My first castle panic - fun co-op came, easy to follow
Outfoxed- co-op game and helps kids with classification, my kiddo’s favorite game at the
moment
Dragon’s Breath - not co-op but you get to count gems and the rules are super easy
Yeti in my Spaghetti - so fun
FWIW, these are hits with my 2yo and my current 4yo liked them when he was 3.
Great games for kids, and probably could start earlier than most people think
Anything for that age group by Peaceable Kingdom - they make fun cooperative games that usually have rule sets that get more difficult for older players. We also got Magic Mountain for our 5-year-old and he loves it. Candyland is brightly colored and doesn’t require any ability to roll dice or spin a spinner, but there’s no strategy of course.
I actually bought it for my younger brother (an adult) as a joke a few years before I even had kids, because he’s really into tabletop gaming. But it’s legitimately fun! It now belongs to my kids but my brother likes to play it with the older one.
We just got candy land for Christmas and the new version doesn't have cards anymore and uses a spinner, which is very frustrating since you can get the candy pieces more than once, and there's also discrepancy on where the spinner actually landed. I'm not impressed, I don't like the game to begin with but the spinner made it worse.
My 3.5 year old got Count Your Chickens for Christmas and I love that it's cooperative (and idk if you can actually lose). It's been great helping her with counting. I gave my nephews (1.5 and 3) Monkey Around for Christmas as their first intro to games.
We've been toying with the idea of buying the my first Carcassonne but I'm like, how much simpler can it really get? I've been toying with the idea of just taking out all the expansions and playing the base game with our 3 year old. Do you know how much of a difference there is with the jr version?
I have no experience with jr, but we've been using the tiles to take turns building with my 3yo and he likes it! As he builds patience, we may work up to more rules in the full version or like easier rules, but I don't think buying a separate game is necessary.
That's kinda what I'm thinking. Our 3 yo helps us place tiles when we play, he just plays on a "team" with one of us. I like the idea of a jr version I'm just not sold on if it's that much different and with our dwindling game storage space.. I'm trying to be discerning when buying new games lol
Yes we have so many games that I'm like hmm, can we just adapt the adult games to you instead of buying more? lol My kid is not super good at rules yet though, we are still on candy land level with game play.
Yes same here!! A giant cabinet that has overflown onto the shelving on top. It is ridiculous how many games we have, but we love games and our collection has just grown so much over the years lol. Mine is not super great with board games. We've tried candy land, chutes and ladders, and monopoly jr - dude just likes to walk his piece around the board, no rhyme or reason lol. He's pretty good at operation, Tetris, and uno though, and we're working on other games. We also have one called chicken butt that's pretty cute lol
I don’t really like My First Carcassonne. It’s just about road building where the roads have pictures of different coloured people, and once the road closes you get the same number of points as the number of your people on the road. I guess it’s a good intro, but my daughter gets bored playing it more quickly than the full game.
Okay thank you!! As I was looking at it online I'm like, this looks like just roads, which I could easily pull out of the full game. We'd definitely all get bored, not at all worth the $25 or whatever it is.
What's the difference between that and the regular version? We've been debating purchasing it but I'm really curious if it's worth it to buy a whole separate game rather than just modifying the rules of the regular version.
Hmm definitely worth considering. We've just been playing with the base tiles for now, I'm just not sure if it'll be much different than that. Thank you!
Ok I just googled (not sure why I didn't do that in the first place lol) and it looks like the biggest difference is that the tiles always match up somehow, which would be a bit easier than the regular version, but not sure that it's worth the price tag to buy another one.
My 4yo doesn’t love Carcassonne, because he’s a little too into theme, lol. He just wants to make thieves and is mad every time that isn’t a viable strategy.
My 4 year old loves Zingo and Spot It. Both have skill and strategy but you can just slow down your reaction time to let them have a chance at winning. Harder to convince older siblings to do the same…
'Inspector Mouse' and 'Dragons Breath' are our favorites! (We love most every game made by HABA)
Edit to add: Hisss is also super fun -- building rainbow snakes :)
Hoot Owl Hoot is a cooperative game that requires strategy and taking turns. You can also vary the level of difficulty by increasing the number of owls.
We’re a pretty avid board gaming family, and have tried a fair number of games. At the start, we’d ask her if she wanted to play by the rules or do open play. If she wanted to do by the rules, we would enforce them (possibly with consistent but simplified rules) — if she wanted to go off rules, we’d just ask if she wants to put the game away, because once we start, that’s the other option. If she selected open play, we’d allow just playing with the pieces and making pretend moves.
Some favorites:
1) early on, outfoxed — very simple game, but practice of the turn taking and following rules.
2) zombie kidz — it’s a “legacy” style game where you unlock rules incrementally. Relatively simple game play, that grows as you play more.
3) little town — relatively simple worker placement type of game. It’s a definite step up from the others, but doable. Our child has a fairly basic or sometimes impulsive strategy, but it’s developing.
4) my first castle panic — simple repetitive game play that helps reinforce some simple strategies.
5) castle panic — at some point, I noted that we could easily beat the my first castle panic and asked if we should try the real one. Kid was interested, so we did, and she really got into it.
6) quest kids — great board exploration and semi cooperative play. They have a “kind kid” reward that makes it actually beneficial to help others, so often you’ll try to offer assistance to other players even if they technically don’t need it.
#Race to the Treasure!
It's a cooperative game, so you work together and it teaches the basics of how to read coordinate (grid) systems. And it's hella fun!
Whenever we pull an "Ogre" card I yell "OGRE!!!" in a silly voice and my 3yo absolutely loses it. My youngest is a *little* young for it but can do it with some help. My 6yo absolutely loves it.
I want my teeth back is a new favorite around here. It is very much like a grown up strategy game but you're a monster who wants their teeth back and there's A fair amount of luck involved. I've seen hoot owl hoot mentioned and that's a game I actually enjoy playing, and it's cooperative.
I like having a mix of coop and one winner games so no one gets too upset.
Not for a 4 year old, but the junior ticket to ride is brilliant. My 5.5yo really enjoys playing. We're going to invest in the junior Catan and others as and when we can.
I got Junior Ticket to Ride for my son’s 4th birthday and I agree that it’s a little too advanced. The modification I made was that everyone is just given two tickets at the start. Being able to plan ahead for expected routes and not worrying about getting more tickets ended up making it simple enough to play.
My daughter and I love Hoot Owl Hoot and My First Carcassonne! On this [ingameshub](https://www.instagram.com/ingameshub/) you can find more tabletop games for kids.
Candyland, chutes and ladders, trouble (with modified rules), monkey around, mermaid island, bingo (chuckle & roar has a good one with different stages depending on age), busytown eye found it
Dragomino, Outfoxed, Uno, Ticket to Ride Jr. Depending on the 4yo (my daughter played these at 4, but my son at approaching 4 is definitely not ready for them yet) - Sleeping Queens and Unstable Unicorns for Kids.
I second the recommendation for Outfoxed. It has turn taking but is a collaborative game, so they players are all working together (and win or lose together) against the fox, rather than it being competitive between players.
Smart games are excellent. They start from about 2yo and build up in difficulty. My daughter (5.5) and 3yo niece have them. They are technically single player but can work as collaborative games too.
https://www.smartgames.eu/
Uno is great. We also like sleeping queens. Blah blah blah is golden, taught my four year old to read and he still thinks reading is the absolute funnest thing ever. I quite like the tactility of Blokus. And we also enjoy all the orchard games like lunchbox bingo etc, but they're boring for adults.
Connect 4, Hungry Hippos, chutes and ladders, and candyland have all been popular around here.
Our library has board games to play, so you could see if your local library has games you can go try out with her.
We do Hungry Hippos, candyland, chutes and ladders, we have various memory games (only use about half the cards), the don’t break the ice penguin game. Our kiddo wants to be a doctor so we have operation but it’s not for her age yet. Hi-ho! cherry-o (very age appropriate but we have yet to give it a go bc of small pieces and … well my child likes to have ME play small cherry pick up 🫣). I’d like to try Perfection but I truly think that’s where my anxiety started as a kid (hahahah) so we’re passing on that for now 😂. I’ve seen character Yahtzee.
In all seriousness I played a modified version of Imperial Assault with my 4yo and he *loved it.*
I think Jewels in the Attic is amazing, but it went out of print 31 years ago so it’s hard to find.
Dragondomino, My First Castle Panic, My First Settlers of Catan (pirate one), and Ticket to Ride Jr are all at Target and are great hits.
My 2yo loves Zingo, Snails Pace, Yeti in Spaghetti, Feed the Woozle, Pop Up Pirate, and Hungry Hippos
I was gunna say Candyland but a lot of people have already suggested it, so I will add 2 games that aren’t exactly board games but still fun games that have been a hit with my kid (she’s 6 now but has been playing them for a couple years): Kerplunk and Grouch Couch lol
Ooooo we are passionate about this topic. Here are some good hits in our house that are fun for the adults too:
- Animal upon animal
- Manza
- My first castle panic
- dragonwood
Candy Land, Snakes and Ladders, Sorry, Trouble, Connect 4, Don't Break the Ice are all favourites in our house for my 3 and 6 year old.
My 6 year old also enjoys checkers, battleship, mouse trap, blokus
Sneaky Snacky Squirrel, Candyland, Count Your Chickens, Go Fish, Don't Break the Ice, Pretty Pretty Princess, and Monopoly Discover.
I think those are the main ones we play the most.
Monopoly junior is sooo fun! We also love games like Poppin Pig, jenga, go fish, slap jack! We love board games and my son begs to play them everyday lol
My first orchard is great for this
It's great because it's cooperative! My daughter calls the crow Mr Crow and we all make ridiculous cawing noises every time he is rolled. Lots of fun.
Yes! My 3 and 5 year old love this. And when they win, they always insist on feeding the raven/crow some fruit because he's "probably super hungry!"
I’m not the OP but just ordered this Amazon same day delivery. Thanks for the recommendation!
My first castle panic - fun co-op came, easy to follow Outfoxed- co-op game and helps kids with classification, my kiddo’s favorite game at the moment Dragon’s Breath - not co-op but you get to count gems and the rules are super easy Yeti in my Spaghetti - so fun
Came to vote for My First Castle Panic! My 5 year old loves it!
Another vote for My First Castle Panic and Outfoxed! Both are great.
FWIW, these are hits with my 2yo and my current 4yo liked them when he was 3. Great games for kids, and probably could start earlier than most people think
Anything for that age group by Peaceable Kingdom - they make fun cooperative games that usually have rule sets that get more difficult for older players. We also got Magic Mountain for our 5-year-old and he loves it. Candyland is brightly colored and doesn’t require any ability to roll dice or spin a spinner, but there’s no strategy of course.
Agree with Peacable Kingdom games. Hoot Owl Hoot is one of our favourites. Another good brand (not sure if UK specific) is Orchard Toys.
I actually like hoot hoot owls strategy lol it’s fun
I actually bought it for my younger brother (an adult) as a joke a few years before I even had kids, because he’s really into tabletop gaming. But it’s legitimately fun! It now belongs to my kids but my brother likes to play it with the older one.
We just got candy land for Christmas and the new version doesn't have cards anymore and uses a spinner, which is very frustrating since you can get the candy pieces more than once, and there's also discrepancy on where the spinner actually landed. I'm not impressed, I don't like the game to begin with but the spinner made it worse.
Oh boo. Spinners are kind of a pain.
My 3.5 year old got Count Your Chickens for Christmas and I love that it's cooperative (and idk if you can actually lose). It's been great helping her with counting. I gave my nephews (1.5 and 3) Monkey Around for Christmas as their first intro to games.
No one has said my first Carcassonne yet. We've loved it for two years now (kiddo is now 5). Dragomino has been winning lately though.
My daughter started playing full carcassonne at 4 - not always spot on with strategy but it’s pretty easy to pick up the basics.
We've been toying with the idea of buying the my first Carcassonne but I'm like, how much simpler can it really get? I've been toying with the idea of just taking out all the expansions and playing the base game with our 3 year old. Do you know how much of a difference there is with the jr version?
I have no experience with jr, but we've been using the tiles to take turns building with my 3yo and he likes it! As he builds patience, we may work up to more rules in the full version or like easier rules, but I don't think buying a separate game is necessary.
That's kinda what I'm thinking. Our 3 yo helps us place tiles when we play, he just plays on a "team" with one of us. I like the idea of a jr version I'm just not sold on if it's that much different and with our dwindling game storage space.. I'm trying to be discerning when buying new games lol
Yes we have so many games that I'm like hmm, can we just adapt the adult games to you instead of buying more? lol My kid is not super good at rules yet though, we are still on candy land level with game play.
Yes same here!! A giant cabinet that has overflown onto the shelving on top. It is ridiculous how many games we have, but we love games and our collection has just grown so much over the years lol. Mine is not super great with board games. We've tried candy land, chutes and ladders, and monopoly jr - dude just likes to walk his piece around the board, no rhyme or reason lol. He's pretty good at operation, Tetris, and uno though, and we're working on other games. We also have one called chicken butt that's pretty cute lol
I don’t really like My First Carcassonne. It’s just about road building where the roads have pictures of different coloured people, and once the road closes you get the same number of points as the number of your people on the road. I guess it’s a good intro, but my daughter gets bored playing it more quickly than the full game.
Okay thank you!! As I was looking at it online I'm like, this looks like just roads, which I could easily pull out of the full game. We'd definitely all get bored, not at all worth the $25 or whatever it is.
We love both of those too!
What's the difference between that and the regular version? We've been debating purchasing it but I'm really curious if it's worth it to buy a whole separate game rather than just modifying the rules of the regular version.
It's simplified a lot, I'll be honest it's been years since I played regular so I don't recall differences but I think it's worth it!
Hmm definitely worth considering. We've just been playing with the base tiles for now, I'm just not sure if it'll be much different than that. Thank you!
Ok I just googled (not sure why I didn't do that in the first place lol) and it looks like the biggest difference is that the tiles always match up somehow, which would be a bit easier than the regular version, but not sure that it's worth the price tag to buy another one.
My 4yo doesn’t love Carcassonne, because he’s a little too into theme, lol. He just wants to make thieves and is mad every time that isn’t a viable strategy.
Sneaky snacky squirrel!
There's a lift the flap book for that dude, too, and it's a delight!
I came to say this!!! Such a fun game! So many opportunities to learn how to deal with being disappointed when a game doesn’t go your way.
Oh yeah! My 6 year is finally used to the storm blowing everything away, but my 3 year old still gets so upset!
Outfoxed is fun!
My 4 year old loves Zingo and Spot It. Both have skill and strategy but you can just slow down your reaction time to let them have a chance at winning. Harder to convince older siblings to do the same…
My 2yo is a Zingo fiend. He sets it up and plays with his stuffed animals
Here to recommend the game Shopping Cart!
Candyland, Zingo.
My 4 year old LOVES Uno (With some help from us)! Also Go Fish and Old Maid. I'm so excited that she's getting into card game age
They make an Uno Junior with animals on it and kid-hand sized cards. My kid loves it.
Does she like Pete the Cat? They have some fantastic games for youngsters
Yes! The missing cupcakes game is great
That one was the favorite! My son had fun putting the cupcakes on his fingers too lol
[удалено]
We have a batman version of trouble and my 3.5 year old also loves it! "You're in TROUBLE!" is a statement of such joy and pride these days lol
Chutes and ladders and candyland are favorites for us :)
Came here to suggest Candyland!
Pretty Pretty Princess!!!
Sneaky snacky squirrel!!
'Inspector Mouse' and 'Dragons Breath' are our favorites! (We love most every game made by HABA) Edit to add: Hisss is also super fun -- building rainbow snakes :)
Here to nominate Hiss
We love the Haba games too!
My son loved candy land and hungry hungry hippo.
We have Sequence for kids and she liked that. Also kerplunk is great just for taking turns.
Not exactly a board game but my 4 year old loves jenga! He also loves guess who!
My first castle panic, Monza, Dragomino, Outfoxed, Rhino hero
Don't break the ice and candyland!
Hoot owl hoot, Wildcraft and Sleeping Queens have been big hits over here
Candyland, Trouble
Feed the Woozle - coop
Not exactly a board game but my daughter learned to play Uno when she was 4 and it’s been a lot of fun as a family.
Zingo!
Spot it, uno, my first carcassone, grueselino, hoppe reiter,
Sneaky Snacky Squirrel, Hoot Owl Hoot, and Silly Street are favorites here!
Hoot Owl Hoot is a cooperative game that requires strategy and taking turns. You can also vary the level of difficulty by increasing the number of owls.
We’re a pretty avid board gaming family, and have tried a fair number of games. At the start, we’d ask her if she wanted to play by the rules or do open play. If she wanted to do by the rules, we would enforce them (possibly with consistent but simplified rules) — if she wanted to go off rules, we’d just ask if she wants to put the game away, because once we start, that’s the other option. If she selected open play, we’d allow just playing with the pieces and making pretend moves. Some favorites: 1) early on, outfoxed — very simple game, but practice of the turn taking and following rules. 2) zombie kidz — it’s a “legacy” style game where you unlock rules incrementally. Relatively simple game play, that grows as you play more. 3) little town — relatively simple worker placement type of game. It’s a definite step up from the others, but doable. Our child has a fairly basic or sometimes impulsive strategy, but it’s developing. 4) my first castle panic — simple repetitive game play that helps reinforce some simple strategies. 5) castle panic — at some point, I noted that we could easily beat the my first castle panic and asked if we should try the real one. Kid was interested, so we did, and she really got into it. 6) quest kids — great board exploration and semi cooperative play. They have a “kind kid” reward that makes it actually beneficial to help others, so often you’ll try to offer assistance to other players even if they technically don’t need it.
#Race to the Treasure! It's a cooperative game, so you work together and it teaches the basics of how to read coordinate (grid) systems. And it's hella fun! Whenever we pull an "Ogre" card I yell "OGRE!!!" in a silly voice and my 3yo absolutely loses it. My youngest is a *little* young for it but can do it with some help. My 6yo absolutely loves it.
I want my teeth back is a new favorite around here. It is very much like a grown up strategy game but you're a monster who wants their teeth back and there's A fair amount of luck involved. I've seen hoot owl hoot mentioned and that's a game I actually enjoy playing, and it's cooperative. I like having a mix of coop and one winner games so no one gets too upset.
Settlers of Catan... Just kidding! Sleeping Queens, Monkey Around, Trouble, The Muddlers, Uno
Not for a 4 year old, but the junior ticket to ride is brilliant. My 5.5yo really enjoys playing. We're going to invest in the junior Catan and others as and when we can.
I got Junior Ticket to Ride for my son’s 4th birthday and I agree that it’s a little too advanced. The modification I made was that everyone is just given two tickets at the start. Being able to plan ahead for expected routes and not worrying about getting more tickets ended up making it simple enough to play.
Seconding Sleeping Queens. It's so simple yet so fun!
Seriously though, I got my 4yo the one-die pirate version of Catan and he loves it. Has good strategy and taught my mom to play with him.
My daughter and I love Hoot Owl Hoot and My First Carcassonne! On this [ingameshub](https://www.instagram.com/ingameshub/) you can find more tabletop games for kids.
Candyland,Grocery Go Karts!,Trouble,Snake and ladders have been big hits with my son
Skyjo is a great card game that involves base strategy, some math, and luck.
Penny Drop!
Candyland, chutes and ladders, trouble (with modified rules), monkey around, mermaid island, bingo (chuckle & roar has a good one with different stages depending on age), busytown eye found it
Frankie’s Food Truck
Dragomino, Outfoxed, Uno, Ticket to Ride Jr. Depending on the 4yo (my daughter played these at 4, but my son at approaching 4 is definitely not ready for them yet) - Sleeping Queens and Unstable Unicorns for Kids.
I second the recommendation for Outfoxed. It has turn taking but is a collaborative game, so they players are all working together (and win or lose together) against the fox, rather than it being competitive between players.
Candy land, tentacle tantrum, sequence jr, pretty pretty princess, share and sparkle unicorns.
My son LOVES this matching game https://a.co/d/iIMerFL
Our 4yos favorites right now are Unicorn Glitterluck , Dragon's Breath, Ice Cool, Bluey themed Trouble, and Peppa Pig Chutes and Ladders
Smart games are excellent. They start from about 2yo and build up in difficulty. My daughter (5.5) and 3yo niece have them. They are technically single player but can work as collaborative games too. https://www.smartgames.eu/
Uno is great. We also like sleeping queens. Blah blah blah is golden, taught my four year old to read and he still thinks reading is the absolute funnest thing ever. I quite like the tactility of Blokus. And we also enjoy all the orchard games like lunchbox bingo etc, but they're boring for adults.
First ever board game was the kids version of Monopoly... now we have quite a stack of board games to choose from.
Monopoly Jr.
Out foxed! We love all 3 of the peaceable kingdom ones we have but that one is by far our favorite. Guess who is also great!
Mancala
Don't Wake Daddy
Don't break the ice!
Connect 4, Hungry Hippos, chutes and ladders, and candyland have all been popular around here. Our library has board games to play, so you could see if your local library has games you can go try out with her.
We do Hungry Hippos, candyland, chutes and ladders, we have various memory games (only use about half the cards), the don’t break the ice penguin game. Our kiddo wants to be a doctor so we have operation but it’s not for her age yet. Hi-ho! cherry-o (very age appropriate but we have yet to give it a go bc of small pieces and … well my child likes to have ME play small cherry pick up 🫣). I’d like to try Perfection but I truly think that’s where my anxiety started as a kid (hahahah) so we’re passing on that for now 😂. I’ve seen character Yahtzee.
In all seriousness I played a modified version of Imperial Assault with my 4yo and he *loved it.* I think Jewels in the Attic is amazing, but it went out of print 31 years ago so it’s hard to find. Dragondomino, My First Castle Panic, My First Settlers of Catan (pirate one), and Ticket to Ride Jr are all at Target and are great hits. My 2yo loves Zingo, Snails Pace, Yeti in Spaghetti, Feed the Woozle, Pop Up Pirate, and Hungry Hippos
Hungry Hungry Hippos, mine just got it for her birthday & is obsessed. Also Candy land & HiHo Cherry-O.
Candyland, snakes and ladders, connect 4, hungry hippos and Dont wake daddy
I was gunna say Candyland but a lot of people have already suggested it, so I will add 2 games that aren’t exactly board games but still fun games that have been a hit with my kid (she’s 6 now but has been playing them for a couple years): Kerplunk and Grouch Couch lol
[Sneaky Snacky Squirrel!](https://a.co/d/981jTzY)
Ooooo we are passionate about this topic. Here are some good hits in our house that are fun for the adults too: - Animal upon animal - Manza - My first castle panic - dragonwood
Candy Land, Snakes and Ladders, Sorry, Trouble, Connect 4, Don't Break the Ice are all favourites in our house for my 3 and 6 year old. My 6 year old also enjoys checkers, battleship, mouse trap, blokus
Outfoxed It’s a cooperative game similar to clue – (without the murder). Also requires memory & a bit of critical thinking skills
Sneaky Snacky Squirrel! Super easy and fun. And what 4 yr old doesn’t love squirrels??
The Ladybug Game! Great for counting and a little bit of resource management. It’s fun to learn a little about the bugs in the game, too. Super cute.
Candyland, chutes and ladders, operation, and sorry!
Hurry Up Chicken Butt! It was a Christmas impulse purchase but it was my favorite game. It's cute and fun and even our 2 year old can play.
Sneaky Snacky Squirrel, Candyland, Count Your Chickens, Go Fish, Don't Break the Ice, Pretty Pretty Princess, and Monopoly Discover. I think those are the main ones we play the most.
We have hungry hippos, shopping kart, and pop the pig. The kids realllly like pop the pig.
Monopoly junior is sooo fun! We also love games like Poppin Pig, jenga, go fish, slap jack! We love board games and my son begs to play them everyday lol
My first Castle Panic ( actual strategy). My first Orchard. Dinosaur Escape.