15 Exciting Virtual Holiday Party Ideas to End the Year

The holidays might look a little different this year, but that’s no reason to keep from celebrating. Whether you decide to go small this year or host a virtual holiday party of your own, there are many things you can do to find a way to bring the festive holiday spirit across the screens and to your homes.

Here are 14 fun and exciting ideas that you can adapt as you host a virtual holiday party!

1. Virtual Holiday Karaoke Party

Time to belt out those tunes even if you have to do it on Zoom (or any other virtual platform out there)! Just because you can’t book a karaoke room this year doesn’t mean you have to skip the singing altogether. Thank goodness for platforms like Watch2Gether, you can stream karaoke videos from YouTube, whip out your microphone, and sing with everything you’ve got.

(You can also use Watch2Gether to play fun background music while your party is going on.)

2. Virtual Holiday Scavenger Hunt

If you played this game during Halloween, you saw how fun it could be. Why not play it again with family, friends, or workmates this holiday season? You can keep adding your creative twist, like coming up with a point system for whoever brings the item first. Or you could even provide clues without stating the item and leave your attendees to guess what it actually is. Not sure what items to add on the scavenger hunt list for your virtual holiday party? Check this out!

3. Virtual Holiday Trivia Contest

Make a list of questions centred around this season. It can be anything from traditions around the world, Christmas carols, holiday food, anything! (The internet is your best friend here.) Divide people into groups and/or breakout rooms and have them come together to celebrate the holiday season with a little bit of brainwork. The group that gets everything correct and answers the questions the fastest wins!

4. Virtual Holiday Movie Charades

Come on, holiday parties aren’t fun without those crazy charade games, and who says you can’t play them virtually? If you and your friends or workmates are holiday movie aficionados, this virtual holiday party game is perfect for you. Divide the group into two teams, A and B, and have them give each other the word, character, movie, or quote. The team that gets the most points wins the game.

5. Virtual Holiday Pictionary

Gingerbread. Eggnog. Nativity scene. Christmas lights. These are all samples of items you can come up with for sketching if you want to play the holiday version of Pictionary for your virtual holiday party. You can use random name picker tools or random word choice generators like this one. To make it more fun, have only one person draw and share their screen while they are drawing (use the AWW App—it works well with Zoom!). The person who guesses it gets the point.

6. Virtual Holiday Cooking/Baking Party

If you and your friends love to bake/cook, share your favourite recipes, book a date in the calendar, and get together virtually for some holiday cooking/baking fun! Think of mint chocolate chip cookies, special hot cocoa drinks, your favourite pies—the list is endless! It’s best to share the recipe ahead of time so all the participants can get the ingredients ready before the day. And really, what’s more festive than your place all warm and cosy and smelling like holidays?

7. Virtual Secret Santa

It’s no big secret that Secret Santa is one of the highlights of an office’s holiday party celebrations. If you can’t meet together, draw names, and get presents for each other—at least, not in person—there are always ways to do it virtually. With DrawNames, you can input names, set wish lists, create some rules, and more! You can even anonymously ask questions to the person you’re giving the gift to, so you can get them something they’ll truly enjoy.

8. Virtual Holiday Costume Fun

Who says costumes are only for Halloween and masquerade balls? You can decide on different Christmas-themed characters, such as elves, reindeer, angels, and the like, and get everyone to wear something. You can even take it a step further and dress as characters from favourite Christmas movies and make it into a contest where the best costume wins a prize.

9. Virtual Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

Show off your fashion sense with ugly Christmas sweaters. Get your family or group of friends to find the best, ugliest sweater they can find, and then wear it together at a Zoom party. Get ready for laughs and jokes! Come on, the sweaters aren’t that bad. At least they’re cozy!

10. Virtual Holiday Movie Show

You know those good, old holiday movies that melt the heart and leave us a bit teary-eyed? If you and some friends are the types that come together to watch movies during the holiday season, but you can’t now because of all the restrictions, the next best thing is to watch it apart…together. With platforms like Metastream and Teleparty (formerly Netflix Party), you can watch the same movie at the same time! Get out the buttered popcorn and hot choco and prepare for a night of magic through movies.

11. Virtual Holiday Traditions Around the World

Different cultures around the world have different ways of celebrating the holiday seasons. Some traditions include Christmas trees and snowmen. Others include menorahs and dreidels. And still others include placing shoes by the window, hiding brooms, and more. Let the holiday season also be a season of learning. Find new ways to bring the holiday spirit to your home and to your friends and family. Discover new traditions you can adapt or new food you can cook and find new ways to celebrate.

12. Virtual Artsy Holiday Party

Love sketching and doodling on just about anything? Got friends who do origami? Love recycling old items and turning them into decorative pieces? Turn your virtual holiday party into an arts and crafts session by doing any of these and more. If you’re also hosting a virtual holiday party for kids, this is a good idea to do. What’s better is that you can use what you created to decorate your house for the holidays!

13. Virtual Holiday Card Competition

Divide your colleagues or friends into groups of two ahead of time and see who comes up with the best holiday card. Make it into a poem, come up with fun, crazy sketches, throw in a few unique ideas—anything goes! The team that gets the most votes wins the competition.

14. Virtual Holiday Awards Ceremony

Some workplaces turn their holiday parties into awards ceremonies to honour their employees for a job well done throughout the year. If this is your company’s tradition, there’s no reason to put it off even if you have to celebrate virtually—for now. It will both surprise and delight your employees. Have everyone come up dressed for an awards night by turning on the glitz and the glam. Create inspiring awards, as well as more humorous ones, and find a reason to celebrate each and every member.

15. Virtual “Kindness Quest”

This season is all about gratitude and giving and celebrating. Why not come together with a group of friends and find ways to give to those who need it? TeamBuilding’s Kindness Quest is a virtual team building event that’s meant to bring out the holiday cheer while leaving a meaningful impact in the community. You can also create your own by teaming up with a local organisation or church ministry and come together with family, friends, and colleagues, to spread the holiday spirit to others this season.