New Year’s Eve Drinking Games: A Party Plan From 8 PM to Midnight
The best New Year’s Eve drinking games build to midnight: start with a beer pong bracket while people show up, switch to big-group games like flip cup when the house fills, and finish with a Power Hour that ends exactly at the ball drop. Here’s the whole night, hour by hour, plus the house rules that make each game feel like New Year’s.
Jump to: The plan · Beer pong bracket · Resolution Kings · Flip cup · Power Hour to midnight · Setup · FAQ
The plan
| Time | Game | Why then |
|---|---|---|
| 8:00–10:00 | Beer pong bracket | People trickle in; teams can sign up as they arrive |
| 10:00–10:30 | Resolution Kings | Gets everyone in one circle and talking |
| 10:30–11:00 | Flip cup | The house is full; the more players, the better |
| 11:00–midnight | Power Hour | Song 60 ends right at the ball drop |
Don’t want the full schedule? Pick any one of these. They all work alone.
8 PM: the beer pong bracket
Early in the night, people are showing up in twos and threes, which is perfect for a bracket. Post a sign-up sheet by the table, take teams as they arrive, and play single-elimination until 10.
- Keep games short: play 6 cups instead of 10 so the bracket moves.
- New Year’s house rule: sink the last cup before 10 PM and your team picks the next song. Small stakes, big trash talk.
- Champion gets bragging rights until next year, or something to hang over the table. See our tournament guide for free printable brackets.
Settle the rules before the first game: island, heating up, redemption. It’s all in the rules of beer pong.
10 PM: Resolution Kings
Play regular Circle of Death (Kings Cup), with one New Year’s swap:
- King = resolution. Draw a King, pour into the King’s Cup like normal, then announce a New Year’s resolution for someone else in the circle. They have to say whether they’ll keep it, and the group votes on whether they’re lying.
- The fourth King still drinks the King’s Cup. Keep that cup small. You’ve got two hours left.
- Queen = question master, but every question has to be about last year.
Print the Kings Cup rules sheet (PDF) and put it in the middle of the circle.
10:30 PM: flip cup
By now the house is packed, and flip cup is the best game ever invented for a crowd. Line up two teams down the pong table and go.
- Year vs. year: split into teams by birth year, or “this year’s resolutions kept vs. broken.”
- Last round of the year: the losing team’s anchor makes the midnight toast.
- Short on time? A boat race runs even faster.
11 PM: Power Hour to midnight
This is why Power Hour was made for New Year’s. Start the 60-song playlist at exactly 11:00:00 and song 60 ends right as the ball drops.
- Sync it: pull up the countdown on the TV and hit play when the clock reads 11:00.
- Do the quick math first: 60 shot glasses of beer is about 7.5 beers in an hour. On top of everything else tonight, that’s a lot. Go with sips, every other song, or light beer.
- Song 60 should be the one everybody screams along to. Pick it ahead of time.
- At midnight, swap the shot glass for the toast.
Set up the house
- One long table does double duty for pong and flip cup. No table? See our best beer pong tables.
- Rules on the wall: hang a House Rules sign by the table and you’ll skip the 11:45 argument about bounce shots.
- Light it up: an LED beer pong sign makes the pong corner look like a bar.
- Water and food on every table, and figure out everyone’s ride home before the ball drops, when rideshare prices go through the roof.
FAQ
What are good drinking games for New Year’s Eve?
Beer pong for the early crowd, Kings Cup and flip cup once the house fills up, and a Power Hour timed to end at midnight.
How do you time a Power Hour for midnight?
Start the 60-song, one-minute-per-song playlist at exactly 11:00 PM. The last song ends at 12:00.
What’s a good New Year’s drinking game for a small group?
Quarters or Kings Cup. Both work with three or four people.
Can you play these without drinking?
Yes. Every game works with soda, seltzer or water, and Power Hour works fine as a name-that-tune game.
Hosting Thanksgiving first? Here’s our Thanksgiving drinking games plan. More games for the night: see all our party games.
Planning the whole year? See the beer pong party calendar.