18 Ideas for Running Online Team Building (Without Losing Your Mind)

In today's fast pacing realities one of the the main tasks is simply keeping the roof on. Which means team building has taken on a whole new meaning — it's become a way to look after the team's mental health. It's not just entertainment anymore, it's a kind of therapy: it takes the edge off, helps people switch gears, and strengthens the informal bonds inside a team.

But a big event isn't always in the budget — or in anyone's remaining energy. So we've put together a list of ideas you can pull off entirely on your own, sorted by how much prep and effort they take.

THE CLASSICS

Popular activities you can run right away — no prep, no real moderation needed.

📹 Movie Hall

Players invent versions of famous movie titles, twisted to fit their job or industry, and take turns calling them out. For example:

Fifty Shades of UI
One Flew Over the DevOps Nest
Star Wars: Attack of the Jira

🙈 Find the Common Ground

Split everyone into groups of 3–4 in breakout rooms. In 5 minutes, each group has to find three non-obvious things they all have in common. Something like "we all collect something" or "we've all had a ginger cat at some point." Then each group shares with everyone else. The whole point is to dig for the weird and interesting stuff, not "we all own iPhones" :)

🎶 Emoji Charades

A player drops a string of emojis into the chat describing a song, movie, or book. Everyone else guesses. For example: 🎶🔥🌧️ → “Set Fire to the Rain”

📷 Photo Hunt

Find an object somewhere in your home and show it to the camera. First one to do it scores a point. Prompts: something blue; the strangest mug you own; something from your childhood; something older than you are, and so on.

🗣️ Two Truths, One Lie

Each person shares three facts about themselves — two true, one made up. Everyone else has to spot the lie. To mix it up, you can set a theme for the facts: three facts about your childhood / school days / sports / hobbies, etc.

🧒 Child Photos

The organizer collects childhood photos from everyone in advance. During the session, they show them one at a time and the team guesses who's who.

IMPROV AND TALKING GAMES

These call for thinking on your feet. They have actual rules, and sometimes you'll want a moderator (anyone on the team can do it).

📕 Alphabet

Two players hold a conversation in a given scenario (the group makes up the setting and roles together). The first line starts with the letter A, and every line after that has to start with the next letter of the alphabet. Whoever slips up first loses.

Example (setting: a developer asking their manager for a raise):

Player 1: Astronauts get paid less than you, so there's nothing to negotiate here.
Player 2: But I'm pulling overtime literally every week!
Player 1: Come on, we already doubled your salary last month.
Player 2: Do you have any idea what groceries cost now? My expenses have gone through the roof…

❓ Question for a Question

Pick two players and invent a scenario for them. The scenario needs some kind of conflict baked in to keep the conversation moving. They start talking — but they can only ever address each other with questions. The moment one of them says something that isn't a question, another player takes their place. For example: one player is a passenger with no money, the other is a taxi driver; the passenger's goal is to talk their way into a free ride, the driver's goal is to get paid.

Passenger: Have you ever done something completely irrational but deeply human?
Driver: Are you suggesting I start drinking this early in the morning?
Passenger: Well, is a driver even allowed to drink before a shift?
Driver: And what makes you think today's a working day for me? …and so on.

🐘 More / Less

Two players hold a conversation (the group makes up the setting and roles together). A third player is the moderator, who periodically calls out "more!" or "less!" — and the players have to crank the intensity of their emotions and behavior up or down accordingly.

Example: Player 1: a peasant who's come to the king with a complaint. Player 2: the king of a medieval kingdom.

P1: Good day! I have a complaint — when you were out hunting, you accidentally killed my cow.
Moderator: More!
P1: O most radiant and merciful sovereign! Your shadow graces our fields, but my cow… my cow perished the moment you sneezed in our direction!
Moderator: More!
P1: And she was no ordinary cow! She was like a mother to me! Milk, love, and compassion!
P2: How dare you come to me with such a trifle?
Moderator: Less!
P2: …What kind of king am I, if my own subjects can't feel safe about their cows? We'll compensate you in full.

📣 The Prompter

Two players act out a scene. Two more are "prompters," who occasionally toss a random word at one of the players (say, "fridge" or "giraffe"). The players have to weave that word into their dialogue immediately. Setting and roles are invented together.

Example: Player 1: a museum security guard on his first-ever night shift. Player 2: a mysterious visitor who claims to be lost.

P1: Hang on, how did you even get up here? This is the museum roof! There's nothing here but pigeons and an ancient fridge!
P2: I just lost my scarf. (Prompter 1: "hippo") Grey one, covered in little pink hippos. You haven't seen it, have you?
P1: Listen, the roof is always locked, we never let visitors up here. What scarf? How did you get in? (Prompter 2: "aqua aerobics") Look, I'm no Sherlock Holmes, but back when I worked as an aqua aerobics instructor, I learned one thing: when someone tells you they're wearing a flotation vest, don't take their word for it — check yourself. So I'm going to have to search you…

ONLINE SERVICES / APPS

Skribbl.io — the online version of Pictionary. Take it up a level by throwing in words like "framework," "high-load," or "approval" :)

Codenames — a team word game built on associations and cracking each other's codes.

Gartic Phone — somewhere between drawing and storytelling, where everyone adds their own piece to the picture or the story.

GeoGuessr — guess the country or city from a Google Street View shot.

SongTrivia — "name that tune," in several different flavors.

Jackbox Games — a whole bundle of wildly different online games for groups of all sizes.

Among Us — not the phenomenon it once was, but still a very fun take on Mafia.

Kahoot — a platform for building quizzes in all sorts of formats.

Mentimeter — similar to Kahoot, with even more options for quizzes and polls.

Retro games — or how about a trip back to childhood, cartridge consoles and all, with a Mario Kart or Mortal Kombat tournament? There are plenty of console emulators floating around online.

Either way, online team building doesn't have to be expensive. Sometimes all it takes is a bit of imagination and a little nerve — and what comes out of it genuinely brings people closer.

And if you do have a budget and want a turn-key event — check out our ironic online detective quests! 🕵️