The food: sides, pie and the bird itself
Start here. Nobody is shy about food, so this round warms the table up for the sections that involve actual relatives. Read the question, then go round clockwise and take one sentence from everybody before anyone is allowed to argue. If you open the floor after the first question you will still be on stuffing twenty minutes later.
Two rules are worth setting before you begin. First, nobody may answer both, because the whole point of the game is the cost of choosing. Second, this round is about preference and never about anybody's version of a dish, which is why every question below is written about the food rather than the cook. If you want a scorekeeper, have someone tally which side wins each question, and by the end you will have a strange and fairly accurate portrait of your family.
Q1.Would you rather give up stuffing forever or give up mashed potatoes forever?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whichever one you sacrifice, you still have to sit at the table while everyone else eats it, and you are not allowed to sulk. Ten seconds to justify yourself.
Potatoes usually win the vote and stuffing usually wins the argument. The stuffing side is louder because stuffing only exists for about four weeks a year.
Q2.Would you rather have a plate where nothing touches anything else, or a plate where everything is deliberately mixed into one pile?Tap to reveal
Answer: Mixers have to give the pile a name. Separators have to explain what they do when the gravy starts to move.
This splits a table almost exactly down the middle, and it reveals something about people you have known for thirty years in about four seconds.
Q3.Would you rather eat only the crispy skin and none of the meat, or only the meat and none of the skin?Tap to reveal
Answer: No trading afterwards. Skin voters also have to say honestly how much they already ate standing at the counter.
Skin has a small and ferocious constituency, and whoever is carving is almost always in it.
Q4.Would you rather have pumpkin pie with no whipped cream, or a bowl of whipped cream with no pie?Tap to reveal
Answer: You have to eat your choice at the table, in front of whoever made the pie, without commentary.
Children pick the cream instantly. Adults pretend to weigh it up for a while and then pick the cream.
Q5.Would you rather have jellied cranberry sauce that slides out of the can with the ridges still on it, or homemade sauce with whole berries?Tap to reveal
Answer: Ask the can voters whether they actually like it or whether they just like the sound it makes coming out.
The can wins more often than anyone admits beforehand, and it usually wins on nostalgia rather than taste.
Q6.Would you rather eat only white meat for the rest of your life or only dark meat?Tap to reveal
Answer: Winner of the majority gets first pass at the platter next year. Losers carve.
Dark meat has quietly taken over in the last decade, and at most tables the white meat defenders are the ones who grew up being served it first.
Q7.Would you rather green bean casserole disappear from every table forever, or sweet potatoes with marshmallows on top?Tap to reveal
Answer: You have to break the news to whoever brings it. Practice the sentence out loud now.
Both dishes have people who eat them once a year and mean it, and this is the question most likely to produce a genuinely offended noise.
Q8.Would you rather have gravy on absolutely everything on your plate, including the pie, or gravy on nothing at all?Tap to reveal
Answer: Nobody may pick the sensible middle. Whoever tries has to take the pie option.
The all-gravy answer is chosen as a joke and then defended with real conviction about ninety seconds later.
Q9.Would you rather eat dessert first and dinner afterwards, or wait a full three hours after dinner before any pie appears?Tap to reveal
Answer: Dessert-first voters have to say what they would do with the pie they no longer have anything to look forward to.
Everyone wants dessert first in theory, and almost nobody can explain what the rest of the evening is for once the pie is gone.
Q10.Would you rather have one enormous plate with no refills, or a small plate you may refill as many times as you like?Tap to reveal
Answer: Small-plate voters have to estimate their number of trips now, out loud, and the table holds them to it.
The small plate wins on principle and the big plate wins in practice, because getting up means losing your seat and your conversation.
Q11.Would you rather have soft dinner rolls with butter or a pan of cornbread?Tap to reveal
Answer: Regional loyalty counts as an argument, but you have to name the region.
This one usually maps onto where people grew up more neatly than anything else on the page, and it is worth going around the table for that alone.
Q12.Would you rather only ever eat the leftover sandwich the next day, or only ever eat the plate on the day itself?Tap to reveal
Answer: Sandwich voters have to describe their exact build, in order, including what goes on the bread first.
A surprising number of people pick the sandwich, and they are always the ones who can describe it in the most detail.
Q13.Would you rather live in a world with apple pie but no pecan pie, or pecan pie but no apple?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whoever loses the vote gets to decide what goes on top of the survivor for the rest of time.
Apple wins on volume and pecan wins on intensity of feeling, so the room often splits loud minority against quiet majority.
Q14.Would you rather choose the entire menu but be allowed no second helpings, or have someone else choose everything with unlimited seconds?Tap to reveal
Answer: Menu-choosers have to name all five dishes right now with no changes later.
Control loses this one more often than people expect, usually the moment somebody says the word seconds out loud.
Q15.Would you rather have a deep-fried turkey every year or a smoked turkey every year, never the other?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whoever picks deep-fried is now responsible for the safety briefing.
This is the question that turns two people at your table into experts nobody knew were there.
Q16.Would you rather eat the exact same Thanksgiving plate every day for a week, or have no leftovers at all?Tap to reveal
Answer: A week means a week: same plate, same portions, no additions, and you still have to be pleasant about it on day five.
Day three is where people change their minds, and you can usually watch it happen on their faces mid-answer.
Q17.Would you rather claim the wishbone or claim the last slice of pie?Tap to reveal
Answer: You cannot have both and you cannot trade. Wishbone voters must say what they would wish for.
Children take the wishbone, adults take the pie, and the teenagers at the table take about a minute to decide which of the two they are.
Q18.Would you rather have pumpkin spice in every single thing you eat and drink all November, or no pumpkin flavor ever again?Tap to reveal
Answer: No exceptions in either direction. Yes, that includes the pie, and yes, that is the hard part.
People come in loudly anti-pumpkin-spice and then remember that pie exists, which is the whole reason this question works.
Q19.Would you rather be the person who always brings the sides or the person who always brings the desserts?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whichever you pick, you are bringing enough for everyone, and you are bringing it warm.
Desserts sound easier until someone points out that the pie has to survive the car and the sides only have to survive the kitchen.
Q20.Would you rather eat Thanksgiving dinner at one in the afternoon or at eight in the evening?Tap to reveal
Answer: Set the whole day around your answer and say what happens in the hours on either side of it.
The early camp wants the long lazy evening and the late camp wants the long lazy morning, and neither side ever wins a convert.
The family table: seating, relatives and the questions you get asked
This is the round that gets loudest, and the one to handle with a little care. Every question here is about the comedy of being related to people in general, never about anybody in the room. Keep it that way with one house rule: you answer about yourself, and you may not answer on somebody else's behalf.
It plays best once the plates are cleared and before anyone has got up. If there is a teenager being quiet, let them go first on two or three of these — the seating questions hand them something easy and funny to say. And when an answer turns into a story, let the story happen. The questions are only here to start them.
Q1.Would you rather sit at the kids table for the entire meal, or sit between two relatives who each want to tell you all about their new hobby?Tap to reveal
Answer: If you pick the kids table you are also on juice-spill duty. If you pick the hobbies you have to ask one follow-up question about each.
Half the adults pick the kids table instantly and mean it, which tells you most of what you need to know about adult conversation.
Q2.Would you rather be asked the same question about your personal life by six different relatives, or be asked nothing at all and left out of the conversation?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whoever picks the six questions has to answer the first one right now, and has to sound pleased about it.
Being asked is annoying and being ignored is worse, and people usually realize that halfway through defending the second option.
Q3.Would you rather be seated right beside the gravy and pass it thirty times, or be at the far end where everything reaches you cold?Tap to reveal
Answer: The gravy seat has to pass it without ever being thanked. The far end has to ask for things loudly, every time.
Everyone underestimates how much work the middle of the table is until they have sat in it once.
Q4.Would you rather give the toast before dinner or the thank-you speech at the end of the night?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whatever you pick, you are standing up for it and you get one sentence of notes. Deliver a practice version now.
The toast is short and terrifying, the closing speech is easy and nobody is listening, and quiet people almost always take the second one.
Q5.Would you rather have every relative call you by your childhood nickname all day, or have none of them remember how old you are?Tap to reveal
Answer: Nickname voters have to reveal the nickname. That is the price.
This is a very effective way of discovering that three people at your table have nicknames the rest of the family never knew about.
Q6.Would you rather sit next to the cousin who talks without pausing, or the relative who says nothing at all for two hours?Tap to reveal
Answer: You have to keep the conversation alive either way, and you may not use your phone as an escape.
The talker wins easily, and the people who pick the silence are usually the ones who have already tried both.
Q7.Would you rather be in charge of the family group photo or in charge of keeping the toddler entertained through dinner?Tap to reveal
Answer: Photographer has to get everyone in frame with their eyes open on the first try. Toddler duty means you eat standing up.
Anyone who has actually organized the group photo picks the toddler without hesitating, every single time.
Q8.Would you rather host the relatives who turn up two hours early, or the ones who turn up two hours late?Tap to reveal
Answer: Early arrivals come straight into the kitchen. Late arrivals expect the food to still be hot. Pick your suffering.
Hosts split hard on this, and the answer usually depends on whether they would rather lose their prep time or their timing.
Q9.Would you rather answer every question you are asked completely honestly for the whole meal, or dodge every single one with a joke?Tap to reveal
Answer: The joke option means no straight answers at all, even the easy ones. Try it for the next three minutes.
The joke sounds like the safe choice until someone asks a kind question and the joker has to deflect it in front of everyone.
Q10.Would you rather your baby photos come out after dinner or your old school report cards?Tap to reveal
Answer: The table gets to pick one item from your choice and ask you about it. No vetoes.
Photos are embarrassing for a minute and reports are embarrassing for an hour, so the fast answer is rarely the right one.
Q11.Would you rather explain what you actually do for a living to relatives who will not follow it, or listen to a relative explain your job to someone else and get it completely wrong?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whichever you choose, you have to sit through it with a pleasant expression and no corrections.
Almost everyone picks the wrong explanation, because being described badly is easier than describing yourself well.
Q12.Would you rather be the youngest person at the table or the oldest?Tap to reveal
Answer: Youngest gets no say in anything. Oldest has to have an opinion about everything, on request.
Teenagers pick oldest for the authority and adults pick youngest for the peace, and the middle of the table sees both sides.
Q13.Would you rather go down to the basement for the extra chairs, or make small talk with the neighbor who dropped by for twenty minutes?Tap to reveal
Answer: Chairs means four trips. The neighbor means four topics. Choose and commit.
The chairs win on physical effort alone, which is the clearest evidence there is of how tiring small talk actually is.
Q14.Would you rather do the dishes with the relative you never really talk to, or give your opinion on every single photograph on another relative's phone?Tap to reveal
Answer: The dishes take forty minutes and you have to talk for all of them. Nodding does not count, and neither does saying lovely eleven times.
The dishes option quietly turns out to be how half the good conversations in a family have ever happened.
Q15.Would you rather be seated with your in-laws for the whole meal, or be split up and seated at the opposite end from your own partner?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whoever is separated may not make eye contact across the table. No signalling.
Everyone laughs at this one and then answers it very carefully, which is exactly the right way to play it.
Q16.Would you rather be the one who tells the same family story every year, or the one the story is always about?Tap to reveal
Answer: The teller has to tell it now, in under a minute. The subject has to sit through it without interrupting.
Nobody thinks they are the teller. Every family has one, and the table will identify them in about four seconds.
Q17.Would you rather hold the baby for the entire meal or take the dog out three times in the rain?Tap to reveal
Answer: Baby duty means you eat one-handed. Dog duty means you miss the part of the meal everyone talks about later.
The dog usually wins, and the people who pick the baby are the ones who have worked out that it gets you out of the dishes.
Q18.Would you rather squeeze twenty relatives into one small house, or have four relatives in a house so big the conversation echoes?Tap to reveal
Answer: Small house means someone is eating on the stairs. Big house means someone has to keep the energy up single-handed.
The crowded house wins by a wide margin, and it usually wins from the people complaining loudest about the crowd.
Q19.Would you rather be the family member who always forgets the thing they promised to bring, or the one who turns up with four of them?Tap to reveal
Answer: Forgetters have to apologize convincingly. Over-bringers have to find fridge space for the extras themselves.
Both types are at your table right now, and there is a decent chance they will identify each other before they identify themselves.
Q20.Would you rather stay at the table for four hours after the plates are cleared, or be excused twenty minutes after dessert?Tap to reveal
Answer: If you stay you talk the whole time. If you go you go alone, and you miss whatever gets decided.
This is the one question where the generations split cleanly, and it is worth going round the table in age order to watch it happen.
Hosting, cooking and the disasters that almost happened
Hosts love this round and guests learn from it. If someone at your table has cooked twenty of these meals, put them last on every question: they will have a real answer rather than a guess, and it lands much better once everybody else has committed.
These are hypothetical disasters, and that is exactly what makes them safe to play. Nothing here asks anybody to rate a real meal, and you should not let it drift that way — if somebody starts on the year the turkey came out pink, steer it back to the question. The best moment for this round is the hour while something is still in the oven, because it keeps people standing in the kitchen doorway instead of on their phones.
Q1.Would you rather serve a slightly dry turkey exactly on time, or a perfect one an hour and a half late?Tap to reveal
Answer: Late voters have to say what the guests are doing for those ninety minutes, minute by minute.
Hosts pick on time and guests pick perfect, which is the single most reliable divide in this whole section.
Q2.Would you rather your oven die at eleven in the morning, or your fridge die overnight without you noticing?Tap to reveal
Answer: You get one phone call to fix it. Say who you are calling and what you are asking for.
The oven feels worse and the fridge is worse, and the moment someone works that out the whole table changes its answer.
Q3.Would you rather do all of the cooking and none of the cleaning, or none of the cooking and all of the cleaning?Tap to reveal
Answer: All means all. Cleaners are also responsible for the roasting pan, and cooks may not pre-rinse anything.
Cooking wins with people who have not hosted and cleaning wins with people who have, almost without exception.
Q4.Would you rather carve the turkey in front of everyone having never practiced, or wash every dish in the house alone?Tap to reveal
Answer: Carvers get no advice from the crowd and no second attempt. Washers get no help and no dishwasher.
Carving in public is the most feared job at Thanksgiving, and the dishes are the one people actually regret choosing.
Q5.Would you rather forget a side dish completely, or remember it and pull it out of the oven ten minutes too late?Tap to reveal
Answer: If you forget it, you have to decide whether to tell anyone. If it is late, it arrives after people have stopped eating.
Forgetting wins, because the dish nobody saw was never missed and the dish that arrives late gets discussed for an hour.
Q6.Would you rather run out of gravy or run out of chairs?Tap to reveal
Answer: No substitutes. No sitting on arms of sofas. Whoever picks gravy has to tell the table which dish suffers most.
Chairs is the answer from anyone who has stood through a meal, and gravy is the answer from everyone else.
Q7.Would you rather host every single year for the rest of your life, or never host again and always travel?Tap to reveal
Answer: Hosts never get a year off. Travelers never get to choose the menu, the timing or the sleeping arrangements.
People in their twenties pick traveling and people in their forties pick hosting, and both groups think the other one is mad.
Q8.Would you rather realize at nine in the morning that you never bought butter, or realize at three in the afternoon that you never turned the oven on?Tap to reveal
Answer: Butter means a trip out on the worst shopping morning of the year. The oven means renegotiating dinner on the spot.
The butter is a solvable problem and the oven is a story, which is why the oven answer gets picked by people who like an audience.
Q9.Would you rather cook the whole meal from memory with no recipes, or follow recipes exactly for dishes you have never once tasted?Tap to reveal
Answer: Memory voters have to say which dish they would lose first. Recipe voters may not taste anything before serving.
Confidence picks memory and caution picks recipes, and the most experienced cook at the table often picks recipes.
Q10.Would you rather set off the smoke alarm once, at full volume, with everyone in the house, or have the place smell faintly of smoke for three days?Tap to reveal
Answer: The alarm happens at the exact moment the first guest walks in. The smell outlasts the leftovers.
The alarm wins easily, because it is over in thirty seconds and three days of smell is a slow punishment nobody wants.
Q11.Would you rather have four helpers in your kitchen you have to keep busy, or no help at all?Tap to reveal
Answer: Helpers must each be given a real job. No help means nobody touches anything, including the door.
Every host says helpers and then describes, in detail, why they mean no help at all.
Q12.Would you rather the dog get a whole pie off the counter, or the toddler get into the bowl of whipped cream?Tap to reveal
Answer: Either way it happens while you are looking the other way, and either way you have about four seconds to react.
Parents pick the dog. Dog owners pick the toddler. Nobody who has both picks at all.
Q13.Would you rather have everything ready two hours early and lukewarm, or everything perfect but served in three separate waves?Tap to reveal
Answer: Waves means some people are eating while others watch. Early means nothing on the table is quite hot.
Lukewarm and together beats perfect and staggered at almost every table, which is a useful thing for a host to learn early.
Q14.Would you rather lose the recipe card you have used for twenty years, or lose the serving dish that only comes out on this one day?Tap to reveal
Answer: You may not replace either. Recipe voters have to reconstruct it from memory next year in front of everyone.
People assume the recipe and then pick the dish, because the dish is the thing the children remember.
Q15.Would you rather host with no dishwasher, or host with no table and everyone eating on their laps?Tap to reveal
Answer: No dishwasher means every plate by hand. No table means no serving space either, so plan accordingly.
The lap dinner is funnier and the hand-washing is easier, and this question divides a room almost exactly in half.
Q16.Would you rather wash dishes for four straight hours, or set and reset a table for forty people across the day?Tap to reveal
Answer: Table-setters do the place cards too. Dish-washers do not get to sit down.
The dishes are harder and the table is longer, and the answer usually depends on whether someone would rather be alone or in the room.
Q17.Would you rather accept every offer of help and lose all control of your kitchen, or refuse every offer and miss the entire afternoon with your family?Tap to reveal
Answer: You cannot change your mind after the first hour. Say which one you will regret less at ten at night.
This is the real question inside all the others, and it is the one hosts answer slowly and honestly.
Q18.Would you rather have a wonderful meal in a house that looks like a disaster, or an immaculate house and a perfectly ordinary dinner?Tap to reveal
Answer: Guests are arriving in twenty minutes and you have time to fix exactly one of the two.
The food wins by a mile at the table and the house wins in everybody's actual behavior the morning of, which is worth pointing out.
Q19.Would you rather stay up all night with the turkey, or get up at four in the morning to start it?Tap to reveal
Answer: Either way you are on your feet by six and hosting by two, and you may not nap before dinner.
Night owls and early risers both think their answer is obvious, and the argument between them is better than either answer.
Q20.Would you rather a guest arrive with an unannounced extra person, or arrive with a dish that needs an hour in your already full oven?Tap to reveal
Answer: You have to say yes warmly to whichever you pick, out loud, right now, as practice.
The extra person is easy and the extra dish is chaos, but the dish gets chosen anyway because it feels rude to say otherwise.
Travel, the parade, the game and Black Friday
Play this one in the car. It is the only round that needs no table at all, and it is built for the drive out on the Wednesday or the drive home on the Sunday: one question per exit sign, and the driver answers last so they can keep their eyes on the road.
At the table it makes a good closer for mixed ages, because a nine-year-old has genuine opinions about the balloons and a grandparent has genuine opinions about the traffic and both are equally right. If there is somebody in the room who truly loves football and somebody who truly does not, the game questions will get you the most honest answers of the night.
Q1.Would you rather drive eight hours with no traffic at all, or fly for two hours with a four-hour delay at the gate?Tap to reveal
Answer: Count the door-to-door time before you answer, then answer anyway on feel rather than maths.
Drivers pick the drive and flyers pick the delay, and almost nobody switches sides no matter what the numbers say.
Q2.Would you rather watch the parade in person in the cold, or on television in pajamas with coffee?Tap to reveal
Answer: In person means a five in the morning start and no bathroom for four hours. Television means you see it and never feel it.
Anyone who has done it once in person votes for television, and anyone who has not still wants their turn.
Q3.Would you rather be the one who drives the entire way, or the one who navigates and keeps everyone in the car calm?Tap to reveal
Answer: The navigator also handles the arguments, the stops and the question of whether we are nearly there.
Drivers say driving is easier and passengers say navigating is, which strongly suggests both jobs are worse than they look.
Q4.Would you rather leave at four in the morning to beat the traffic, or leave at midday and sit in all of it?Tap to reveal
Answer: Early means waking the children. Midday means arriving during dinner. Say which conversation you would rather have.
The four in the morning answer sounds heroic the night before and considerably less so at half past three.
Q5.Would you rather do Black Friday in a store at five in the morning, or online at midnight while the site keeps crashing?Tap to reveal
Answer: One purchase only, and you have to actually get it. Say what you are buying.
The store answer is nostalgia and the online answer is experience, and the split runs almost perfectly by age.
Q6.Would you rather miss the end of the game or miss dessert?Tap to reveal
Answer: You find out the score from someone else's reaction. You hear about the pie for a week.
This is the fairest question on the page, because the two halves of the room genuinely cannot understand each other's answer.
Q7.Would you rather always travel out on the Wednesday before, or always travel home on the Sunday after?Tap to reveal
Answer: You have to pick the one you keep doing forever, and the other day is always calm and empty without you.
Wednesday is worse and Sunday is longer, and frequent travelers tend to pick Wednesday because the reward is on the other side of it.
Q8.Would you rather sleep on a couch at a relative's house, or pay for a hotel twenty minutes away?Tap to reveal
Answer: The couch is in the room where the early risers gather. The hotel means missing whatever happens after eleven.
The hotel wins on comfort and loses on everything else, and the people who pick it are usually the ones who did the driving.
Q9.Would you rather be the passenger in charge of the music or the passenger in charge of the snacks?Tap to reveal
Answer: Music has to please everyone in the car including the driver. Snacks have to last the whole way and survive being sat on.
Music is the power and snacks are the actual influence, and this becomes obvious about two hours in.
Q10.Would you rather have to explain football to someone for an entire game, or have someone explain it to you the whole way through?Tap to reveal
Answer: Explainers may not say it is complicated. Listeners have to ask at least three real questions.
Both sides think they are being generous, and this question quietly identifies which one each person is at your table.
Q11.Would you rather lose your luggage on the way there, or lose the cooler with the pie in it?Tap to reveal
Answer: The pie cannot be replaced at that time of night. Your clothes can be borrowed. Weigh that properly.
People pick the luggage instantly and then spend the next minute realizing how much they just admitted about the pie.
Q12.Would you rather stay an extra two days, or leave three hours after dinner?Tap to reveal
Answer: Staying means you are there for the leftovers and the cleanup. Leaving means you drive in the dark.
Two days sounds lovely at the table and leaving sounds lovely at nine at night, which is exactly why the question works.
Q13.Would you rather keep the giant parade balloons and lose the marching bands, or keep the bands and lose the balloons?Tap to reveal
Answer: Whichever you cut, you have to tell a child in the room why the parade is still worth watching.
Adults keep the balloons for nostalgia and anyone who has ever been in a marching band keeps the bands, loudly.
Q14.Would you rather have Thanksgiving somewhere warm and eighty degrees, or somewhere with snow already on the ground?Tap to reveal
Answer: No hybrid answers. Say what you are wearing and what you are doing between dinner and dessert.
Snow wins at most tables even among people who complain about it all winter, which tells you the holiday is mostly atmosphere.
Q15.Would you rather have everyone come to you in one go, or go to everyone in one day with three houses and three dinners?Tap to reveal
Answer: The three-house version means three full plates and three goodbyes, all on schedule.
Anyone who has actually done the three-house day answers this one before you finish reading it.
Q16.Would you rather take a long walk between dinner and dessert, or have an hour's nap?Tap to reveal
Answer: The walkers take everyone with them. The nappers do it in the chair, in the room, in front of the game.
The walk wins the vote and the nap wins the afternoon, and every table knows it.
Q17.Would you rather be in a car with four people and no music, or alone for ten hours with anything you want to listen to?Tap to reveal
Answer: Alone means the whole drive, both ways, and nobody to share the last hour with.
The introverts and extroverts at your table will sort themselves into two clean piles on this question alone.
Q18.Would you rather be the person who packs the car, or the person who unpacks it at midnight?Tap to reveal
Answer: Packers get one attempt and everything must fit. Unpackers get no help and no light in the driveway.
Packing is a puzzle and unpacking is a chore, so the answer usually depends on whether someone enjoys being needed.
Q19.Would you rather have an on-time flight in the middle seat, or a three-hour delay with a whole row to yourself?Tap to reveal
Answer: The row is genuinely empty. The middle seat is between two people who both want the armrest.
The delay wins more often than airlines would like, which says a lot about how bad the middle seat has become.
Q20.Would you rather do the Black Friday shopping from somebody else's list, or hand your list over and let them shop for you?Tap to reveal
Answer: No phone calls from the store either way. They guess, or you guess.
Control freaks pick shopping for others and everyone else picks handing it over, and both groups think they got the easy job.
The silly round: absurd, impossible and unanswerable
Last round, and the one that rescues the evening if the energy has dropped. None of this is answerable, which is the point. The best table rule here is that you must justify your choice in a single sentence and the table votes on whether the justification was any good — the vote is usually funnier than the answer.
This round also travels well to a classroom or a kids table, because it requires no knowledge of anything at all. If you are playing with children under ten, run it first rather than last: by the time the adults reach the absurd questions, the children will be asleep on the sofa.
Q1.Would you rather be the size of a turkey for the whole day, or have a turkey the size of you on the table?Tap to reveal
Answer: Turkey-sized people have to explain how they get onto the table. Owners of the giant turkey have to say who carves it.
Children go straight for the giant turkey and adults go for being small, because being small means somebody else does the cooking.
Q2.Would you rather have a gravy fountain in your house forever, or one bathtub filled with mashed potatoes, once?Tap to reveal
Answer: The fountain is on all year and you maintain it. The bathtub is a single afternoon and there are witnesses.
The fountain wins until somebody mentions cleaning it, at which point the entire table changes its mind at once.
Q3.Would you rather communicate only in turkey noises for the whole meal, or only in a whisper?Tap to reveal
Answer: Either way you still have to ask for things to be passed, and people still have to understand you.
The whisper sounds dignified for about two minutes and then becomes the more embarrassing of the two by a wide margin.
Q4.Would you rather smell permanently of roast turkey, or be permanently dusted with powdered sugar?Tap to reveal
Answer: Both are noticeable from across a room. Say which job you would still be able to do.
The sugar looks better and the turkey smells better, and the argument about which is worse in an elevator will run for minutes.
Q5.Would you rather ride on top of a parade balloon, or be the balloon?Tap to reveal
Answer: Riders have no safety harness. Balloons cannot see anything and are held by eighty strangers.
Riding wins with everyone except the people who realize that being the balloon means being adored by two million people.
Q6.Would you rather have every meal for a year taste exactly like Thanksgiving dinner, or never taste it again but remember it perfectly forever?Tap to reveal
Answer: Perfect memory means you can describe it in detail and never have it. Say whether that is better or worse than the real thing.
This is the one absurd question that turns quietly serious, and it is a good one to end a round on.
Q7.Would you rather be chased around the yard by one turkey the size of a pony, or fifty turkeys the size of pigeons?Tap to reveal
Answer: You get one kitchen implement to defend yourself with. Name it.
The fifty small ones sound manageable until someone points out that they can all move at once and in different directions.
Q8.Would you rather have to say thank you out loud for every single object you touch all day, or be unable to say it even once?Tap to reveal
Answer: The first version includes doorknobs and forks. The second version includes the person who cooked.
The forks are funnier and the second option is genuinely uncomfortable, which is why almost everybody picks the doorknobs.
Q9.Would you rather eat the whole meal sitting on a beanbag well below the table, or standing up at your place the entire time?Tap to reveal
Answer: Beanbag people cannot see their own plate. Standing people may not lean on anything.
Standing wins with adults and the beanbag wins with everyone under twelve, and both sides are certain the other is wrong.
Q10.Would you rather have the turkey politely narrate your meal, or have the pie sing every time someone cuts a slice?Tap to reveal
Answer: The narration is accurate and constant. The singing is loud, and there are eight slices.
The singing pie gets picked for comedy and the narrating turkey gets picked by anyone who imagines it for longer than five seconds.
Q11.Would you rather have a gravy boat that never empties, or a plate that refills automatically but only with the dish you like least?Tap to reveal
Answer: You cannot hide the plate and you cannot give it away. The gravy has to go somewhere too.
The endless gravy is obviously better, so watch for the people who pick the terrible plate just to be interesting.
Q12.Would you rather be able to eat unlimited food with no consequences for one day, or be able to teleport straight home the moment dinner ends?Tap to reveal
Answer: One power only, one day only, and you have to say which hour of the day you would use it in.
Younger tables pick the eating and anyone with a long drive home picks the teleport before the question is finished.
Q13.Would you rather wear an outfit two sizes too small all day, or wear a full turkey costume and be completely comfortable?Tap to reveal
Answer: You are in the family photograph either way, and the photograph goes on the wall.
The costume wins, and the people who pick the tight outfit are the ones who have not thought about the second helping yet.
Q14.Would you rather have a live marching band walk through your dining room every year at six in the evening, or a parade balloon permanently tethered in your front yard?Tap to reveal
Answer: The band takes four minutes and plays whatever it likes. The balloon is there in July too.
The band is chosen for the spectacle and the balloon for the bragging rights, and the neighbors are a factor in both.
Q15.Would you rather have one day a year when it snows mashed potato, or one day a year when it rains gravy?Tap to reveal
Answer: You cannot stay indoors. You have somewhere to be, and you have to get there.
Potato snow wins because everyone pictures it settling on trees, and gravy rain wins nobody over once they picture their car.
Q16.Would you rather be forced to nap in a chair in front of everybody, or be the only person in the house who cannot nap at all?Tap to reveal
Answer: Nappers may be photographed. Non-nappers have to stay awake and cheerful while everyone else sleeps.
The public nap is humiliating for one afternoon and being the only one awake is lonely, so this one usually goes to a vote.
Q17.Would you rather Thanksgiving last a full week, or happen twice a year but only for two hours each time?Tap to reveal
Answer: A week means a week of cooking. Two hours means arriving, eating and leaving, twice.
The two-hour version gets picked fast and defended weakly, because nobody can explain how the pie fits into it.
Q18.Would you rather know exactly what the dog is thinking all day, or have everyone at the table hear your thoughts for one full minute?Tap to reveal
Answer: You choose the minute. You do not get to choose what you are thinking during it.
The dog wins overwhelmingly, and the one person who picks the minute always has a reason worth hearing.
Q19.Would you rather have leftovers that never run out, or be able to taste everything ten times more intensely for one meal?Tap to reveal
Answer: The endless leftovers stay exactly as good as they were. The intense meal includes the sprouts.
The intense meal sounds better and the endless leftovers get picked, because people are honest about what they want on the fifth day.
Q20.Would you rather be able to pause Thanksgiving for an hour whenever you like, or rewind one moment of the day and do it again?Tap to reveal
Answer: The pause is for you alone and nobody else moves. The rewind is one moment only and you have to name it.
The pause wins with hosts and the rewind wins with everyone else, and the rewind answers are the warmest thing you will hear all day.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you actually play would you rather at a table?
Read the question, pause, then take an answer from everybody in turn before anyone is allowed to debate. That single rule is what separates a game from a poll: if you let the first person explain themselves immediately, you will get three answers in half an hour. Once everybody has committed, use the follow-up line printed under each question — it is there to force people off the fence and into a reason. A show of hands afterwards gives you a winning side, and the questions where the table splits down the middle are the ones worth arguing about.
How long does it take to get through 100 questions?
About two hours at a talkative table, which is more than most gatherings want in one sitting. Twenty questions runs twenty-five to thirty-five minutes and is the right size for after dinner. The page is built in five rounds of twenty for exactly this reason: pick the round that suits the room, keep the rest for the drive home or next year.
What ages does this suit?
Six and up for the food and silly rounds, which need no knowledge of anything and work as well with a first-grader as with a grandparent. The family table and hosting rounds land better from about twelve, because the jokes depend on having sat through a few of these meals. Nothing on the page needs an adult to pre-read it, and nothing touches politics, religion, money or anybody's cooking.
Can I use this in a classroom?
Yes, and it works better than a quiz does in the week before the holiday, because there is no wrong answer and no child can be embarrassed by not knowing something. Two ways to run it: put the two options on the board and have students physically move to one side of the room, or use it as a five-minute writing prompt where they defend their choice in three sentences. The silly round is the one to start with, and the food round doubles as a speaking exercise for English language learners.
Can I print these questions?
Yes. The page prints as a clean list with the follow-up lines included, free, with no account and nothing to sign up for. Printing is often better than passing a phone around a table, and it lets you hand one round to each end of a long table and run two games at once.
What do I do about the person who refuses to choose?
Give them a five-second count and then the table chooses for them, which is a worse outcome than choosing badly and fixes the behavior almost immediately. The other common problem is the opposite: one person answering for everybody. The house rule that solves it is that you answer only for yourself, and anybody who answers for someone else forfeits their own turn on that question.
How is this different from Thanksgiving trivia?
Trivia rewards whoever already knows the most, which is fine for a quiz night and awkward at a table holding a seven-year-old and a retired history teacher. Would you rather has no right answer, so everybody arrives equal and the fun comes from the disagreement rather than the score. If you want both, run a round of trivia for the competitive half of the family and keep these for the part of the evening when nobody wants to move.
