Honest rankings
Baby shower games people actually want to play
Every baby shower game list has forty entries and no opinions. Here's the short version: eight games worth your time, ranked by how much fun the guests really have, with a note on which ones survive a virtual shower. Melted-candy-bar diaper game not included, on principle.
1. The baby betting pool works over text
The only shower game that keeps going after the party. Everyone gets 1,000 free points to bet on the due date, the weight, the hair situation, who cries first in the delivery room. Odds move as people pile in, the parents post insider updates, and the baby settles every market on arrival. It runs entirely off one link in the group chat, which also makes it the best game for a virtual shower or a group that's spread across time zones. Read the full rundown, or set one up in two minutes.
2. Guess the due date works over text
The classic. One date per person, closest wins, argue about tie-breakers forever. Still great, and we wrote a whole guide to running a due date pool properly, including the tie-breaker rules that prevent family disputes.
3. Baby photo lineup
Every guest submits their own baby photo ahead of time; everyone matches photos to grown adults. Reliably funny because somebody's baby picture looks exactly like them and somebody else's looks like a completely different species. Needs a little prep, worth it.
4. The price is right, nursery edition
Line up real baby products (diapers, car seat, the tiny socks that cost what regular socks cost). Guests guess prices, closest total wins. The grandparents' guesses alone, calibrated to 1987 prices, justify the whole game.
5. Name gauntlet works over text
Everyone writes down what they think the baby's name will be, sealed until the reveal. If the parents are keeping the name secret this doubles as a months-long guessing game, and it's a built-in market in a betting pool too: when does the name actually get revealed?
6. Advice cards, but honest
Skip "sleep when the baby sleeps." Have guests write the one piece of advice they'd actually give their best friend, plus one thing they got completely wrong as a new parent. The second half is where the good stuff lives. Save them for the rough week four.
7. Nursery rhyme speed round
Read the second line of a nursery rhyme, guests race to name it. Harder than anyone expects, fast, zero prep, and it works for mixed crowds of kids and adults.
8. Late-night diaper messages
Guests write jokes and pep talks in marker on newborn diapers. The game part is weak, but the payoff lands at 3am six weeks later when the parents are running on fumes and find "this one's on you, champ" mid-change. Long-tail comedy.
For virtual showers: the games that survive a screen are the ones built on guessing, not props. The betting pool, the due date game, and the name gauntlet all run entirely over text with one link and no accounts, which is the whole reason Odds Baby exists.
Free, always. No app, no signup, no email.