The Best Games To Play With Friends Online [April 2020]

Just because you’re stuck at home doesn’t mean you can’t keep hanging out with friends. Thanks to Zoom, Discord, and dozens of other video and audio chat apps, it’s easier than ever to hang out with your friends over the web. While chatting might be good enough for the first few video hangouts, eventually, you’re going to want something else to do. Thankfully, games have been at the forefront of moving online over the last two decades. Whether you’re looking for an extensive co-op RPG or just a simple browser game, there are thousands of games that make it easy to play online, and we’ve rounded up ten of the best.

Agar.io is one of the most popular entry on this list, and is one of the most simple and addictive. If you’re looking for a game that’s easy to pick up and play in short bursts, Agar.io is that game, especially if you’re new (and won’t survive longer than minutes at a time). As you get better at the game and your runs grow longer, Agar.io does tend to take up larger chunks of your time, so it may eventually become something you can’t play between work meetings. Still, Agar.io feels fair and fun, which is important for any gaming experience. All you have to do is eat, grow, eat bigger players and don’t get eaten yourself. Simple as it gets—while still being incredibly relaxing.

Similar to Agar.io, your goal is to “eat” and become as large as possible. Where Slither.io is different, however, is that you control a snake, and in order to be eaten or killed, another snake has to cross your path and cause you to run into their body. This snake can be of any size, and once you’re dead they can eat your body and gain all of your mass for their own. This results in a faster-paced experience, where aggression is rewarded and being bigger is actually more dangerous than being smaller, since small snakes can more easily outmaneuver you and trick you into running into them. Slither.io is a  more balanced experience than Agar.io, but it does take a little longer to get used to.

If you have a Nintendo Switch, you’re probably already deep into Pokemon Sword and Shield, battling against your friends and family and finding new Gigantamax Pokemon online. However, if you’d rather battle against friends and strangers in a free-to-play Pokemon clone, Pokemon Showdown. While you won’t get the experience of training your Pokemon and taking on gym challenges, Pokemon Showdown does grant you access to battles with thousands of online players. Pokemon Showdown is a fan game that manages to add Pokemon from across all eight generations. You can choose from randomly-generated teams, or build your own, putting together a team guaranteed to crush the competition. The game is playable in both browsers and as a downloadable app for Windows, so you can choose how you want to play the game depending on your needs. With more than 150,000 active users, it’s one of the most popular ways to play Pokemon online.

Cards Against Humanity is one of the most popular tabletop party games you can play in 2020, and if you’re at all familiar with it, you’ll feel right at home here. If you’re familiar with Cards Against Humanity, you’ll feel right at home here. Pretend You’re Xyzzy is a free Cards Against Humanity clone that you can play online, with friends or with random players. It’s most fun with friends in a group voice call, but you can play with randoms if you’re bored/don’t have any friends to speak of. Unfortunately, the game has been slammed throughout 2020, but if you can make your way onto a server, you’ll find a rewarding experience for you and your friends.

For more than a decade, it’s been tough to find a better co-op FPS than the Borderlands series. Part first-person shooter, part RPG, Borderlands is all about shooting bad guys, scoring loot, and upgrading your abilities to cause more destruction across the vast planet of Pandora. Though Borderlands 2 is considered the peak of the series, all four games—Borderlands, Borderlands 2, Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, and Borderlands 3—all offer some great gunplay, fights, bosses, and plenty of jokes to keep you laughing. The multiplayer is super easy to use, and many of the games in the series often drop to under $10 on Steam, making it a great buy for you and your friends to pick up.