Scribble Telephone

About Scribble Telephone

Play Scribble Telephone with 3 to 10 people: quick play joins a public room in your language, Make a room gives you a private room with an invite link, a QR code and a six-character code, and Same device lets a group share one phone or laptop. Write, draw, describe, then watch every chain go wrong in the reveal.

Scribble Telephone is a free drawing telephone game for 3 to 10 players. Everyone writes a silly prompt, then the prompts go round the circle: the next player draws one, the player after that describes the drawing in words, the next draws that description, and so on until every chain has gone round the group. Then comes the reveal, where each chain plays back step by step and you watch "a cat on a skateboard" turn into "a sad potato at a disco". Play online in a quick play room or a private room with friends, or pass one phone or laptop around the table. Nothing to install.

Also called: telephone drawing game, draw and describe game, drawing telephone, party drawing game.

How to play Scribble Telephone

1. Type a name, then press Play now for a public room, or Make a room for a private one and send friends the link, the QR code or the six-character code. For a group in one place, choose Same device and pass one phone or laptop around.
2. Write a prompt: something fun to draw, like "a penguin at the dentist". Stuck? Press Give me an idea.
3. Draw the prompt you are handed. You get the pen, an eraser, a fill bucket, 16 colours, four brush sizes, Undo (or Ctrl+Z) and Clear. Press Done when you are happy, or change it until the clock runs out.
4. Describe the drawing you are handed in a few words, without seeing what it was meant to be. The next player draws your description, and so it goes on.
5. Each step has a clock. A step ends as soon as everyone has handed in, or when the time is up: whatever you have so far is sent for you.
6. When every chain has gone round, the reveal plays each one back: the prompt, the drawing redrawing itself stroke by stroke, the guess, the next drawing… React to any step with a laugh or a gasp, and give your star to the best moment of each chain.
7. The podium adds up the stars and laughs, and hands out the awards: Funniest Drawing, Best Guess, Most Chaos and more. Save any chain as one tall picture or share it.

Rules

• Players: a game needs 3 to 10 players. Anyone who arrives while a game is on waits in the room and joins the next game.
• Chains: there is one chain per player, started by their prompt. With the standard full circle, every chain passes through every player once, so a game of six has six steps. A private room can stop chains after 3, 5 or 7 steps instead. Quick play chains are at most eight steps long.
• Steps: the first step is writing, then drawing and describing take turns. In quick play you get 30 seconds to write and 60 seconds to draw; a private room's host chooses 20 to 60 seconds to write and 40 to 120 seconds to draw.
• Running out of time: if you haven't written a prompt, one comes from the idea box. If a drawing is missing, the next player retells the last text in their own words instead; if a description is missing, the next player draws the last text.
• Dropping out: if your connection drops, you keep your seat for a minute and a half, and can carry on where you were. Steps you miss are skipped. If only one player is left, the reveal starts with the chains as they are.
• Points: each star your work gets is worth 3 points and each laughing reaction 2; other reactions are worth 1. Each player's reactions count once per kind on each step, your own never count, and you can't star yourself. One star per chain.
• The reveal: in a private room the host turns the pages (or switches on auto-play); quick play reveals play by themselves.
• Prompts and descriptions are one line of up to 80 characters, and rude words are hidden with asterisks.

Scribble Telephone tips and strategy

• Write prompts that are fun to get wrong. Two ideas in one ("a shark eating spaghetti") make better chains than one plain object.
• Draw the big idea first. The shapes that say what it is matter more than the details. Colour helps: a yellow sun and a blue sea are understood at once.
• Don't write words in your drawing. It spoils the fun, and the next player is meant to guess.
• Describe what you see, not what you think it was meant to be. The funniest chains come from honest guesses.
• Press Done early if you are happy: when everyone is done, the game moves on at once.
• Save your favourite chain from the podium and send it to the group: it is a picture that makes sense even to people who weren't there.