Play Board Games to Have Fun and Improve Your Quality of Life!

From The Washington Post - August 27, 2025 (excerpts from the article)

By Meeri Kim

Want to reduce your risk of dementia? Play a board game.

Playing board games has been associated with higher cognition, improved quality of life and lower risk of developing dementia for older adults.

Board games have made a massive comeback in the past decade. And researchers are discovering that board games are not only fun, they may also benefit our brains, especially as we age.

The global board games market has an estimated value of $18.53 billion and is projected to grow by $5.17 billion from 2025 to 2029. Classic games such as chess, Monopoly, Scrabble and Go remain popular, now joined by modern favorites such as Ticket to Ride, Pandemic and Wingspan. If you think you don’t have anyone to play with, no problem. Board game cafes and bars offer a place to drink, socialize and play outside the home.

Since antiquity — senet, a board game played by the Egyptians, dates to around 3100 B.C. — players have reveled in the shared experience, healthy competition and sheer entertainment value of board games.

Playing board games has been associated with higher cognition, improved quality of life and lower risk of developing dementia for older adults. Experts think some of the effects could be explained by their social nature. Some research suggests that face-to-face play may have an additional benefit above playing them alone. Stimulating leisure activities such as board games are thought to enhance cognitive reserve, the brain’s ability to function despite aging, injury or disease.

“There is a certain complexity, even for simple board games, in this process of understanding the game system that demands something from your cognition,” said Carla Sousa, a games researcher at the Center for Research in Applied Communication, Culture and New Technologies (CICANT) at Lusófona University. “Analogue games, in general, are also much more social than digital games.”

Board games and brain improvements

Research from the past two decades has found significant links between board games and brain-related improvements.

In one study, out of 17 cognitive and physical activities, only playing board games, reading, dancing and playing musical instruments were associated with a lower risk of dementia among adults older than 75.

Here are some tips to get started:

• Start simple. If you haven’t played board games in a while, start with a game you played when you were a kid. Or, Moya-Higueras suggested, start with “filler games,” which are short, simple and easy to learn. Sousa suggested popular games such as Carcassonne, Kingdomino and Catan.
• Play in person rather than virtually. Research suggests that face-to-face play is associated with a greater brain boost compared with virtual play. “The social component is fundamental,” Pozzi said. Start by suggesting a low-stakes game night to family and friends as a weekly or monthly ritual.
• Expand your gaming circle. If you want to venture beyond your existing network, find a board game club, store or cafe. “I would go to my local board game shop — sometimes you can also play there — and board game cafes are very good places to meet people,” said Sousa, whose preliminary research shows that the board game community is inclusive and accepting of diverse groups of people.

Pozzi recently led a study that brought groups of older adults together for board game lessons, and the participants enjoyed their experience so much that they continued to meet, even after the study had long ended.