I remember how stressful car rides felt when the girls were babies. Whether I was focused on trying to not have them fall asleep for the dreaded quick car nap or not being able to comfort them while they were upset because I had to keep my eyes on the road. As we’ve gone through all the phases from newborn to tweens, through trial and error, I found ways to keep all ages entertained… without screens, usually. We have a family rule that if it’s under two hours, no screen. Over two hours, enjoy your movies, kiddos! 😉
Going on car rides with your kids is inevitable. Unfortunately, kids have short attention spans and tons of energy. When you combine this with them being harnessed into a car seat or stuck beneath a seat belt, car trips can get frustrating fast.
To avoid this, consider planning ahead with some fun car trip activities for kids. The right activities can turn long road trips into bonding experiences for the whole family and short trips to the store into a breeze. I learned which road trip activities work best and am sharing them with you. This way you can use them to keep your kids happy and entertained on car rides so you can focus less on endless rounds of “Are we there yet”, and more on the road ahead.
21 Car Activities for Kids
Different age groups have different attention spans and interests. This is why it makes sense to plan your car activities for long trips based on your kid’s age group so you can find ideas your kids love. With the right activities, you may find yourself planning some long drives just so you can go on road trips with kids!
Car Activities for Babies
Babies may be the hardest age group to plan for since they’re too little to understand. You also have to be careful what you leave within their reach since they’ll be largely unsupervised during the drive. Thankfully, this doesn’t mean there aren’t ways to help them pass the time on family road trips.
Teethers
Attaching a teether to your baby’s car seat using a pacifier clip is a good way to entertain them while soothing sore gums. Be sure to choose large teethers that they can’t get all the way into their mouths and make sure you inspect them before leaving to check for dangerous, broken-off pieces. Look how cute this one is!
Mirrors
A great way to entertain your baby on long drives is to attach a mirror to the back of their headrest, facing towards their car seat. Your baby may not know that they’re looking at themselves, but they’ll definitely find the cute face looking back at them to be a ton of fun! Don’t be surprised if you hear giggles and coos coming from their car seat during family road trips.
Rattle Socks
You can’t put much in the car seat with a young baby, but you can add some rattle socks to their feet to give them a safe, fun way to stay entertained on a long road trip. As your baby moves their legs, they’ll be delighted by the gentle rattling sound their feet give off!
Naps
Honestly, when it comes to long family road trips and young kids, naps are your best friend. Babies sleep a lot — and most find car rides soothing — so planning your car trips around your baby’s naps is a great idea. If you’re going on a very long drive that’s going to be multiple hours, alternate between entertaining car ride activities and naps, being sure to pull over for a quick stop to remove the fun rattle socks, mirrors, and teethers so they can have a calm and peaceful environment for some restful sleep.
Car Activities for Toddlers
The challenge with car activities for toddlers is definitely their short attention span and boundless energy. Here are a few easy tips to help your toddlers pass the time on family road trips.
Singing Their Favorite Songs
I know listening to nursery rhymes for hours on end may not feel like a fun idea for you, but allowing your toddler to listen their songs that they know and can sing along to will help keep them entertained. I can’t count how many times we listened to this CD! Singing is a great way to harness some of their energy without having to leave the car. Use this idea alongside other activities on this list so you get a chance to listen to your own music too!
Searching For Colors
An educational way to keep your busy toddler’s brain engaged on road trips is to have them search for colors. This can be inside the car, in the scenery you pass, or even colors of other vehicles on the road. Think of this like the game I Spy with My Little Eye that’s geared toward small kids. Looking for certain colors is a fun game that the whole family can be a part of and it’ll help your toddler learn to identify colors in a wider environment.
Fidget Toys
There are plenty of soft, fidget toys that are perfect for entertaining toddlers on car rides. Soft pop-its and flexible pop tubes are safe for young kids in the car. Buckle toys and handheld spinners are also great fidget toys if you know your kid will keep them in their lap where they belong. If you’re going on a shorter car ride, keeping some fidget toys in the car is a great idea for quick boredom busters.
Busy Boards and Felt Boards
Busy boards are loaded with fun things like zippers, buckles, Velcro, and buttons that will keep your toddler busy in the car. Felt boards make room for creativity by using felt shapes to create imaginative scenes on a soft board. Both busy boards and felt boards are fun things to do at home. They’re designed to be small and light enough to fit in your child’s lap, making them perfect for car activities.
Car Activities for Preschoolers
There are so many wonderful car activity ideas for preschool-age kids since their brains are primed and ready to learn. Keeping your kid’s brain entertained is a simple screen-free road trip activity away! The key to good games for preschoolers is to try to promote self-directed play. You’ll have to focus on the road so it’s better if your preschooler has an activity they can do themselves.
Water Wow and Color Wonder
These mess-free coloring books allow your kids to be creative and color without risking markers in the car. Water Wow works by filling special brushes with water and “painting” their cardboard books to reveal colorful images. Color Wonder works similarly using special markers in coloring books to color without any mess.
Regular Coloring Books and Colored Pencils
There’s nothing wrong with a regular coloring book and a pack of colored pencils! Give your child a pillow or stuffed animal friend to place across their lap for a bit of support, and let them color in their coloring books for some mess-free imaginative fun. Remember to bring a pencil sharpener to use at rest stops if you decide to bring colored pencils on your drive.
Flashcards
Because your preschool-aged kids are little sponges, they’re often excited by the idea of learning. Harness this excitement by bringing flashcards on your next car trip. Your kids can practice colors, numbers, and sounding out letters in a fun and interactive way that will make the car ride fly by. If you have older kids or an adult passenger, bring them in on the fun by getting them to quiz your preschooler using fun flashcards.
Magnetic Play Sets or Reusable Stickers
Just because your preschooler is strapped into a car seat doesn’t mean that their imaginations need to be restrained as well! Bring a magnetic play set along in the car for some quick and easy fun without fear of losing pieces. Reusable stick pads also allow your kids’ imaginations to run wild as they dress up dolls or move planes and trains around their sticker board. I still remember my mom hiding one of these for me when I was a kid on a long road trip and how much I enjoyed it!
Car Activities for Tweens
Entertaining older kids isn’t as much about keeping them occupied as it is about finding the perfect screen-free activity for them to do. Phones, tablets, and even car TVs can keep your tween occupied in the car for hours, but it’s good to mix things up. Instead, try to coax them away from the screens with some fun games they can do with you.
Road Trip Scavenger Hunt
This takes a bit of advanced preparation but it’s worth it since it’ll keep your tween engaged on the drive and out of their phones. Create a list of things you can expect to see on your trip so your kids can search as you drive. Some things you could add to your scavenger hunt include landmarks, streets, or even things you might see at your rest stop when you pull over for a break.
The Alphabet Game
The alphabet game is similar to a scavenger hunt, except you don’t have to prepare at all. This fun game for older kids is the perfect way to involve everyone in the car. The first player has to find something as you drive along that starts with an A, and then the second person has to find something that starts with a B. Moving through the alphabet you take turns locating and naming the things you see.
The License Plate Game
If you’re going on a really long car trip with your family, consider playing the license plate game. In this game, you’re on the lookout for license plates from all 50 states! Each time you spot a license plate from a different state you get a point. Only one plate per state and only one person can claim the points for a plate. At the end of the trip, the person with the most points wins!
Magnetic puzzles
Puzzles are a great activity for tweens, but they’re tough to take in the car because the pieces get lost. This is where magnetic puzzles come in! They’re stored in a magnetic tin and made on a magnetic surface so the chances of you losing any pieces are greatly reduced.
Audiobooks and Podcasts
While audiobooks and podcasts can be a great option for a wide array of ages, it’s super fun when you get to the ages where the stories are engaging for you, the driver, too. Check out our favorite audiobooks for ages 4-6 and our favorite audiobooks for ages 7-10.
Car Activities for Teens
Older kids can often amuse themselves, but there’s nothing wrong with trying to involve them in a fun game that the whole family can play during long car rides. A lot of the best car ride activities for tweens can also be played — and enjoyed — by teens and vice versa.
Mad Libs
Mad Libs are a super fun way to get your teen involved in family fun during the car ride. The best part is, as long as your teen or older kids are holding and writing down ideas on the mad libs pad, even younger kids can help with coming up with wonky action words, nouns, or ways to describe something. The amount of fun your family will get out of Mad Libs games cannot be overstated and the hilarious answers you come up with will make everyone laugh as the miles pass by.
20 Questions
This is another game that can cross age groups. Everyone in the car takes turns to come up with a person, place, or thing. The other people in the car have to ask questions that can be answered by either yes or no until they come up with the right answer. The game is called 20 Questions because you’re supposed to limit the number of questions you ask to 20. If you get the right answer, it’s your turn to come up with a person, place, or thing.
Pen and Paper Games
Games like tic-tac-toe and hangman can be fun for your teens to enjoy. They can include their younger siblings in the game and help them understand how it’s played. Bringing along books of crossword puzzles, word searches, or sudoku is also a great idea for keeping your teen entertained during a long car ride.
Journaling, Writing, or Drawing
Keeping your teen occupied on car rides can be as easy as giving them a pad of paper and a pencil. They can use that space to doodle ideas, sketch scenery you pass, or jot down their thoughts and ideas. Teenagers have a lot of thoughts and emotions that they’re working on processing and expressing themselves through drawing or writing is a great way to work through those feelings. With all of their feelings out on paper, you may even find your teen willing to open up and have a conversation with you — and that really is the best way to spend time with an older kid.
Taking family road trips doesn’t have to be a scary prospect. In fact, with the right car activities for kids, you might find yourself looking forward to taking your family out on the road! Try some of these age-appropriate activities the next time your kids need to travel in the car and see what a difference they make to your family travel.
