When your team works from different locations, it can be tough to feel connected. That’s where virtual team building activities come in. We’ve put together a list of 35 fun virtual team building activities that will help your remote team bond, laugh, and thrive — no matter the distance. From quick icebreakers to exciting games, there’s something for every group. Whether your colleagues are scattered across the country or even the globe, these creative activities are designed to bring everyone together. And the best part? They’re a blast! Ready to build stronger relationships and boost team morale? Let’s get started!
1. Virtual Volunteer Day
Choose a cause and organize a volunteer event, such as writing letters to seniors or participating in an online charity run. It’s a great way to give back while bonding as a team. Not only does this activity help your team feel connected, but it also fosters a sense of shared purpose beyond work goals. Plus, knowing you’ve made a positive impact together can boost morale and leave everyone feeling inspired.
2. Pet Parade
Encourage team members to introduce their pets during a video call, fostering light-hearted moments and helping team members bond over their furry friends. It’s a great icebreaker that brings plenty of laughs and joy, especially when unexpected ‘guest appearances’ happen during meetings. Sharing stories and funny quirks about each pet helps humanize the virtual space, making it feel more relaxed and personal. Bonus: It’s a great way to meet everyone’s favorite four-legged (or feathered!) coworkers.
3. Cooking Class/Competitions
Book a virtual cooking class where the team can learn a new recipe together, making for a delicious and interactive team building experience. To spice things up, turn it into a friendly cooking competition where team members put their own spin on the recipe and share photos of their final dishes. Whether it’s a pasta masterpiece or a creative dessert, the friendly rivalry and tasty results will leave everyone smiling and hungry for more!
4. Mindfulness Sessions
Sometimes, team building is taking a step back and just breathing. You can forget about the project your team is diligently working on and forget that it might be months until life returns to normal. To do this, set up a regular mindfulness session. Ask your team for a volunteer(s) to lead a meditation or a yoga session one morning. Don’t make these mandatory. Instead, welcome anyone who wants to join.
5. Staff Fun Facts
Regardless of whether your team is full of introverts, extroverts, or a mixed bag, everyone has an interesting anecdote or fact about themselves. If you want your team to identify more as friends and teammates than simply coworkers, have your staff send you some facts about themselves. Once a day or once a week, release one of the facts via email or Slack. Then, let your employees guess who the phrase or story describes. With a few surprises and twists, your team will learn all about their colleagues in a more exciting manner.
6. Photo Competition
Not everyone has an inner Ansel Adams, but the advent of smartphones provides a solid medium to take outstanding photos. Invite your team to take pictures of things around the house or just outside and have a vote to see who’s the best. The upside to this competition is its simplicity and the little time it takes to complete. Plus, you never know if the quiet guy from accounting has an exquisite eye for photography.
7. Team Trivia Challenge
Kick off a classic trivia challenge with general knowledge questions that get everyone’s competitive spirit going — think pop culture, history, or even quirky company facts. Once the team is warmed up, take it to the next level with questions based on fun facts about your colleagues. Play a trivia game where the questions are based on personal tidbits, helping everyone learn more about each other in a relaxed setting. It’s a fun way to boost team knowledge while sharing a few laughs along the way!
Another idea is to use QuizBreaker, a great ice breaker for remote employees. This service enables teams to learn new things about each other and increase communication among remote staff. You can customize quizzes by day, timing, and frequency, so this service is perfect for a company with an upcoming in-person retreat or meeting. Complete quizzes with staff prior to the event, and it should alleviate some of the awkwardness that comes from meeting co-workers face to face for the first time.
QuizBreaker sends out an email with a list of fun questions. From there, the team receives another email where they must guess and match the answer to the person who said it. This becomes an ideal way to help get to know your team members and have fun doing it too.
8. The Virtual (Team Building) Happy Hour
If you’ve implemented a company happy hour after work on certain days, you may find that it increases team building and improves company culture. Furthermore, it provides your team with the opportunity to unwind and talk about anything other than work. Despite its lack of work-related conversation, happy hours can actually help boost engagement at work. As others get to know each other better and work together, they can look forward to happy hour as a reward for completing a goal.
If the conversation stagnates or you want to engage the team-building aspect, try a few games. These games should have a casual approach, giving your remote workers the opportunity to learn a bit more about each other. Some popular virtual happy hour games include:
- Show and Tell
- Never Have I Ever: Safe for Work Edition
- The Bucket List (share your bucket list items)
You could also try classic board games that translate well virtually, such as:
- Pictionary
- Scattergories
- Yahtzee
- Codenames
Whatever you decide to do during your virtual happy hour, just make sure that your team interacts and gets to know each other. That’s one of the most effective team-building activities you’ll find.
9. MTV Cribs for the Virtual Office
For the past 20 years, MTV has satisfied the curiosity of the masses with “Cribs.” On this reality show, celebrities bring camera crews into their home to showcase what it’s like to live in luxury. Well, your remote team may not have crystal chandeliers, grand pianos, and Ferraris, but they might find it fun to show off their place (or home office) “Cribs” style. Ask for volunteers to do this live or on a recording, and let everyone enjoy the insight into the real-life of a remote worker.
10. Guess the Workspace
For a twist on the MTV Cribs idea — ask team members to share photos of their home workstations, then guess whose desk belongs to whom. It’s a fun peek into each other’s work-from-home setups. You’ll discover who’s the minimalist, who loves a cluttered creative space, and who has the most colorful desk decor. It’s a light-hearted way to get to know each other’s personalities and might even spark some inspiration for your own setup!
11. Five Questions
Five Questions is another awesome team-building game that opens the floor for agreement, discussion, and debate. Each workday, list five questions on your collaborative work platform. Give everybody a few hours to answer, and then open the table for discussion. For example, your five questions could include:
- In your opinion, what’s the best sci-fi movie?
- What’s the greatest music video of all time?
- What’s your favorite Taco Bell menu item?
- Who’s the greatest athlete ever?
- If you could meet an author past or present, who would it be?
Remember to switch up the questions to fit the interests of your team. The idea is to keep them engaged, keep them talking, and keep the team building at full steam ahead.
12. Virtual Talent Show
Host a virtual talent show where team members showcase their hidden talents — singing, dancing, playing an instrument, or even doing magic tricks. You’ll be amazed at the variety of skills your colleagues have been keeping under wraps! It’s a chance for everyone to shine outside of their usual work roles, creating an atmosphere of support and celebration. Plus, it’s a guaranteed way to add a lot of laughter and fun to the day!
13. Virtual Book Club
Start a book club where team members read the same book and meet to discuss it. Choose a mix of fiction, business, and self-help books for variety. This gives everyone a chance to share their thoughts and insights while sparking engaging conversations that go beyond work topics. It’s also a great way to discover new perspectives and build camaraderie as you bond over shared stories and lessons learned.
14. Team Playlist
Create a shared Spotify playlist where everyone can add their favorite work tunes. It’s a great way to discover new music and bond over similar tastes. Whether it’s energizing beats for focus or chill tracks for relaxation, you’ll get a unique glimpse into each team member’s personality. Plus, having a shared playlist can make workdays feel a bit more connected, even when you’re miles apart.
15. Wellness Challenge
Encourage healthy habits with a wellness challenge, such as a daily step count competition or a hydration tracker, and share progress in a group chat for motivation. It’s a fun way to inspire a bit of friendly competition while promoting physical and mental well-being. You can even offer small prizes or shoutouts for the top performers, making it a win-win for both team spirit and personal health. Plus, seeing everyone’s progress can be a great reminder to take breaks and stay active throughout the day.
16. Recapture the Water Cooler
Water cooler talk is a way to chat about the latest movies and sports while taking a break from work. You can implement virtual team building activities that recapture the essence of water cooler chat each day or once a week. To do so, start a “water cooler” channel on your collaboration platform. This will allow people to periodically post their thoughts on the latest current events or what they’re binge-watching these days. Not only does this equate to team building, but it also brings people together.
17. Themed Decor Competition
Challenge your team to home office decor competitions. You could choose a Halloween theme, a Fourth of July theme, or any other theme that your employees agree upon. Throw in a small prize like an Amazon gift card to add some extra motivation. It’s a great way to get creative and bring some festive fun into the virtual workspace. Team members can share photos or give a quick video tour, and everyone can vote for their favorite setup. It’s amazing how a little decor can brighten the mood and spark some friendly banter.
18. Online Escape Room
Choose a virtual escape room experience where teams work together to solve puzzles and complete challenges within a set time, fostering problem-solving and teamwork skills. It’s an exciting way to break up the usual meeting routine and get everyone thinking creatively under pressure. The collaborative element helps team members practice clear communication and quick decision-making. Plus, the shared sense of victory when you ‘escape’ together can be a great team morale booster!
19. Weekly “Chat Roulette”
There’s no better way to get to know someone than with one-on-one conversation. Regrettably, these types of interactions occur much less frequently with remote teams. Enter Donut. For employers using Slack as their preferred remote work communication or collaboration tool, this application makes it easier to establish personal connections between individuals who work from home. Donut regularly and randomly pairs up team members and encourages they meet or chat remotely. Employees complete these virtual meet-ups via video conference or chat. To make things less awkward for participants, management can include some talking points to help get things started.
20. Organize a Scavenger Hunt
Running out of ideas of how to build camaraderie for your remote staff? Don’t dismiss classic activities such as scavenger hunts. Two tools that should be in your arsenal for virtual team building activities are ActionBound and GooseChase. These mobile applications take users on digitally interactive scavenger hunts. And because they monitor activities in real-time, they are perfect for encouraging collaboration among distributed teams.
Users can play in teams and complete missions where they score points. You can schedule the hunts for a set time and duration. The applications enable users to submit and use GPS locations, directions, pictures, and videos during the hunt. When the game concludes, the organizer can put together a slideshow of the best photos and videos of the hunt.
21. 20 Questions to Get to Know You Better
This activity can be one of the most simple and fun. Although starting by asking personal questions may be tempting, it is crucial to keep the topics light and fun. A small questionnaire helps spark a conversation between colleagues. The deeper-level connections come later. You can set up this game in one of two ways:
- Option 1: Include questions as a survey for new hires so that they can share some non-personal details about themselves, and the existing team can get to know their new colleague better.
- Option 2: Break the questions up during the month, either as a daily question or five at the beginning of the week. Since long answers would not be required, this would be perfect for a virtual bulletin board or team communication hubs such as Slack, Discord, or Microsoft Teams.
22. The “What If” Group Project or Plan
Out of all the virtual team building activities, this one may be the most creative yet. The object of this activity is to get staff members who would not regularly interact to show their most creative selves and work together to solve a “fun” problem. Because adding additional stress is not a goal for this project, it is essential to encourage the participants to have fun when dreaming up solutions and remind them that there are no wrong answers or plans for this project.
Pick a team of four or five workers and dream up a scenario for them that includes anything from escaping a deserted island or creating a new (ridiculous) consumer product to planning the ultimate vacation on a specific (low) budget or surviving an alien invasion. Make sure you schedule the due date for this “project” at least a month beforehand. This allows everyone in different time zones the ability to join in at some point. If you are using collaboration software, such as Slack, make sure each team has their own private project channel. Participants can “present” their final outcomes any way they desire. Use a video presentation, PowerPoint, a blog post, etc. To increase participation in this activity, include a prize for the top two or three projects or plans.
23. The Video Call “Coffee Chat” or “Company Lunch”
Everyone loves a free meal, and some of the best conversations usually happen during a nice long coffee break or lunch. For companies with a distributed workforce, getting the entire company together in-person for a meal requires extensive coordination and significant funding. Fortunately, video conferencing and food delivery software can make things a lot easier for remote managers wishing to take everyone “out for coffee.”
Employers should set a date and time for their chosen event well in advance to ensure most remote staff can take part. Since not everyone drinks coffee and many people have dietary restrictions, it is best to ask participants for their preferred meal or snack and have that meal delivered a few minutes before the informal video conference call.
Using reloadable gift cards so everyone can make order their own food ahead of time is also convenient. While it might be slightly strange to hear some slurping and seeing fellow staff members chewing via video, the socialization and bonding that occurs by seeing each other’s faces and discussing non-work-related things are priceless.
24. Schedule a Virtual Movie or TV Show Night
With the boom of social media and television outlets, “live-tweeting” (sharing one’s reactions to TV episodes, sporting events, or awards shows while they are airing) is another virtual team building activity you can try with remote teams. It can also be quite simple to set up. The main goal here is to provide a means for your distributed team to relax and bond with one another.
The most important requirement for this activity is setting up a screen-sharing software or streaming service. It is easiest when everyone is watching popular global or national events such as the Oscars or Super Bowl. Services like Kast enable users to create watch parties and view the same movie or TV show simultaneously. Determine a set time to stream the film by picking a date and time, and have everyone log on to the video stream at the same time. Kast also offers messaging capabilities so viewers can chat while watching.
25. Lunch & Learn: Online Learning Sessions
Host virtual workshops or ‘lunch and learn’ sessions where team members can share expertise on a topic or skill, promoting knowledge-sharing and professional development. It’s a great way to break up the day and give everyone a chance to learn something new while enjoying their lunch. Topics can range from industry insights to personal interests like photography or cooking tips, keeping it fresh and engaging. These sessions not only boost skills but also provide a unique opportunity to see your colleagues in a teaching role, building mutual respect and connection.
26. Celebrate Holidays and Special Occasions Online
Remote staff have lives outside of work. Because of the geographical isolation that often comes with remote work, bonding with colleagues is difficult. Thus, celebrating important milestones in a virtual setting just as much as you would if you interacted face-to-face with your team.
The easiest way is by putting every telecommunications tool in your arsenal to work. If you use a communication tool like Slack or Microsoft Teams, have a dedicated channel for “watercooler” news or personal events. Encourage staff to upload pictures of celebrations (weddings) or milestones (kids, pets, or sports activities). Host virtual baby showers or birthdays by having the team join in on a video call and send a gift or birthday cake to the person being celebrated. Want to make it extra special? Send everyone on the team a cupcake too so that they can join in on the tasty fun.
Bringing Your Team Together with Fun Virtual Team Building Activities
With the right virtual team building activities, bringing your remote team closer together is easier than you might think. These fun ideas help break the ice, build stronger connections, and add a bit of joy to the workday. Whether you’re solving puzzles in an online escape room or laughing over a pet parade, these activities can boost morale and create lasting memories. Try mixing things up by choosing a few new options each month. Remember, a happy and connected team is a productive team. So, go ahead — get creative and watch your remote team thrive!
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If these virtual team building activities sound like fun, imagine sharing them with your own remote team! At Virtual Vocations, we connect you with top remote job opportunities that can help you land the role you’ve been searching for. Become a member today to access exclusive job listings, career resources, and the support you need to find your ideal remote position. Join us and start building meaningful connections with your new team — no matter where you are!
Do you have any virtual team building activities that are effective or that your employees enjoy? Connect with Virtual Vocations on Facebook, X (formerly known as Twitter), LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube to share your thoughts and tips. We’d love to hear from you!
Original November 2020 article written by Skye Rodgers.
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