10 Best Harry Potter board games for aspiring muggles

If you’ve read the Harry Potter books and watched the films a million times over, it may be time to get a board game or two to continue enjoying the franchise with your friends and family.

I will be prioritizing unique Harry Potter board games over Wizarding World renditions of existing board games, although there are some classic examples I can’t ignore.

Harry Potter Death Eaters Rising

Harry Potter: Death Eaters Rising is a cooperative board game of teaming together to get through the Death Eaters and defeat He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Through play, the Dark Lord will point to different locations, indicating where he will be next.

Players must recruit wizards and visit different locations to defeat Death Eaters and protect the key locations from corruption. Damage and the abilities of the Death Eaters happen without dice rolling, allowing for strategic planning. Player actions, however, are at the mercy of action dice that all must be assigned.

In an exciting bout, players must travel around the board to recruit wizards and defeat Death Eaters in a bid to stop You-Know-Who. Should all your wizards die, or enough locations become corrupted, then evil shall reign victorious.

Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle serves not just as a cooperative card game where players work together to defeat villains and protect the Wizarding World, but also as a retelling of all seven books (and all eight films). There are seven games to be played here, each one set in a different year.

The core gameplay is simple yet engaging. Players fight villains through card actions and can purchase more powerful cards to build their deck. In each year, the players need to defeat all the villains before they gain ultimate control of the locations.

As each game goes over each year, the villains, settings, and cards progress in line with the films. Your character will progress from first year to seventh year, and you’ll be able to look back and see how far you’ve come with your friends. You don’t need to play Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle in year order, but a dedicated group will allow for an engaging slew of game nights.

Harry Potter Hogwarts Battle – Defence Against the Dark Arts

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle – Defence Against the Dark Arts is an adaptation of Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle that pits two players dueling against each other in a practice bout. Players will choose a House, and will position themselves in the middle of the sparring board.

Players will take turns using their cards to push back their opponents with spells, recover themselves, place annoying Hexes in their opponent’s deck, and grab better cards from the market. Should a player find themselves at the end of the board, that player gets stunned, and the board gets reset. Players keep their powerful cards, but must engage in the tug-of-war-esque battle again.

When a player gets stunned three times, they lose. Harry Potter: Hogwarts Battle – Defence Against the Dark Arts is a great two-player duel that simulates spell battles pretty faithfully whilst delivering a solid card game.

Harry Potter Quidditch Clash

Harry Potter Quidditch Clash allows you and one other to go head-to-head in a glorious game of Quidditch.

With an oval board, a Quaffle, and a Golden Snitch (of course), players will be using decks of cards and a spinner to reposition themselves and the balls around the board. Should a Quaffle find its way into a hoop, that team will score points. Should a Golden Snitch find its way to a player, however, then I think you already know what happens.

With a great board and point stand, it’s a fun and light game for two players. It may not provide an authentic Quidditch experience, but it’s still a bit of fun.

Harry Potter Unmask the Death Eaters

Harry Potter: Unmask the Death Eaters is a social deduction game of secret and shifting loyalties. At the beginning of the game, one player will secretly be assigned as a Death Eater, and will have to subtly sabotage the Order of the Phoenix players.

The group will battle with giants and dementors and try to pass through the encounters to achieve victory. However, the secret Death Eater, should they be part of the encounter, will be using their cards to secretly thwart their efforts. Considering the different ways the cards are used in Harry Potter: Unmask the Death Eaters, a good player may be forced to play a bad card, meaning suspicion is always on the rise.

In the middle of the game, there’s the potential for another player to secretly join the Death Eaters, meaning trust is never something that can be counted on. Whether the Death Eaters make it to the end uncompromised or whether they get routed out by other other players is completely up to the scrutiny and guile of the players. It’s brilliant.

Harry Potter House Cup Competition

Harry Potter: House Cup Competition is a worker-placement game where players align with a House and will compete against the others to make their wizards stronger and complete challenges for those precious House Points.

The game lasts over seven game rounds, and in those rounds players will assign their wizards to spots on the board to gain Knowledge, Magic, or to level up one of their skills (Potions, Charm, and Defence Against the Dark Arts). The stronger your wizards are, the better they’ll perform in the challenges that earn you House Points.

Harry Potter: House Cup Competition is a tense game as players fight over positions on the board. Combos of placement and lessons allow for explosive turns, although it only matters how well you train your wizards to face the trials ahead.

Funkoverse Harry Potter

Admittedly, Funkoverse: Harry Potter is a complicated strategy game, but if you’re into objective-based games with lots of rules, combat, and strategy, then you’ll love it even more with the Harry Potter dressings.

Two teams will challenge each other in a scenario and map of their choosing. As players walk around the board to score points in line with the scenario’s objective, they can do battle with each other to push their opponents back and thwart their plans.

Funkoverse: Harry Potter has other Harry Potter-specific expansions to augment and enhance your play, and should everyone agree, you could even create strange cross-overs with other Funkoverse Strategy games.

Trivial Pursuit Harry Potter Ultimate Edition

If you’re a Potter Head then the standard Trivial Pursuit: Harry Potter Edition won’t do. You’ll want the ultimate edition, boasting over 1,800 questions that explore the obscure and minute details of the franchise.

It plays like standard Trivial Pursuit, although with clean Harry Potter aesthetics and questions that challenge even the most veteran fans. And even if you don’t know that much about Harry Potter, it’ll still be fun time as you’ll learn along the way.

Whether you’re in the mood for an intense fact-off with your friends or a lighter trivia night, Trivial Pursuit: Harry Potter Ultimate Edition is a solid pick.

CODENAMES Harry Potter

Codenames: Harry Potter is a challenging two-player game of secrets and clues. A grid of tiles will sit in between the players, showing either a word or an image from one of the films. Each player will receive a secret grid, marking many of the tiles as Order of the Phoenix tiles, and a few of them as Death Eater tiles.

The aim here is to provide a small clue that relate to any of the Order of the Phoenix tiles, and from your clue, they must guess which of the tiles you’re hinting toward. Once they’ve made a guess, it’ll be your turn to pick a tile from a clue they provide. Be careful, however, because should any player choose a Death Eater tile from an opponent’s grid, both players will lose.

To win, both players must be savvy with their word choice to hint their opponent toward all of the Order of Phoenix tiles without accidentally suggesting a Death Eater tile. It’s a tense word game that will keep both players on the edge of their seat.

Harry Potter Hogwarts Magical Mayhem

Harry Potter: Hogwarts Magical Mayhem is an extremely interactive kid’s game that honestly looks like a blast to play no matter how old you are.

With eight unique mini games to play, including push-your-luck, dexterity, and logic, players will go around Hogwarts trying to score points for their House through the completion of these challenges.

It’s incredibly creative, easy, interactive, and most importantly fun for the smaller wizards in your life to enjoy. To be frank I also wouldn’t mind a go at Harry Potter: Hogwarts Magical Mayhem, although I’m unsure if most adults would agree with me.

Now that you know of these brilliant Harry Potter board games, the difficult part is picking one to set up the most magical game night.

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