The Best Drinking Games: 15 Classics With Rules — From Beer Pong to SwigSki

The best drinking games aren't a question of budget — they need a group that's up for it, clear rules, and a game that builds momentum. Here are the 15 most reliable classics with complete instructions: from Beer Pong to King's Cup to Rippel-Dippel, each with equipment, player count, and escalation level. Plus two games where the Apres Allstars SwigSki3000® takes center stage — one of them even works on the dance floor.

Last updated: July 28, 2026

💡 By the way: two of the 15 games are best played with our Miniski Roulette and the SwigSki3000® — we introduce both further down the list ↓

The best drinking games at a glance — all 15 in one table

So you can find the right game for your group: all 15 at a glance. Every one is explained in full detail below.

Want to know what order these games should run in to carry a whole night? The guide Drinking Games for the Party builds the dramatic arc for you.

Cups & balls — the action classics

These games need good aim and a sturdy table (or lawn). They're competitive, loud, and the reason furniture eventually gets rearranged at every good party.

1. Beer Pong

Equipment: cups, ping pong ball, table · Players: 2–6 in two teams · Level: medium

Beer Pong is one of the few drinking games where skill matters just as much as luck. It emerged at US colleges in the 1950s/60s (legend has it at Dartmouth) and is now the standard at house parties worldwide.

Setup: 6, 10, or 15 plastic cups (10–16 oz) on each side arranged in a pyramid, tip pointing toward the center of the table, the back row no more than two centimeters from the table edge. Goal: throw the ping pong ball into an opponent's cup. Whoever's cup is hit has to drink it. The team that hits all of the opponent's cups wins — but watch out: if that team went first, the opponent gets to keep throwing until they miss. Cups that get knocked out of position are re-racked before the next throw. And: respect your teammates and opponents, even when things get competitive.

2. Flip Cup

Equipment: cups, table · Players: 4+ in two teams · Level: fast

The fastest team game on the list. Two teams line up facing each other across the table, a filled cup in front of every player. On go, the first player on each team drinks their cup empty, places it upside-down on the table edge — and has to flip it face-down with a flick from underneath. Only once the cup is standing can the next player on the team start. The team whose last cup lands upside-down first wins. Sounds simple, turns into a nerve-wracking standoff by round three.

3. Rage Cage

Equipment: many cups, 2 ping pong balls · Players: 5+ · Level: escalating

Everyone stands around the table, with a dense block of filled cups in the middle. Two players start at the same time: each tries to bounce their ball into their own empty cup. If they land it, the cup and ball move on to the next player clockwise. If the cup catches up to you from behind while you're still throwing, your cup gets stacked into the faster player's — you grab a full cup from the middle, drink it, and keep throwing. The game ends when the middle is empty. Rage Cage is loud, chaotic, and the moment when two little clusters of people turn into one party.

4. Flunkyball

Equipment: ball, bottles, space · Players: 8–12 in two teams · Level: medium

Flunkyball (also called beer ball) needs room and fresh air — so it's more of a game for the backyard, a festival field, or the park. Two teams of 4–6 people face each other with open beer bottles, and an empty plastic bottle stands in the middle.

Taking turns, each team tries to knock the plastic bottle over with a ball. If they succeed, the opposing team has to stand the bottle back up as fast as possible — as long as it's down, the scoring team keeps drinking. Drinking only continues until the bottle is back up and the ball is behind the line again — on the opponent's loud "Stop!" everyone has to put their drink down immediately. The team that finishes all its beers first wins. The Flunkyball community is active enough that there are efforts underway for a nationwide league with official championships in Germany — which says something about how seriously some recreational athletes take this game. More outdoor games: Outdoor Drinking Games.

5. Funneling

Equipment: funnel, tube · Players: 2+ · Level: go easy

An ordinary funnel and a tube — that's all this college-campus classic needs. One person holds the funnel up high, the second takes the end of the tube in their mouth. Pour in the beer, lift it up — the pressure sends it straight down in one go. Also known as a "beer bong" or "speed-shotgunning."

The technique: as little foam as possible. Pour the beer in slowly at a shallow angle, wait a moment, then tilt the tube down slightly so the remaining foam can escape. Some people fit a ball valve between the tube and the funnel — then the beer only flows at the push of a button. Important: funneling means a lot of volume in a short time — once is a party trick, several times in a row is not. More on that below under Pace & Limits.

Cards, dice & table classics

The category for the table: a deck of cards or a pair of dice is all it takes, and the group stays seated together. This is where the sociable part of the evening happens. Find even more card and dice games in our complete drinking games overview.

6. King's Cup (Ring of Fire)

Equipment: deck of cards, large cup · Players: 4–8 · Level: medium

A large cup (the King's Cup) sits in the middle, with the cards spread face-down in a circle around it. Taking turns, everyone draws a card — and every card has a fixed rule. A common setup: Ace = waterfall (everyone drinks, no one can stop before the person before them does), 8 = pick a drinking buddy (who now drinks along with you for the rest of the game), Queen = question round (whoever answers a question instead of asking one back drinks), Jack = make a new rule. And the Kings: whoever draws one of the first three pours a splash of their drink into the King's Cup. Whoever draws the fourth King drinks the mix. What the remaining cards mean varies from round to round — house rules are part of the game here.

7. Busfahrer

Equipment: deck of cards · Players: 3–6 · Level: escalating

The card game with the most feared finale (the name translates to "bus driver"). Phase 1: everyone is dealt four cards one at a time and guesses beforehand — red or black? Higher or lower than the first? Between or outside the first two? Suit (hearts, diamonds, spades, clubs)? A wrong guess means drinking. Phase 2: the remaining cards are laid out as a pyramid and revealed row by row — whoever holds a matching card puts it down and hands out sips. Whoever has the most cards left at the end loses and becomes the "bus driver." Phase 3: the bus driver flips over a row of cards; every face card means a drink — and starting over from the top. Some bus rides feel like they last until sunrise.

8. Mäxchen

Equipment: 2 dice, dice cup, coaster · Players: 3+ · Level: relaxed

Mäxchen is a German dice-bluffing game (also called Mäxle, Meiern, or Schummelmax) and is probably the most popular dice-based drinking game in Germany, made famous in part by the film "Werner — Gekotzt wird später!" The first player rolls the dice hidden under the cup. The higher number becomes the tens digit, the lower one the units digit — so a 4 and a 3 becomes 43. Every following player has to beat the previous number. If they can't — or don't want to roll what they actually got — they lie. The next player decides: believe them or call their bluff. If it's revealed and the lie was true, the liar drinks; if the doubter was wrong, they drink instead. Doubles — say, two fours — beat any regular number. And the highest number of all: 21, the Mäxchen itself — beats everything.

9. UNO drinking game

Equipment: UNO card game · Players: 3–8 · Level: relaxed

UNO as a drinking game is perfect for warming up — you don't need anything besides the card game itself. Shuffle the cards, pile them in the middle of the table, and take turns drawing a card:

• Same number as the previous card → you drink
• Same color as the previous card → you drink
• Skip card → a player of your choice drinks
• Reverse → you drink, and the direction changes
• Draw Two → the next player drinks
• Wild Draw Four → everyone drinks
• Two Draw Twos in a row → the next player drinks two sips
• Wild (Zero) → you decide who drinks your next drink

The game ends once all the cards have been drawn. House rules of your own are explicitly welcome — stick to sips with beer or wine; shots have no place here.

10. Rippel-Dippel

Equipment: lipstick or marker · Players: 5+ · Level: medium

Rippel-Dippel is a German number-calling game and one of the best games for bigger groups — and the only one where you can read the score right off someone's face. (Spelled Rippel-Dippel, traditionally called out as "Ribbel-Dibbel" — both refer to the same game.) Everyone sits in a circle, each person starts out as "Ribbel-Dibbel without a dot," and numbers are handed out around the circle. Player 1 starts: "Ribbel-Dibbel number 1 without a dot calls Ribbel-Dibbel number 6 without a dot." Number 6 answers using the same pattern and calls the next person.

Whoever stumbles over their words, hesitates too long, or misses that they've been called gets a dot ("Tippel") drawn on their face with lipstick or a marker as a penalty — and drinks. From then on they're "Ribbel-Dibbel number 6 with one dot" and have to say that correctly the next time they're called — which is exactly where most people trip up. Every mistake adds another dot, and the face turns into a running scoreboard. After four mistakes you're out — or the game only really gets going, depending on house rules. The classic actually works surprisingly well sober too, as a concentration game.

11. Bier ärgere dich nicht

Equipment: "Mensch ärgere dich nicht" board game · Players: 2–4 · Level: relaxed

Bier ärgere dich nicht ("beer, don't get mad") takes the classic German board game (similar to Sorry! or Ludo) and adds drinking rules on top. You drink when: one of your pieces gets sent back, the die flies off the table, or one of your pieces reaches the finish. Additional house rules are welcome any time. Better for smaller groups, but with a constant, guaranteed dose of frustration — the name says it all.

12. Klimpern

Equipment: cup, coin · Players: 2+ · Level: relaxed

It doesn't get simpler than this: stand a cup about 15 cm from the table edge, place a coin on the table edge, and flick it toward the cup with your finger. If you land it, you decide who drinks. If you miss, you drink yourself. Quick to explain, instantly playable, and easy to scale up with more cups or greater distances.

Ski special — drinking games with wow factor

Three games you won't find on any other drinking games list — because they revolve around a piece of wood from the Alps: the ski. Two of them, to be precise.

13. Mini-Ski Roulette — spin the bottle with your own rules

Equipment: Miniski Roulette · Players: 3+ · Level: up to you

Everyone knows spin the bottle — with Miniski Roulette, instead of a bottle, a mini ski with a mounted shot glass spins on a disc. Whoever the ski tip points at is up. The real trick is the four spinning discs that come with it: all of them are writable, so your group writes its own rules. One disc for the warm-up ("down a shot," "give out 2," "spin again"), one for the escalation phase, one for truth or dare — no phone, no notes, and the rulebook grows along with the night. That makes it the only game on this list that comes with a fully customizable rule system.

14. SwigSki3000® on the dance floor — the game that turns strangers into friends

Equipment: SwigSki3000® · Players: 4+ · Level: party mode

This isn't a table game — it's one for the dance floor. The SwigSki3000® heads out into the crowd, and you round up drinking buddies on the spot. Everyone lines up and lifts the same ski together — each person drinks from their own mounted glass, but because everyone's holding the same ski, everyone drinks at the same moment. No one can stop early, no one can cheat.

What makes the moment special: taller people have to bend their knees a little so shorter people can drink comfortably too. That creates physical closeness and laughter in seconds — no icebreaker in the world does it better. And when four people take a shot in sync, someone is guaranteed to pull out their phone — this is the moment that gets photographed at every party.

The heart of the game is what happens afterward: whoever is still holding the ski at the end has to go find new drinking buddies. Once you've experienced the trick, you know it — next time, you hold on to the ski deliberately until the very end. That's how the SwigSki travels from group to group across the whole party. About the device itself: the base set consists of four modules that snap together — tip, two middle sections, end piece — so four people per round. An extension set lets the ski grow for bigger groups, and every module can be removed, cleaned, and replaced individually.

15. Limbo — and why a ski beats a pole

Equipment: long pole (or SwigSki) · Players: 5+ · Level: movement

Limbo just needs a long, sturdy pole and two people to hold it. Classically a broomstick — but anyone with a SwigSki3000® on hand automatically has the better limbo pole: long, sturdy, made of wood, and it looks considerably better than a broomstick from the cleaning closet.

The rules are well known: music plays, everyone takes turns dancing under the pole, which gets lowered after every round. Whoever touches it or falls is out — or drinks, depending on house rules. Whoever gets the lowest of everyone wins and gets to decide what happens next. Using the SwigSki as a limbo pole and then as a drinking game right after rounds out a whole evening from a single accessory.

No equipment on hand?

No problem: there's a whole universe of games that work completely without cups, cards, or balls — just words, numbers, and a group that's up for it. You'll find the 15 best of those in our guide Drinking Games Without Equipment. And if your group is more into questions than action: Funny Drinking Games collects the guaranteed laughs.

Pace & limits — how to keep it fun

The best drinking games live off the group, not the buzz. Four rules that make every night better:

• No one has to: Anyone who doesn't want to drink alcohol can play with water, juice, or non-alcoholic beer — the game mechanics work exactly the same.
• Pace the fast games: Funneling, Rage Cage, and Busfahrer bring a lot of volume in a short time. Once is a highlight; on repeat, it isn't. Water in between and something in your stomach beforehand both help.
• Whoever's driving plays with water: No discussion.
• Take age limits seriously: Local drinking-age laws for beer, wine, and spirits vary by country — check what applies where you live. Drinking games with shots aren't for minors anywhere.

FAQ

Related articles:
Drinking Games Without Equipment · Good Drinking Games — The Selection Criteria · Bachelorette Party Drinking Games · Outdoor Party Games

Sources: Rules cross-checked against common rule sets (spielregeln.de, beerpong.de, alkipedia.com, flunkyliga.de); Beer Pong history: vinepair.com; drinking-age laws vary by country and should be checked locally (last checked: July 2026).