and hop on board the Zoom icebreaker super-happy, glad, fun-times train! 🙃🙃
Cheeky little plug: did you know with tl;dv you can record any (or all) of your Google Meets automatically? So, download the Chrome Extension and share all of the team LOLs for future laughs and embarrassment.
* tl;dv takes no responsibility for any embarrassment, unbridled fun, or awkward team moments that may occur. Please make sure to read the directions before deploying any Zoom icebreaker games. Zoom responsibly.
In this article:
- Two truths and a lie
- Sparkn online experience
- This week’s question is…
- Virtual escape rooms
- Don’t smile
- Snack time
- Fancy dress day
- Squad Squabble
- Open ended questions
- Bet on the crowd
- Zoom Bingo
Two truths and a lie
This is a classic game to get to know people, which is why it’s one of the best icebreaker games for Zoom. Ask your participants to come up with three facts about themselves – but one of them has to be a lie. The others have to figure out which one!
The game is particularly effective because it encourages even the quietest of people to speak out.
You can take this game a little further by asking people with wild stories to share pictures or videos of themselves to evidence their anecdotes. With over 115% of US employees telecommuting to a virtual workspace, sharing personal information with one’s colleagues can create the feeling of togetherness, which is what makes this a great Zoom icebreaker game.
What’s more, you can even record your online meeting icebreaker games with tl;dv, via our free chrome extension! Re-live and share your awesome team moments! There we go again with another sneekly little plug. 😉
Sparkn online experiences
While Zoom fatigue can be bothersome for many employees, you can refresh your team with a highly interactive and immersive 15 minutes Sparkn experience. Each spark is hosted by a sparkler who is an exceptional storyteller with an aim to energize your team with their fun and informative display.
Your spark host can join your virtual team meeting by simply using the link that you shared. While each Spark last for 15minutes, for a 20 member or less team, you can always buy their other packages (ignite and blaze) for much longer and diverse sessions.
This week’s question is…
Of all the icebreaker games for Zoom, this one is the most flexible – you can have anything literally as the question of the week. Ask them about their pets, about the podcast they’re listening to at the moment, what they’re proud of accomplishing this week or how many coffees they have downed that day.
Sharing a little bit about themselves and expressing their opinions will create a sense of trust within the team – workplaces with high levels of trust have been proven to have 74% less stress and 50% higher productivity, according to this study by Harvard Business Review.
Not only will people be able to compare their answers and share a laugh, but they’ll also get to know each other more.
Just make sure your chosen question of the week is not a simple yes or no question. But also, try to keep it off the risqué side!
Virtual escape rooms
Do you want to enhance your teams’ problem-solving and critical thinking skills? How about you use this fun yet mind-bending Zoom icebreaker game to encourage collaboration? Escape room games are as challenging as ever, even when they are virtual.
Try the Kumospace Milburn mansion with your team. This online ice breaker game is much better at promoting fluid communication and coordination among employees than conventional virtual meetings.
Don’t smile
Get your teammates to keep a straight face for as long as they can and see who lasts the longest without cracking up. Sixty seconds is a good time frame to test people on their poker faces.
It’s common knowledge that people burst out laughing during this game. Even the ones who never crack a smile will start grinning when they realize they’ve won. If you want to make it harder for your colleagues, try to get them to break their straight faces with jokes. Even if you’re not good at comedy, there’s still a chance they’ll laugh at your lack of comedic talent, making this one of the easiest icebreakers on Zoom.
Snack time
Been having meetings all day? Final video call before the weekend starts? Ask your teammates to show off their tableside snacks and lunches if your meeting is near lunch, teatime, or dinner! If you make this a routine thing, your employees may even get excited about this little Zoom icebreaker game. Encourage your participants to bring out their chef side and even share their epicurean recipes with the rest of the team!
You can always take this game a little further and give an award for whoever has the best food in the team – you’d be surprised how much people will look forward to work meetings when there’s a little gourmet incentive involved.
Fancy dress day
Asking people to dress in a fancy or eccentric way can bring out their creativity and self-expression. Drop a message in the team group chat that it’s time to dress fancy and even introduce a theme for the day if you’re feeling adventurous! With this Zoom icebreaker, you would be surprised as to how inventive people can get while being under lockdown – from strange hairstyles to flashy clothes, your teammates may eventually start competing as to how crazy their outfits can be.
Squad Squabble
Squad Squabble is an exciting virtual team-building game where you test your knowledge about how well you know your colleagues! This game has 4 rounds and would last anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour.
The host will read out the questions, and the first team to hit the buzzer gets to answer! Naturally, the team with more correct answers and the most points takes the win. A host can ask all sorts of questions such as “who uses ❤️ emojis the most on Slack”
Squad Squabble is an excellent Zoom icebreaker game to raise your employee’s energy and morale.
Open-Ended Questions
Asking open-ended questions to your team members is the most typical Zoom icebreaker game strategy. But how can you know what questions to ask? The questions supplied by this free tool are based on behavioral research and are divided into three levels of complexity based on how long a team has been working together:
- Intro: This section is for new teams.
- Tricky: For close-knit groups
- Tough: It’s time to get down to business.
Bet on the crowd
You can use Zoom’s polling tool to get feedback from attendees and see the results right away. Placing a wager on the Zoom polls is turned into a fun wagering game with Crowd. Participants will first vote on a single question or a set of questions. You have the option of sticking to a two-answer format or allowing for up to four responses.
Here are some examples of possible questions:
- Vacations in your own nation or abroad?
- Are dogs far superior to cats?
- Summer or winter?
- For a month, would you rather give up your phone or your car?
- Do you like Pina Coladas, or getting caught in the rain?
- Who is the most prolific Slack user?
Ask your teammates to guess which answer will win before you reveal the answers. The round is won by the player who correctly predicts the majority of the outcomes. You can play many games and keep score, with the highest-ranking teammates receiving a prize.
Zoom Bingo
For teams that joined the WFH movement before the pandemic, you would have ironed out the creases of remote-working long ago. For those still knee-deep, why not poke-fun at the ins and outs of an online-working life, with a little game of Zoom or WFH bingo! The first person to call bingo gets a prize!
A day in Paris 🥖🚴🧈🎡🤹🎨🥐💌
Our CTO and Co-founder, Allan Batteral is from France… so we might be a little biased here. But those missing travel, might like to go on a group virtual tour of Paris! This one-of-a-kind virtual tour is designed for groups of people searching for a fun approach to improve their teamwork abilities.
The one-hour Zoom tour is guided by a knowledgeable guide who takes the party to the City of Lights and challenges them along the way. You are free to ask your guide whatever question you want about Parisian culture; no inquiry is too bizarre. Companies have used this team-building activity to onboard new employees when they are unable to meet in person. This is a fun icebreaker!
BTW: Here’s our Paris Emoji-legend:
🥖 = National bread of France
🚴 = The much loved sport of the nation!
🧈 = If there is one thing that French cooking is known for, it is butter!
🎡 = The Roue de Paris is a 60-metre (200 ft) tall transportable Ferris wheel, first installed at the Place de la Concorde.
🤹 = The Cirque d’Hiver Bouglione in Paris is one of the oldest circuses in the world.
🎨 = The Lourve.
🥐 = Do we even need to explain
💌 = Paris is the city of love
Bring me…
“Bring Me” is an excellent technique to enliven a meeting. Prior to the meeting, the facilitator must gather a few unusual items to play. Then, at a time when no one is looking, each thing would be displayed.
When the participants see something they want, they go home and look for it. The game’s goal is straightforward. It’s to keep the participants from becoming sluggish. The basic conclusion is that it aids them in having better blood circulation and avoiding drowsiness.
Stop dance, team dance partyyyyyy
Sound Fro’s founder, James Bullard, claims that his team plays the classic Stop Dance game. When his supervisor senses that his staff is growing tired of the meeting’s length, he plays music, and everyone gets up to dance. While this may appear odd, he claims that it is useful.
Prepare your favourite tunes, have a dance-off💃, make a team-playlist and get ready to flicker your lights like you’re a kid playing whack-a-mole!
20 points to whoever dares to do the worm, live and on camera and recorded!
Introduce your partner
Milena Regos, the founder of Unhustle, encourages the attendees of her meetings to split up into groups of two and answer the following questions:
- What keeps them up at night
- Their latest achievement
- One thing about them that no one can find online
Sometimes, it can be difficult to penetrate that surface-level friendship when relationships are formed purely online. Why? Because our interactions are limited to a computer screen and don’t enter the real-world where we get a glimpse into the real-person. This kind of Zoom icebreaker might be a bit awkward at first, but being vulnerable with your colleagues is a sure-fire way to speed up team-bonding!
Werewolf among the villagers game
If you’re like me, and always got a little too carried away playing Kris Kindle, also known as Secret Santa and are known for confronting your friends during Christmas time with your definitive list who is everyone’s Secret Santa, then this game is probably for you!
This Zoom icebreaker game can last for days or weeks. You can have sections of this game played over Zoom, and the rest of the play online via Slack or other communication tools.
It’s the classic Werewolf among the villagers game and the full game instructions can be found here. The best part is the werewolf reveal – which you can use an app like this for.
It’s a draw
The whiteboard is another tool that can be utilised in Zoom meeting icebreakers. Miraya Berke, Mixily‘s head of marketing, shares her screen and picks the whiteboard before inviting meeting attendees to draw something in response to a request, such as their favourite food.
She claims that if you give everyone a minute, you’ll end up with a bright group illustration and a nice chuckle. It makes use of a Zoom function that not everyone is aware of, so it’s a good change of pace from an usual Zoom meeting.
Good ol’ board games FTW
While it might not be possible for us to meet our team as frequently as we wish to, we can always connect with them virtually. We do not need to limit our experiences to just conversing in virtual meetings. We can also incorporate ever-entertaining traditional board games and turn it into a Zoom icebreaker game!
Here is a list of top 10 board games for you to play online when the conversation runs its course:
- Fat brain toys pencil
- Play monster relative insanity: see what I mean?!
- Uno
- Watch your mouth
- Wavelength
- Tales from the loop
- Pictionary
- Codename
- Trophies card game
- Yahtzee
Fun Zoom icebreaker questions to ask during virtual team meetings
Icebreaker questions are aimed to increase the bonds, goodwill, and a sense of collaboration among team members. These questions often compel people to give interesting and genuine answers that often facilitate a sense of cohesion which is essential for the team feels. It also promotes friendship and breaks down the ‘work’ barrier among coworkers.
Here is a list of 10 engaging Zoom icebreaker questions:
- If you could spend a day with anybody on earth, who would it be? And why?
This question reveals what the participant values and what achievements are important to them. It shows what inspires them as a person.
- What is your soul animal? And why do you feel connected to it?
This question is a great way of understanding what traits and thoughts the participant has, as you can observe that the traits of the animal they relate to.
- What is your favourite movie?
By asking the participant for their favorite movie, you have a chance to judge their movie tastes! Suggestion: Don’t mention your Nicholas Cage addiction.
- What is an odd or quirky habit you have?
Let’s skip past typical hobbies and interests that most professionals would care to admit and get to some more interesting and juicy tidbits of our team mates lives!
- If you had to choose between having scissors for hands, or sausages for fingers which would you choose?
Ah, the age old question between sausage fingers and scissor hands still rages on!
- If you could teleport to any country at the moment, where would you go?
This reveals a person’s travel experience and what excites and inspires them. Plus maybe you can plan a little team-vacay!
- What is your favorite 70s movie or tv show?
By asking this question, you can guess what your employee likes to do in their leisure time. It can show their lighter sides which will help break the ‘work’ barrier between you and them.
- Which music band would you like to be stranded on an island with?
Are you into music? There’s only one way to find out! This could lead to a “bring your own banjo to work week” – who knows what kind of fun could ensue!
- Which is your favorite app on your phone?
Your favorite phone app can say a lot about your priorities and how they like to be outside of the work environment.
- If you had to eat only one type of ice cream flavor for the rest of your life, which icecream flavor would it be?
Is there even an answer to such a horrible hypothetical question!? Follow up question: how many flavors can one icecream be at one time?
So, go get your Zoom icebreaker game on!
Fun Zoom icebreaker games can increase trust between teammates and encourage them to talk outside the work. Considering how building trust can create 106% more energy at work, according to a US study, getting your teammates to share and engage can increase your team’s productivity. Plus, let’s not forget the fun to be had!
