Drawing party game
Gartic Phone
Write a sentence, draw the sentence you are given, describe the drawing you are given. Repeat until it is unrecognisable and everyone is laughing.
- Made by
- Onrizon Social Games
- Released
- 2020
- Shelf
- The ride · 10–20 minutes
- One session
- A full game runs ten to twenty minutes
- Account
- No account
- Connection
- Live multiplayer: a dead spot ends the round
- Controls
- Mouse, stylus or finger
- Pays its way with
- Adverts before you join
- Last retested
- 22 September 2026
Opens the developer's own site in a new tab. The link is editorial: nobody paid for it, and we get nothing if you click it.
- To start
- £0, nothing to install
- Most it will sell you
- Nothing we could find — adverts pay for it
- Paid random items
- None
Every price, with its source: what each cabinet really costs.
The first five minutes
You type a sentence. Somebody draws it badly. Somebody else describes the drawing. By the end of the chain your sentence about a bus has become a wizard on a horse, and the album at the end is the whole point.
How a game runs
Everyone writes, everyone draws, everyone guesses, and the results are presented as an album at the end. Modes vary the chain — one turns your sentence into an animation, another has everyone drawing the same prompt at once — and the room owner sets how long each turn lasts.
It takes nothing to start: pick a name, pick a character, and you are in. Private rooms are made with one button and shared with a link.
Why it sits in the middle of the shelf
A full game is ten to twenty minutes and the chain has to finish for the album to make sense, so this is the one cabinet where leaving early genuinely spoils it for other people. That is the whole reason it drops marks for a clean stop.
On a phone it works, and drawing with a finger is exactly as bad as it sounds. Landscape mode and a stylus help. A laptop trackpad is fine; a mouse is better.
Play it privately
There are public rooms, and they are full of strangers drawing whatever they like. The advertising consent notice on the way in also lists a very long roster of partners — decline the optional ones.
Our advice, and the way we tested it: make a private room, send the link to people you know, and the whole objection disappears. As a thing to do with four friends on a train, it is unbeaten on this floor.
What works
- Anonymous play with no account and no download
- Private rooms are one button and a link
- The album at the end is a genuinely good payoff
- Several modes keep it from getting stale over an evening
What grates
- Leaving mid-game breaks the chain for everybody else
- Public rooms are unmoderated user drawings — use a private room
- Advert consent banner with a very long partner list
- Drawing with a finger on a phone is a fiddle
The verdict
The best thing here to do with other people, and the one that most needs a little care about how you play it. Private room, people you know, twenty minutes: near perfect. Public lobby on your own: not what it is for.
Questions we get asked
Is Gartic Phone free?
Yes, free in the browser and paid for by advertising. No account is needed to play.
How many people do you need?
It works from about three upwards; four to eight is where it is at its best.
Can I play with just my friends?
Yes — create a private room and share the link. It is the way we would recommend playing it.