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As a travel couple, we spend a lot of time on the road or in the lounges waiting for something.
Even if you are super creative, at some point you will run out of ideas on how to kill the extra time and what you can do together besides just staring at your phones. You don’t want to be bored on a special trip with the person you love!
And sometimes you are just too tired or lazy to come up with something original, so you need a good and preferably easy trip games solution for the two of you.
Well, you probably already know how much I love board games after my post 10 Best Travel Board Games For Adults, but this time I wanted to focus specifically on couple travel realities and cover more than just board games.
On my new list of the best travel games for couples, there are some new board games ideas, but also a few suggestions for digital games for two as well as discussion games to kill the boredom if you just wanna talk and have some fun!
Discussion Games For Couples – When There Is Extra Time To Get To Know Each Other Better
How often do you find time to just sit and talk?
These days everyone is busy all the time, so a trip together gives a perfect opportunity for actually talking to each other. When you walk around a new city hand in hand, sunbathe at some beautiful beach, or stuck in a car, bus or train for hours before you get to someplace nice, take this time to learn a new thing or two about each other.
Make it fun and in a form of a game instead of being all serious!
Here are some ideas for discussion games you can use on your road trips, during airplane layovers, or whenever you wanna talk to your partner.
Even if you do it just for kicks or to kill the time, you might still deepen your bond and have some fun time together instead of being bored and cranky!
Tell me in the comments if you have other discussion travel games ideas for couples on the road!
1. Use Conversation Starters And Make Sure To Listen
Sometimes you may feel like an old married couple that has nothing to talk about anymore.
Believe me, it’s never true!
Just because there are no fresh topic ideas off the top of your head at the moment, doesn’t mean they don’t exist. I’m sure there are plenty of new things to discuss for you two!
These cool conversation starter cards were created just for situations like that. Whenever you feel stuck, just pick a card and you’ll have something to talk about. Just like that!
There are 100 cards in the pack. You can hardly ever run out of ideas even if you choose this as your main travel game!
Some of them are romantic, some philosophic. There are a few to share your childhood memories and previous experiences, others make you dream about your future.
These cards are said to be perfect for all kinds of couples: from new to married, no matter the age. You can decide how deep you want to dive into a specific subject. And if you aren’t in the mood for some topic right now, simply pick another card!
Sample questions from Our Moments for Couples:
- What’s your most embarrassing memory from Junior High?
- If you had an extra $100 to spend on yourself every week, what would you do?
- What did you want to be when you were 10 years old?
- What would be the absolute perfect day?
2. Play Would You Rather – Fun Road Trip Game For a Couple
Time to have some fun on the road!
Would you rather fall asleep from boredom or play some fun road trip games with your loved one?
Haha, don’t answer that.
For this game you don’t need any equipment, but a book of ready-to-choose random questions may be very handy when you are out of ideas or too tired to come up with the fun ones.
Some questions are fun and may be easy to answer right away, others may be more challenging and take some time to think.
Turn on your imagination and discuss all the ‘what if’s together! You may be surprised when you partner’s answer is the opposite of yours!
Sample Would You Rather questions:
- Would you rather never get a paper cut again or never bite your tongue again?
- Would you rather be able to see through walls or be able to hear sounds from a mile away?
- Would you rather have to drink only hot drinks all summer long or eat only cold foods all winter long?
3. Practice Your Foreign Language Skills
Going on a trip to Spain and wanna practice your speaking skills? Even if not, foreign languages are always a good idea!
We tend to forget a language fast if we don’t use it regularly. If you are lucky to have at least one language in common with your partner besides your native one, why not practice it on the road? It can be a great idea to diversify your usual airport or car games and do something productive for a change!
You don’t necessarily have to go to a specific country to speak with someone when you conveniently have someone right here, by your side! It works best if you are more or less on the same learning level, but if not you can help each other get there.
Basically, there is no rules for this but one: you have to talk.
You may start with something simple, like talking about the day or plans for tomorrow – but in another language. When you get tired of discussing the same daily things every time or master that vocabulary, turn to my previous game ideas again. But this time play in another language! Even the questions that are easy to answer might be challenging to answer correctly – and you might even learn some useful vocabulary in the process!
Here is another book full of ideas that are handy for language speaking practice.
It includes different kinds of questions like:
- Tell me about the top three things on your bucket list.
- Would you rather X or Y?
- If you could do X, what would be Y?
- Trivia questions as in: What country is known as X?
Travel Board Games For 2 – When Two Is More Than Enough
Okay, enough with talking, let’s play a real game or two now!
What is your relationship with board games?
It’s one of our go-to things to do when we want to spend some time together.
Of course, we love to play with others too and organize game nights with friends whenever we are in town, but as we travel a lot, most of the time it’s just the two of us. That’s why when we discover new board games, we first check if it works for a two-player situation.
Most, if not all of the board games in my list of best travel board games for adults are portable and suitable for two players, so check them out!
Here I share three new board games for 2 people I found recently that I haven’t played yet, but they look intriguing.
Tell me in the comments if you have some experience playing any of these and if you liked it! Also please share if you have more board or card games on your mind that are travel-sized and without too many little details. I’d love to play some new ones I haven’t heard of yet!
4. Skull King – Fun Pirate Trick Card Game
Skull King is a fun travel board game for 2 or more people that can be played wherever you have a small surface for cards. Even the back seat of a car will work fine if you have some space in between.
Frequent players say it’s very easy to learn and teach someone else!
Pirate theme creates the cool fun atmosphere and immersive playing experience.
You say Yo-Ho-Ho as real pirates and place your bids for how many tricks you think you each win in the current round. There is a straightforward but interesting way of counting points based on the accuracy of your bid. You can even choose to play a risky approach and either win or lose big time.
Besides the main deck, there are many special cards that make the game less predictable. So you never know for sure how strong your cards are!
Here is a video with the full game overview and all the rules explained in less than ten minutes:
There is a scoresheet included, but you can also keep track of the scores on your smartphone notes app to make it more environment-friendly.
Skull King is especially fun to bring on an actual cruise!
Skull King
Players: 2-6
Play time: 15-30 min
5. Codenames: Duet – Learn To Be On The Same Wavelength
Codenames Duet is an expanded version of the original Codenames game that is more travel-friendly and designed for two players. It has 400 extra cards with words that you can mix together if you have previous version.
While the classic game is better played with more people, in teams against each other, this one is great for a couple playing as one team, so you can win or lose together.
In any Codenames edition, you have to think and choose words carefully. You need to give one-word clues to each other that help to uncover agents, but if you aren’t careful you can bump into an assassin that makes you both lose immediately!
Watch this video to see the gameplay for two players in action:
Codenames Duet card game will be hard to play inside the car as you need some surface to arrange the cards. Still, it’s packed small and easy to bring with you, and you can play it whenever you have a table, a desk, or any other flat surface in front of you.
Some of the suitable places I have in mind are a cafe, a tent, on a picnic, in any airport lounge (a chair between you two will do as a surface), on a cruise ship, and on a train. Just make sure it’s not too windy as it’s a card game after all.
Codenames: Duet
Players: 2 or more
Play time: 15 min
6. Hanamikoji – Beautiful board game for two players with Japanese vibe
The name of Hanamikoji game comes from one of the famous geisha districts in Kioto, Japan.
The goal is to win the favor of enough geishas to earn more charm points than the other player. In each round, there is a set of four actions that you do in turns depending on your current card hand state.
So, the game process looks something like this: the first person draws a card, adds it to the hand, estimates the situation, and performs one of the four actions that seems the most applicable. Then they “give” their open cards to geishas they belong to according to the color and end the turn.
There are a few winning situations and you can even win if you don’t have enough points!
Watch this video for a good overview and rules explanation:
You need a bit of a surface to play Hanamikoji, but it’s a fun game and the box is small enough to even pack it in your hand luggage.
All cards are beautifully designed and put you into charming Japanese quarters even if it’s not your current travel destination. This board game for two will especially complement the vibe of your trip to Eastern countries!
Hanamikoji
Players: 2
Game time: 15-20 min
Free Digital Games For Couples – When There Is No Network
In our era of digital availability, relationships can easily struggle from the mutual lack of attention.
If you look around in the airport lounge zone or even in a restaurant, you’ll most likely see a few couples that are immersed in their phones instead of spending quality time with each other. They are together physically, but mentally many miles apart.
You don’t wanna be like them!
I’ve covered discussion games that make you closer above, and here are some digital travel games for couples for a change.
If you can’t give up your phones, at least do something fun together!
Many digital games for two don’t require a network connection, just a Bluetooth one. Some can be even played on the same device so one of you can save some battery juice for travel emergencies.
For this post, I’ve chosen three games we played together and liked enough to share with the world. They are quick to play whenever you have a few minutes to waste: in the airport, in the back of a car on a road trip, on a picnic, on a bench in the park, in the hotel when too tired for anything else… You get the idea.
7. Sea Battle 2 – Classic Old-School Game For A Couple
Who doesn’t know sea battle?
If you are young enough and never played it on paper, this is how we used to do it in the 90s.
There are tons of sea battle interpretations in the digital world, but I like this particular one because it’s nostalgic and looks similar to what we did manually back in the day. Of course, now you don’t need to draw anything and even think about the strategy of arranging your ships. When we feel lazy, we just both press Auto and go with whatever random distribution the game gives us.
This version is called Sea Battle 2 as they expanded it a lot: you can now earn points by winning the battles and use them to build your city. There are all kinds of extra cheat weapons you can use to win the battle, but to be honest, we prefer old-school fair play without any extra help.
In case you don’t know what’s all this about, the idea is quite simple. You place a number of ships on the field and take turns guessing where your opponent’s ships are. Oftentimes the lucky one wins, but there are some strategies on both placing and guessing parts that can be used to improve your chances.
As opposed to other games I’m gonna tell you about today, for this one you need both your smartphones as you shouldn’t be able to see each other’s screen while playing. Being online is not necessary though, as all you need for this game is a Bluetooth connection. So you can play Sea Battle even on a camping trip with no Internet connection.
8. Fruit Ninja – Fast And Fun Game To Play Together
Looking for a quick fun game to play together when bored? Check out Fruit Ninja!
It only takes a minute to play so you can use it as a time killer absolutely everywhere, even when waiting in line.
The main idea is to cut fruit that comes to you randomly from the bottom of the screen as if someone throws it for you to practice your ninja cutting skills. You share the screen with your partner as it’s divided in half and it scores how much fruit you cut in a given time. There are different modes where you lose if you miss three items or where you have bombs to throw to make each other’s life harder.
Even though it’s random, all the fruit thrown at you is the same that your partner gets, so it’s as fair as it can get. As long as you don’t use unexpected bombs…
Fruit Ninja is a good way to practice your reaction skills and find out who is faster! It’s also fun to play when you are sleepy because of an early take-off or something and need to wake up. Just a few minutes of this competitive fruit cutting – and you are wide awake and ready for a new day of wandering.
9. Badland – Best Graphics Game To Play For Two People
Badland is a super easy and very beautiful game for a couple.
It can actually incorporate up to four players, but that would be more convenient on a tablet than on a tiny smartphone screen. For two players it’s much more comfortable as you don’t cover too much of screen space with your hands and can see everything clearly (as opposed to upside down) just sitting shoulder to shoulder.
As you can see from my screenshot, it’s not surprising that it has won a number of awards. It’s definitely one of the most beautiful game graphics I’ve ever seen! It immediately puts you in a cute atmospheric story: you fly through the magical world together and generally just try to survive all the obstacles on your way.
The co-op mode is available offline as you play on the same device. The gameplay itself is super simple: you just touch the screen to go up and don’t touch to go down. It might seem stupid as touching the screen with your one finger in the same place is the only thing you do, but wait until you immerse into that world! Surviving there is not as easy as it looks!
Final Thoughts About The Best Travel Games For Couples
Okay, I guess now you have enough ideas on how to spend some valuable time with your partner on the road!
I hope these diversify your usual road trip activities and make your journey even more fun and memorable!
Traveling as a couple is a wonderful experience already, but with these interesting travel games for couples, you can spend more time together and learn more about each other in many ways. Playing games as a couple while exploring the world is a great way to deepen your bond and improve your relationship even more!
Tell me in the comments what is your favorite travel game for two people, I’d love to hear more ideas for the two of us!
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