A charades game your kids can play before they can read
Guessy Kids takes the classic forehead guessing game and rebuilds it for children. Every puzzle is a big, friendly illustration instead of a word, so preschoolers join in from the very first round. Hold the phone up, and let everyone act, mime or describe what they see.
For iPhone and Android. Free to download, with the Animals category unlocked from the start.
- picture puzzles
- 399picture puzzles
- categories
- 9categories
- languages
- 33languages
- years and up
- 3+years and up
How to play
Learn the rules in about a minute
No setup, no pieces, no printing anything out. All you need is a phone and at least one other person.
- 1
Pick a category
Animals, fruit, jobs, emotions or colors. With Premium you can throw several categories into a single round.
- 2
Phone on your forehead
The guesser holds the phone up to their forehead with the screen facing everyone else. They cannot see the picture, but the rest of the room can.
- 3
Act it out or describe it
Make the animal sound, mime the movement or describe the object without naming it. Your family, your rules.
- 4
Tilt down or pass
Got it right? Tilt the phone down and the next picture appears. Stuck? Tilt it up to pass and keep the round moving.
A round runs 30 seconds by default. Premium lets you stretch it to 45, 60 or 90 seconds, which makes a real difference with younger kids.
Learn moreWhy this one actually works with young children
Text is what keeps most party games out of reach for under sevens. In Guessy Kids every puzzle is a drawing, so a three year old understands the game the moment it starts.
No reading required
Each puzzle is a large, clear illustration. Your preschooler looks at the screen and starts acting straight away.
Vocabulary without a worksheet
Hundreds of words come up during play. Kids are not memorizing them, they are explaining them, and that is exactly why the words stick.
Everybody gets moving
Acting things out gets the whole room off the sofa. Five minutes of Guessy Kids beats half an hour of passive screen time.
Nobody loses
The game counts what the group gets right, not who beat whom. A four year old and a grandparent play the same game on equal footing.
33 languages built in
Switch languages any time in settings. Same picture, different word, which makes this a surprisingly good language learning tool.
Ready whenever you are
Waiting rooms, long car journeys, rainy afternoons. No box, no cards, no table, just the phone in your pocket.
Categories
Nine categories, 399 puzzles
Every category is hand picked for children. Open any one of them to read the full word list before you even download the app.
FreeAnimals
96 puzzles
The largest and most popular category, with 96 puzzles. Animal noises count as a legitimate clue here, which is exactly why this is the one to start with.
Learn more
PremiumVegetables
38 puzzles
38 puzzles from carrot to aubergine. This category teaches without teaching, because the child is doing the explaining rather than being told what to eat.
Learn more
PremiumFruits
22 puzzles
22 puzzles built on familiar shapes and short words. The best second category after Animals, because almost every child scores a point in the first thirty seconds.
Learn more
PremiumEmotions
43 puzzles
43 puzzles about faces and feelings. From an educational angle this is the most interesting category, because it practises emotion recognition exactly the way specialists recommend.
Learn more
PremiumJobs
31 puzzles
31 professions, from doctor through firefighter to astronaut. This is the best miming category in the app, because every job comes with its own signature movement.
Learn more
PremiumColors
15 puzzles
15 puzzles, the shortest and simplest category in the app. That is exactly what makes it right for the youngest players and for a first round together.
Learn more
PremiumTravel
51 puzzles
51 puzzles covering vehicles, holidays, landscapes and landmarks. This category earns its keep on the road, exactly when you need a distraction most.
Learn more
PremiumObjects
57 puzzles
57 puzzles in the most varied category of them all. Musical instruments, sports gear, school supplies and household things, all of them items you probably have nearby.
Learn more
PremiumActivities
46 puzzles
46 puzzles, all of them verbs. This is the category that gets everyone off the sofa, and it warms up the living room in about five minutes.
Learn moreA look inside the game
Big, uncluttered screens in warm colors. The whole app runs in landscape so the picture stays as large and readable as possible when the phone is on someone's forehead.
For parents
Screen time you can actually feel good about
Guessy Kids is not built to keep anyone scrolling. A round lasts thirty seconds and ends on a results screen, not on another prompt designed to pull you back in.
There is no sign up and no account, we collect nothing personal about your child, and photos you add to your own custom categories never leave the device.
- No registration and no user profiles
- Your own photos stay on your phone
- Round length and sounds are yours to adjust
- Premium removes ads completely
Premium
Free to play, Premium if you want more
The download is free and the Animals category with its 96 puzzles is yours forever. Premium is for families who end up playing this every week.
Free
- Animals category, 96 picture puzzles
- The complete game with 30 second rounds
- All 33 languages, unlimited rounds
- Results screen and sharing
Premium
- All 9 categories, 399 puzzles in total
- Combine several categories in one round
- Custom categories from your own photos and words
- 45, 60 or 90 second rounds
- Time penalty on passes, plus favorites
- No ads at all
Blog
Ideas from the blog
Game ideas, parenting tips and age by age guides, so family time actually feels like family time.
Family screen time: the minutes are not the point
Why screens used together are different from solitary scrolling, and how to set limits that hold. Practical framing for parents, without the guilt.
Read more4 min readBuilding vocabulary through play, ages 3 to 7
How a child's vocabulary actually grows day to day, and which games help. Practical ideas for parents, with no lessons involved.
Read more3 min readRoad trip games for kids: surviving the long drive
Nine car games that need nothing from the boot. Age by age tips so the back seat stops asking how much longer it is.
Read moreFrequently asked questions
The short answers to the questions we get most. The full list lives on the FAQ page.
What age is Guessy Kids for?
Around three and up. Because every puzzle is a picture rather than a word, children who cannot read yet play on their own terms. Older kids get their challenge from the harder categories such as Emotions and Jobs.
Does it need an internet connection?
No. All the puzzles and illustrations live inside the app, so it works on a plane, on holiday and anywhere with no signal. A connection is only needed for purchases and for ads in the free version.
How many people do you need?
Two at a minimum, though four or more is where it really comes alive. One person guesses while everyone else acts. At a birthday party ten kids can act out the same card at once.
Is the app free?
The download is free and the Animals category with 96 puzzles is playable right away. The other categories, custom cards and longer rounds come with Premium.
Is there an Android version?
Yes. Guessy Kids is on the App Store for iPhone and on Google Play for Android. The gameplay and the content are identical on both.
Why is the screen always landscape?
Because the phone sits sideways on your forehead, and landscape gives the people guessing the largest possible picture. The orientation is locked so the screen never rotates mid round.
Make tonight the loud kind of evening
Download Guessy Kids, pick your first category and hold the phone to your forehead. The laughing part takes care of itself.