This fun music bingo game is the perfect party game for anyone who loves music! Instead of listening for numbers to be called, you listen for music to be played and cover the song on your bingo card when you recognize it!
What is Music Bingo
Two of my family’s favorite traditions are playing bingo (we’ve been playing Christmas bingo since I was born) and playing name that tune. This music bingo game combines those two concepts – recognizing a song and bingo – in a super fun game that’s perfect for anyone who can read!
I made a Christmas music bingo game a few years ago that has been played by almost 100,000 people since I shared it. It’s easily one of our most popular Christmas party games, so I thought it’d be fun to share a version that you can play all year long, not just at Christmas!
In this music bingo game, the host plays a random song from a playlist and when you recognize the song, you cover it on your bingo card. The first person to get a bingo wins the game, just like in regular bingo!
what’s great about musical bingo
- Easy setup – I’ve already created the music bingo cards and playlist for you so all you need to do is print and cut out the cards to play!
- Great for a group – I have up to 40 cards available so you can play this with a large group with no real additional work! Perfect for large parties, youth nights, family reunions, and so on.
- Fun variation on a classic – most people probably have played bingo but few people have played music bingo, and it’s a super fun twist!
- Good for most ages – as long as you can read or have someone who can help you read, you can play this game! That’s probably why bingo is such a hit with entire families!
music bingo supplies
This is very similar to traditional bingo and uses all the same basic supplies.
- Bingo cards – I’ve included two different sets of free printable music bingo cards at the bottom of this post. Just print and cut!
- Calling sheet – this comes with part of the download and will help you keep track of what’s been played already.
- Bingo markers – I have a set of these and use them all the time! But if you don’t, you can always use things like cereal, beans, or really anything small enough to fit!
- Music playlist – you can either create your own music playlists using the calling sheet or use the ones I’ve created on Apple Music. This is the playlist for the last ten year game and this is the playlist link for the spanning the decades list.
- Bluetooth speaker – I highly recommend playlist the music playlist on a speaker of some sort so that everyone can hear. Phones are great for small groups but if you have a larger group, you’ll want something louder. I have this one and love it!
- Prizes – these are never required but make the game more engaging and fun. You’ll find some of my favorite prizes ideas later on in the post.
Tip!
If you want to use these again and again, I recommend printing on white card stock then laminating. I have this laminator and these laminating pouches that I use all the time. They’re super easy to use and work great! Then just use dry erase markers to mark the cards!
Prep the Musical Bingo Game
Before you can play, you need to get the music bingo game ready to go! Get your supplies together, figure out how you’re going to play, and get your playlist all ready to go!
- Decide which game version you’re going to play. I have a version of music bingo for adults (multiple decades) and a music bingo game for teens that’s really just the past 10 years.
- Download, print, and cut enough music bingo cards so that everyone who wants to play has one.
- Print out a calling sheet, laminate it (ideally – or just print it out), and put it by whoever will be in charge of keeping it marked off.
- Create your playlist or download and test out the ones that I created. Hook it up to your speaker and make sure everything works correctly!
- Have everyone choose a card (or just hand them out) and give them 20ish markers to go with the card.
Who is going to play the playlist?
You can either have the person who is hosting the game always shuffle the playlist and just not play or you can rotate and have a different person shuffle the playlist and just not play that particular round. Or have them playing the playlist and still playing, it really doesn’t matter since the playlist is shuffled anyway.
How to play music bingo
This is played in the same way that traditional bingo is played except instead of calling out numbers or pictures (like in our birthday bingo game), you’ll play songs instead. The goal is to be the first to get a bingo – five spaces covered in a row.
Start by having everyone cover their free space, then it’s time to play.
Shuffle the playlist and play the first song. When someone knows the name of the song, they call out the name of the song and everyone who has that name on their card covers it up. If no one knows the song after it’s been playing for 15-20 seconds, you can just give the group the answer so you can move to the next song.
The person in charge of the calling sheet should also cover it up so you know it’s been called.
Make it Harder!
If you want to make this game harder, you can tell people that they can’t say what the song is called and people have to actually know the song on their own to cover it up. This is a great variation if you have a bunch of people playing who will know the songs, otherwise I would just let the group name the tune out loud and everyone who has it cover it.
Play another song and do the same thing. If you have the song on your card, you cover it up. If you don’t have the song, you don’t do anything.
How to Win Music Bingo
Keep playing songs until someone gets five in a row (can include the free space) diagonally, horizontally, or vertically and yells out bingo. Double-check that all of the songs they covered to win have actually been called, and once confirmed, that person wins a prize.
If you’re playing one winner per game, have everyone clears their card and you play again in the same exact way. If you’re playing with multiple winners per game, everyone should keep their cards covered and just keep playing more songs.
Play as many games as you want until either everyone has won a prize or all of the prizes are gone!
Tip!
If you’re continuing to play (not clearing cards), make sure to hit next on the playlist rather than hitting shuffle again. If you hit shuffle again, it’ll put all of the songs on the entire playlist back into the rotation and you only want the songs that haven’t been played yet.
Once you’re ready to start a brand new round, then you’ll want to press the shuffle button again to shuffle everything all over again!
More Ways to Play Music Bingo
Looking to change it up from the traditional bingo game? The best way to do that is to change up how you get a bingo. Here are some of my favorite ways to bingo other than the standard five in a row. We often will switch up the “caller” (person in charge of the playlist in music bingo) and let them choose what is determined a bingo in the game.
- Four corners – cover all the corners of the card.
- Postage stamp – cover four spots, making a small connected square, anywhere on the board.
- X – cover both diagonals, creating a large X on the card.
- T – cover the middle column and top row to create a large T on the card.
- Cross/plus – cover the middle column and middle row to create a plus sign.
- Bring a friend – first person to bingo gets to bring a friend with them to choose a prize!
- Biggest loser – the last person to place a marker, wins.
- Black-out – first person to cover their entire board wins, this is a fun way to end and gift a bigger prize.
Two Music Bingo Games
I have created two different sets of music bingo cards and playlists for you to use depending on who is playing.
We played this with a bunch of teens for a youth group night and had so much fun but realized that the original playlist I created was one a lot of the teens weren’t familiar with (but most adults will know all the songs), so we ended up making a second playlist and second set of music bingo cards to include in this post!
Music Bingo for Adults
The first is super popular songs from the past fifty years that I feel like most adults will know and teens will recognize at least some of the songs.
You can see examples of the songs in the photos in this post, but it’s things like Brown Eyed Girl, Ring of Fire, and I’m A Believer.
Music Bingo for Teens (and adults)
The second list is geared more toward teens because when we played music bingo with teens using the first list, a lot of them didn’t know the songs. The second playlist and set of cards using songs from 2010 and later, so hopefully most are songs that teens (and adults) will know.
It also gives you two different games to choose from if you want to play music bingo twice! The second has songs such as APT, Pink Pony Club, and Heat Waves. It’s the same exact design of the cards you see in the photos, just different text on the cards themselves.
Music Bingo Prize Ideas
With over three decades of bingo playing experience, I have learned what prizes people actually want to win. Here are some of the best music-inspired prize ideas you can buy.
- Concert tickets – this would be perfect for a blackout game. You could also do a gift card to something like Ticketmaster or another ticket website.
- Headphones – this can range from a basic pair of Bluetooth headphones to Airpods.
- Speaker – mix it up and get a shower speaker that can work for the pool too.
- Vinyl/CD – you can never go wrong with the most recent Taylor Swift album.
- Apple/Spotify gift card
- Karaoke machine – perfect prize for music lovers!
- Music party game – this one is a quiz game with a music theme!
- Musical suckers – I loved these Chupa Chupa Melody Pops as a kid.
- Music shirt – I fully relate to this shirt.
- Vinyl coasters – these are so cool
- Kazoos – okay so I know people hate these but also they’re a really fun prize for kids and are musical!
Music bingo Tips
Laminate your bingo cards so you can use them every year.
Make sure to use a speaker so that everyone can hear the song!
If you choose to use an edible bingo marker, buy extra! Better yet, provide snack foods like this this sweet Chex Mix for people to snack on instead.
Download the music bingo cards
Enter your first name and email address in the form below to get the printable bingo cards (both variations) and playlist link. You will receive a link to download the PDF to your email within minutes.
If you’d prefer to not provide your email address OR if you need more cards than the 20 provided here, you can get a copy in my shop here. You can also get larger sizes of the cards in my shop.
If you do not see the form, click here to get to it.
If you do not see the email with the printable design templates immediately after you fill out the form, make sure to check your promotions, spam, and junk folders!
The file will include:
- 20 all decades music bingo cards – two versions, 4 to a page and large ones
- 20 2010s+ music bingo cards – two versions, 4 to a page and large ones
- Calling sheets for both versions of the game
- Links to playlists for both type of bingo cards
- Instructions
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