Harry Potter Party Games
Harry Potter Party Games
If you’re planning a Harry Potter party, then this is for you! Here are some tested ideas for creating a magical and unforgettable experience for you and your guests. From the moment your guests arrive, you’ll want to keep them fully immersed in the wizarding world. You can start by greeting them with an entranceway resembling platform 93/4, and asking them to run through a “brick wall” to get to Hogwarts. Once inside, your guests will be sorted into houses using a homemade sorting hat, and compete for the house cup by playing a variety of Harry Potter themed games. These games include Potions class, where guests make Harry Potter themed cocktails, and Flying Lessons, where guests fly on broomsticks to catch items. Other games include Quidditch, Defense Against the Dark Arts, and Charms. All games are carefully designed to keep your guests engaged and entertained throughout the party. Lastly, if your guests are still in the mood, there’s one more game you can play that’s sure to end the night with a bang. But you’ll have to watch the video to find out what it is! Overall, this Harry Potter party is perfect for any fan of the books or movies, and is sure to create a memorable experience for everyone involved. Happy Partying!
I once threw a very magical Harry Potter party and learned what worked and what didn’t, so here are some ideas from what DID work that you could use for your party. So you’ve sent out invites via owl post and your guests received Hogwarts school style invitations to your party. On the day of your party, as your guests start to arrive, don’t let them into the actual party room yet. Keep them in a waiting area where the entrance to the party room is separated by a tablecloth that’s decorated to look like platform 93/4 with a slit down the center. Once everyone arrives, it’s time to start the party. Welcome them all and tell them that to get to Hogwarts, they will have to run full speed into that brick wall. This is a super magical, and on theme way to start the party.
take the letter and scratch out lines and replace names and locations.
Script
Once inside, let your guests enjoy your decorations and once they’ve settled you can explain the rules for the night. They’ll be competing to win the house cup by playing a bunch of Harry Potter themed party games. But they can’t fight for the house cup without teams, so I started with the sorting hat where one by one, I sat the guests on a chair, put the hat on their head and then let pick out a paper from a hat to sort them into their houses. If you can, you should totally voice the sorting hat.
I recommend Potions class as the first game because it takes a bit of focus AND ends up with everyone having a delicious and magical cocktail by the end of the game. This game involves setting up a table to have all the standard things you’d find at a cocktail bar, alcohol, mixers, salt, garnish, etc. But they will be repackaged to look like what you’ve find in potions class, which basically involves removing labels or pouring the liquor and such into fancy potion bottles and relabeling them things like Horklump juice or Wolfsbane. Then, you, the host, will act as the potions class teacher and showcase how to make a Harry Potter themed cocktail, you can find a ton of recipes online, but the game here is that your guests, as a team, will have to very carefully study what you did and try to recreate that cocktail aka potion. You will judge how accurately they are able to recreate it and award their house points as such.
Flying Lessons, oh how I would love to fly a broom, but since we’re muggles here is the best alternative. Get a balance ball and a broomstick and then tape the broomstick to the balance ball. Each team will send a member to be the person flying, and the rest of the team is going to toss a bunch of bean bags or balls or whatever you have handy at them. The objective is the team whose flyer manages to catch the most objects without falling off the broom, wins! Award house points accordingly.
Quidditch. Well since you’ve learned to fly, why not try your hand at quidditch? You’ll need a table, and to place cups on opposite sides of the table in a v-shape. Does this look like beer pong? Because it is. Teams will takes turns trying to sink each others cup but they’ll have to toss the ping pong balls THROUGH the quidditch goal posts in order for the cup to be considered sunk. The first team to sink the opponents cups wins! HOWEVER, we can’t forget about the seeker. One member of each team will be assigned as the seeker and their goal is to run around the room trying to find the golden snitch, which is just a ferrero rocher, hidden somewhere in the room, BEFORE the other teams snitch finds it. So not only are team members frantically trying to sink cups, the seekers are also running around like crazy people trying to find the snitch. I made it so whoever finds the snitch gets to auto-sink like 3 cups of the opposing team. That’s a big deal.
Defense Against the dark arts. Need a break from running around? What about trying to stay perfectly still? In defense against the dark arts, you are taught the Petrificus Totalus spell, which immobilizes an opponent causing them to be rigid and unable to move. In this game, each team will offer a team member to be the immobilized player. The player will stand perfectly still, no moving, no laughing, etc. The goal of the other guests is to try to get the frozen players from the other teams to move by making them laugh or otherwise. You can’t touch the player but you can do things like balancing things on their head and such, it’s up to your creativity. Whichever immobilized player lasts the longest gets the most points.
Charms. Charms has a lot of really cool spells so it was hard to choose which one to make a game around, so I thought, why not multiple spells in one game? We’ll be using Wingardium Leviosa and Accio for this one. Basically one team member stands at one end of the room and casts Accio on a feather on the other side of the room. The rest of the team members are going to try to keep the feather afloat and rally it over to the team member casting accio by blowing the feather upwards. Whichever team can accomplish this the quickest gets the most points.
At the point the party is wrapping up but if your guests are still in the mood, there is one game that I think is a really fun and funny way to end the party. And it’s like the most magically thing you can possibly do, what you may ask? Well a magic show of course. A good ole’ fashioned magic show. But you might be thinking, my party guests are a bunch of muggles and can’t do magic. That’s actually the best part. Have your teams get in their group and challenge them to brainstorm a way to create the illusion of magic using the decorations and some creativity, and then one team at a time, they’ll present their ideas and everyone can vote on them. At my party, the magic show ended up being just really silly ideas but everyone found the legitimate attempts absolutely hilarious and it’s a great memorable way to end the party.
And finally, announce the winners of the house cup, congratulate all the players and make sure to take lots of photos and videos along the way. Like and subscribe if you enjoyed the video. Happy wizarding!
Games
Platform
Sorting
Potions
Flying Lessons
Quidditch
Defense Against the dark arts
Petrificus Totalus: A spell that immobilizes an opponent, causing them to become rigid and unable to move.
Expelliarmus: A disarming spell that causes an opponent's wand to fly out of their hand.
Stupefy: A stunning spell that knocks out an opponent.
Charms
Wingardium Leviosa: A spell that levitates objects, allowing them to float in the air.
Accio: A summoning charm that brings an object towards the caster.
Incendio: A spell that creates fire.
Transfiguration
Transformation Spell: A spell that transforms one object into another.
Herbology
Herbivicus: A spell that encourages plant growth and blooms.
Wand Dueling