The best travel board games for two are Hive Pocket, Love Letter, Jaipur, Lost Cities, The Fox in the Forest and Onitama. Hive Pocket is the smallest with a published box of 140mm x 140mm x 50mm, against 210mm x 210mm x 50mm for standard Hive.
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Nearly every travel game list describes boxes as compact, portable or pocket-sized and gives you not one number. That is useless. A tray table is roughly 250mm deep and a jacket pocket is about 180mm across, so whether a game fits is a measurement question with a yes or no answer.
So this page leads with dimensions, and where a publisher states them we print them exactly as published. Where a publisher does not state them, we say so rather than estimating -- an invented box size is worse than no box size, because you would act on it.
The second thing that decides a travel game, and which nobody measures either, is table footprint in play. A game can have a small box and need a large surface, or vice versa. A deck of cards fits any pocket and still needs somewhere to lay out four expedition columns.
The wind-and-lap test
Two failure modes that only show up away from a table, and neither appears on any box.
Cards outdoors are a problem. A breeze ends a game of Lost Cities and there is no fix beyond weighting everything down. Tile and token games -- Hive above all -- are immune, which is why Hive is the genuine camping and beach answer despite not being the smallest box.
The other is whether a game can be played on a lap or a bed, with no rigid surface. Games with a personal board or a fixed grid cannot: Onitama needs its mat flat, Patchwork needs two boards. Hand-management card games mostly can, as long as the shared area is small. Test this before a long trip rather than discovering it on day one.
04Why we will not estimate a box we cannot cite
It would be easy to fill the list above with plausible-looking millimeter figures for every game, and the page would look more complete. We are not going to, because the entire value of a measured travel list is that the measurements are real.
If you need a dimension we have not published, the reliable route is the publisher's own product page or the retail listing for the exact edition you are buying -- editions differ, and a 2019 reprint is not always the same box as the 2009 original. When we can cite a figure, it will appear here with its source attached, same as everything else on this site.
The picks in full
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2 players · 20 minutes · ages 9 and up
The same game as Hive in a box barely wider than a postcard, and it ships with two extra pieces.
The travel edition of Hive. 26 tactile pieces in a 140mm box with a soft travel bag, including two pieces the standard set sells separately.
- 2
- 20 minutes
- 9 and up
- Gen42 Games
- 140mm x 140mm x 50mm
Skip it if you play at a real table every time. The full-size tiles feel better in the hand and cost about the same.
Specs from Hive Pocket - Gen42 Games (publisher).
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2 to 6 (Second Edition) players · 20 minutes
The smallest game we recommend, and at two it becomes a tight deduction duel rather than a party filler.
A supports-more microgame that sharpens at two. You hold one card, draw a second, and play one -- deducing what the other person is holding from what they discard.
- 2 to 6 (Second Edition)
- 20 minutes
- Seiji Kanai
- Alderac Entertainment Group, then Z-Man Games
- 2012
Skip it if you want a main event. This is a five-minute game you play four times, not an evening.
Specs from Love Letter (card game) - Wikipedia infobox.
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2 players · 30 minutes · ages 12 and up
The best first two-player card game there is: five minutes to teach, and it keeps giving for years.
A two-player-only trading card game. You collect and sell goods in sets, racing the other trader for bonus tokens that shrink as they are taken. Best of three rounds decides it.
- 2
- 30 minutes
- 12 and up
- Sebastien Pauchon
- Asmodee / GameWorks
- 2009
Skip it if you want a board on the table. This is cards and tokens, and it looks slight next to a game with a map.
Specs from Jaipur (card game) - Wikipedia infobox.
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2 players · 30 minutes · ages 10 and up
Old enough to vote and still the cleanest press-your-luck card game for two.
A two-player-only card game about mounting expeditions. Every card you play must be higher than the last on that color, so committing early is how you score and also how you go negative.
- 2
- 30 minutes
- 10 and up
- Reiner Knizia
- Kosmos / Rio Grande Games
- 1999
Skip it if a run of bad draws will sour the evening. The cards decide more here than in anything else we recommend.
Specs from Lost Cities - Wikipedia infobox.
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2 players · 30 minutes · ages 10+
A trick-taking game for two that actually works, which almost no trick-taker manages.
A two-player-only trick-taking card game. Winning too many tricks makes you greedy and scores nothing, so the game is about landing in a narrow band -- and odd-numbered cards each break a rule.
- 2
- 30 minutes
- 10+
- Joshua Buergel
- Foxtrot Games / Renegade Game Studios
- 2017
Skip it if neither of you has played a trick-taking game before. The scoring rewards losing on purpose, and that lands badly cold.
Specs from The Fox in the Forest - Wikipedia infobox.
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2 players · 15 minutes · ages 14+
Perfect information, sixteen move cards, and a rules explanation that takes under two minutes.
A two-player-only abstract on a 5x5 grid. Five move cards are in play at once and they physically pass between the two of you, so arming yourself always arms the opponent.
- 2
- 15 minutes
- 14+
- Arcane Wonders
Skip it if you dislike losing to a mistake you can see clearly in hindsight. Nothing is hidden, so every loss is yours.
Specs from Onitama - Arcane Wonders (publisher).
