The Best Board Games of 2025 So Far

Mooki Island

Age: 4-5+

The perfect quick game for preschoolers! Thanks to its 5 minute playtime, it’s become one of our most played games of all time! Perfect for young kids, you’ll enjoy the memory challenge mixed with the set collection strategies.

Cascadia Junior

Age 6+

A fantastic kids version of the original family game Cascadia. This keeps all the essential elements but reimagines them in a way that is perfect for young kids. It doesn’t forget about older players though, there are built in easy ways to increase the difficulty for savvy players who need a bigger challenge allowing you to even the playing field while playing. Our kids loved it, and I loved it too!

Micro Macro Kids

Age 6-7+

The long awaited family friendly version of Micro Macro Crime City did not disappoint! Fantastic design with some new touches I almost hope to see in future adult versions. The storylines are cute and clean for families and it’s perfect to play solo or together. (it’s a rainy day must have for me!)

Duck and Cover

Age 6-7+

This is one of the cuter game releases of the year and plays up to 7! A simple card game with a solitaire feel. I love that everyone is at once competing with each other but very much so playing their own game. You can play it as a winner take all single round style, or a multi-round series with the best score winning. One of our most played games of the year. (If players know their numbers, they can play very easily right along with everyone else even if the strategy required to win isn’t there yet.)

Jungo

Age 7+

Jungo JUST released and already we think this is one to watch in 2025. Jungo features simple, pure ladder-climbing card play where players must play a card or set that’s higher in rank than what was played before. We love games in this style (Scout, Odin) and Jungo is one of the more easily taught and understood games in the genre.

Toy Battle

Age 7-8+

Keep your eyes on this one, because it’s in the running for our favorite family game of the year! A two player war game that manages to be both cute and cunning. I absolutely love the challenge of choosing the right toy for your current mission and that you choose from the multiple included maps for a new feel each game.

Mythical Dice

Age 8+

Fans of trick taking games, listen up! Mythical Dice reimagines this classic card style game as a dice game and I’m here to tell you it works! This plays very similarly to Skull King (one of our favorites,) but the unique luck factor from the dice makes for some big, exciting moments!

(alternate name sometimes seen on box: Mino Dice)

Garden Rush

Age 8+

This might be the year of the two player games! Garden Rush is a delightful puzzle. Draft vegetables to plant into your garden. Harvest them when you’ve completed their various patterns to earn points. Along the way you’ll use special actions to help you get further ahead and hopefully harvest victory for yourself!

Gardlings

Age 8+

I love push your luck games like the Quacks of Quedlinburg and Gardlings hits all those same notes. You’ll build your garden again and again, drawing tiles out of your bag and placing them to match gems. Each round you’ll buy better tiles for you garden and then build it again racing to be the first player to buy the winning token. It’s fast and fun with the bonus of a puzzle element as you build your garden!

Architects of Amytis

Age 8-10+

I was blown away by how much I loved this one. It feels like a cozy puzzle with all the right strategy elements that make you want to play again and again to find a better way to solve each game. If you loved Kingdomino, in many ways, Architects of Amytis feels like a spiritual sister game that’s a step up in strategy and designed for two.

Solstis

Age 8-10+

This is a unique drafting game with a really fun, puzzly path building challenge. It’s another two player game that we’ve been enjoying for cozy date night pick. I also love that it’s small enough you can toss it in your purse and take with you on your travels! We started playing it on Board Game Arena this year and loved it so much we had to add it to our shelves.

Bomb Busters

Age 10+

It may be no surprise that this game has made the list as it’s also just won the 2025 Spiel des Jahres. This was a fall 2024 release that didn’t hit our table till this year and I’m so glad it did! A cooperative deduction challenge, the 66 unique and REPLAYABLE missions make this a game your family will enjoy for a long time.

Orapa Mine

Age 10+

The most clever Battleship-like game we’ve played in recent memory! Brilliantly simple, yet shockingly brain-burny, it sees you trying to guess the location of your opponent’s shapes on their board by choosing coordinates to shoot waves from and using their exit point and color to deduce what shapes they hit along the way. I love that it can be played as a two player duel or with more!

Critter Kitchen

Age 10+

This is a cute entry weight strategy game all about impressing a food critic with your delicious dishes. You’ll send our your kitchen staff to gather the ingredients you need to make these dishes and compete for the best spots. It’s a whimsical game that appears like a “big” strategy game at first glance, but is actually straight forward.

Zenith

Age 10+

You could say 2025 has been the year of the two player games and I’d absolutely agree! Zenith is a fantastic two player tug of war game where you’ll play cards to try and wrestle control over various locations on the board. You can win in multiple ways and follow multiple different strategies to achieve each one. And if you have a few more players who don’t want to miss out, you can play in teams!

The Lord of the Rings the Fellowship of the Ring The Trick Taking Game

Age 10+

We should have known the board games of 2025 were going to bring the head when the year opened up with this absolute banger! The Fellowship of the Ring Trick Taking Game has you playing through the story of the Fellowship either solo or with friends. Each chapter you’ll complete the unique win condition to advance to the next chapter. It’s a delightful cooperative challenge that is fun at all player counts.

Finspan

Age 10+

I was worried that Finspan would be a “more of the same” game in the Wingspan universe but was delighted to be greated with an enjoyable strategy game that kept the spirit of wingspan with a more unique twist than was found in Wyrmspan, (a game we also enjoyed.) While not significantly easier than Wingspan, Finspan does have a more streamlined feel to it making it bit easier to learn and a great choice for a more strategy focused game that still feels light and welcoming.

Pergola

Age 10+

This game spoke to my nature theme loving soul! Absolutely gorgeous on the table and surprisingly very simple to learn. Pergola is a very point heavy game — every decision you make will get you something. It’s all about finding the best move that nets you the most points each time and using what you’ve already grown to get just a little bit more.