The Christmas Fish Bowl Game (aka: salad bowl game) is a really easy and fun game for Christmas party games, family game night ideas, teen holiday sleepover party games, or Christmas youth group activities. It’s an easy DIY game to play with supplies you have at home!
About Playing The Christmas Fish Bowl Game
What is the Christmas Fishbowl Game?
The Christmas Fish bowl bowl game is a fast-paced game and hilarious group game that combines elements of Charades, Taboo, and old-school Password into different rounds of game play with Christmas words or holiday phrases.
Players work in teams to guess prompts (words or phrases) over three different rounds, each with unique rules.
This is called the fishbowl game, but you don’t really need a fish bowl (or you can pick a cheap glass candle holder bowl up at the dollar store for cheap dollar store games).
You can also use a holiday bowl or Christmas Santa hat or any thing that you can draw slips of paper out of.
This is a fast-paced, easy to learn game (and an easy DIY game to make), and is a great game to get everyone involved and laughing.
It’s fun for groups of friends of all ages from kids to adults — teen games, kids’ activities for Christmas parties, or easy DIY family game nights for Christmas Eve.
If you’re looking for fun group trivia games or challenge games for adults, this is a good game!
- TIP: Don’t miss our pre-made Christmas themed word list for the Fish Bowl Game below! KEEP SCROLLING!
Christmas Fishbowl Game Overview
The goal of the game is for each team to pull a word or phrase from the fish bowl and then guess as many prompts as possible across three rounds.
The team that scores the most points by correctly guessing the prompts wins.
Each round gets progressively more challenging, starting with verbal descriptions, moving to one-word clues, and finishing with charade (with no talking!).
The thing I love most about this game is that you can play it with supplies you have at home already, no need for special purchases or time-consuming setup! Just a game with household items!
How many players do you need to play the Christmas Fishbowl Game?
To play Fishbowl for Christmas, you need at least 4 players — two teams of two people.
However, the game is more fun with a larger group, like 6 to 12 players or more. That way you have enough people on each team to make the rounds more fun and competitive.
This is one of one of those games that more players you have the crazier and more fun it gets.
The more, the merrier!
OUR MOST POPULAR FUN PARTY GAME IDEAS IN THIS CHRISTMAS PRINTABLE GAMES PACK:
How To Play The Christmas Fishbowl Game Step-By-Step Instructions
Fish bowl is a word game played over three rounds, each with different rules for how players give clues to their team to guess words or phrases written on slips of paper.
The objective is for your team to guess as many prompts as possible across all rounds before the timer goes off.
Let’s start with game supplies…
What You Need For The DIY Holiday Game:
- At least 4 players, but more makes it more fun. (It’s a great game for large groups.)
- A small fish bowl people can reach into (or other container or bowl or even a Santa hat) for the word slips / pieces of paper. *I just picked up a small, cheap fish bowl shaped decoration at the dollar store and now I use it for candles and holiday decorations or other party stuff, too!
- Thin slips of paper and pens. (MY TIP: I find cutting up Post-It Notes really fast and helpful for this game. Just discard the part with the sticky on the back. But, for the Christmas themed game, we used colored red and green paper.)
- Pens (TIP: Do NOT use markers like we did when we first played this game. You can see the answers through the paper!)
- A timer (1 minute per turn) — the timer on your phone is fine.
EASY GAME TIP: You can also pre-print words (see our list below) to save time.
Setting Up The FishBowl Game For Christmas Activities:
1. Divide into two teams of equal size (or as equal as you can get). If you’re playing with a very large group, you can split them into smaller teams of 3-4 groups.
2. Give each player 3 slips of paper and have them write down a random Christmas word and/or easy holiday phrase on each slip without showing other players. (One word or phrase per slip.)
These prompts can be Christmas characters, holiday places, Christmas themed things, or actions you would do during the holidays (like wrapping Christmas gifts) — just tell people not to make them super complicated. They should be well-known and everyday Christmas items people will generally know (especially if you’re playing with a mix of kids and adults).
I find giving people hints to get people started is helpful. You can give them examples like, “Santa” or “Christmas Cookies” or “Snow” or “Stocking.”
Remind everyone that people have to guess these (including your team!), so you don’t want to make them too hard. You may get some duplicates (especially if you’re doing theme Christmas words), but that’s OK.
3. Fold up the slips of paper and place them in a bowl.
GAME TIP FOR SMALL GROUPS: The larger the group, the more slips of paper you will have. If you are playing with a smaller group but want longer game play, give each player 4-5 pieces of paper to write their word or phase prompts on.
ALSO PLAY THIS POPULAR GIFT EXCHANGE GAME: THE SOCK EXCHANGE CHRISTMAS PARTY GAME
Directions On How to Play Each Round of Christmas Fish Bowl By Rounds
Fish bowl is played in three rounds: Describe It, Give One Word, and Act It Out.
Christmas Fish Bowl Round 1: Describe It (like Taboo Game)
This Round: Describe the word or phrase using as many clues as possible without saying any part of the word or phrase.
1. One player from Team A draws a slip from the bowl and has 1 minute to describe the word or phrase using as many clues as possible, without saying the word or using gestures.
2. Team members try to guess the word or phrase.
If the team guesses correctly, they keep the slip and the same player quickly draws a new paper prompt and tries to describe that one.
If they’re stuck, the player can pass once per round.
3. Keep going and try to get your teammates to guess as many word or phrase prompts in 1 minute.
4. After 1 minute, Team B takes their turn and repeats the process. Alternative back and forth between teams in 1 minute intervals until all slips of paper in the bowl are gone.
5. At the end of the round, tally scores by counting the number of prompts (slips of paper) each team guessed correctly. Write the scores down and loudly proclaim which team is the current loser. (That last part is optional, of course. It’s just how we play.)
6. Fold the slips of paper and place them back in the fish bowl, shake to mix well, and move to Round 2.
IMPORTANT NOTE: If the announcing player accidentally says part of the word for this round, they are immediately out. The timer stops and play passes to next team.
For example, if the phrase is Christmas Stocking and they say, “Something you put gifts in for Christmas” they are out because they said part of the guessing phrase (“Christmas”).
CHRISTMAS GAME PLAY EXAMPLE: The phrase is Christmas Stocking. The announcing player says “Something you hang by the fire.” If no one gets it they then say, “Santa stuffs it.” If someone guesses it, they put the slip of paper aside and then pull another slip of paper from the fish bowl and start the process over. Keep going to try to get as many in before the timer runs out.
Christmas Fish Bowl Round 2: Give One Word (like the Password Game)
This Round: Only say one word to describe the word or phrase. For example, if the word is “stocking” the clue giver may say “Santa” or “socks” (and can’t say “stocking”).
1. A different team (and different designated players) start first this round. (Or, you can play the team who won the last round gets to go first.)
2. The designated player from the new team draws a slip of paper prompt out of the fishbowl.
This time the clue-giver can only say one word to describe the word or phrase, but can’t say part of the word or phrase.
3 If the team guesses, quickly choose another slip of paper and start the process.
You can pass one time only per player prompting (per round), if needed.
If the player says more than one word or accidentally says part of the word or phrase, then the turn ends and play passes to next team with the timer reset.
4. After 1 minute, the next team takes their turn and repeats the process.
Alternative back and forth between teams in 1 minute intervals until all slips of paper in the bowl are gone.
5. At the end of the round, tally scores by counting the number of prompts (slips of paper) each team guessed correctly.
Add the score to the scores from Round 1 for each team.
6. Fold the slips of paper and place them back in the fish bowl, shake to mix well, and move to Round 3.
GAME TIP: It’s helpful if you have a good memory and can remember some of the words from Round 1!
Christmas Fish Bowl Round 3: Act It Out (like Charades)
This Round: Act out words or phrases without using any words (which is not my favorite round, tbh).
1. For the final round, players act out the word or phrase without speaking.
For example, if my word is “stocking” I might pretend I’m hanging a stocking by the fire and
2. Teams alternate 1-minute turns until all the clues are used, like in previous rounds.
3. This round ends the game.
Fish Bowl Game Scoring
- After each round, tally the number of correctly guessed slips for each team for a running total of rounds.
- At the end of the third round, the team with the most points wins!
GAME TIP: Give out fun winner ribbons or medals like this or a game trophy to the winning team to up the competitive energy!
Bonus Fish Bowl Game Round
If you want to add a bonus round for the Fish Bowl Game, you can add a Pictionary round where players draw as many of the designated prompts as they can in 1 minute without using any words or without acting out any words. Just drawing!
GAME PLAY TIP: I love these for drawing games.
MORE HOLIDAY FUN: 49 Best Family Games For The Holidays (Fun Christmas Party Games for Kids and Adults from Christmas Minute To Win It Games To Christmas Olympics and More!)
50 Ideas For Christmas Fish Bowl Game Words And Fun Game Phrases
If you want to print your own words and have everything ready for your game night when guests arrive, you can steal our list of words for the Christmas Fish Bowl Game!
Creative and Fun Ideas For Holiday Fish Bowl Game:
- Santa Clause
- Jingle Bells
- Silent Night
- Frosty Snowman
- Holly Jolly
- Winter Wonderland
- Santa’s Sleigh
- Candy Canes
- Naughty or Nice
- Deck the Halls
- Lump Of Coal
- Christmas Stockings
- Reindeer Games
- Rudolph
- Gingerbread House
- Silver Bells
- Snowflakes
- Joy To The World
- Christmas Tree
- Snow
- Father Christmas
- Night Before Christmas
- Mistletoe Kiss
- Giving Gifts
- Snowman
- Poinsettia
- Christmas Eve
- Christmas Lights
- North Pole
- Sleigh Ride
- Joy to the World
- Christmas Wreath
- Roasting Chestnuts
- Elves
- Toys
- Christmas Tree Ornaments
- Christmas Cookies
- Snowball Fight
- Polar Express
- Hot Chocolate
- Peace on Earth
- Fireplace
- Chimney
- Away In The Manger
- Oh Holy Night
- Christmas Carols
- Frosty The Snowman
- Christmas Games
- Ugly Christmas Sweater Party
- Bows
ALSO PLAY THIS FUN CHRISTMAS GAME: DIY Unwrap Plastic Ball Game For Teens, Kids and Adults Christmas Party
Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year!
I hope you have fun with this Christmas fish bowl game!
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