28 Quick 5-Minute Team Building Activities to Boost Morale

🤼These popular 5-minute team-building activities are perfect for injecting a little team spirit throughout your work.

Think team building is hard? Yeah, it actually is sometimes. Bored participants, impatient bosses, budget limits, and, even worse, time pressure could all undermine your efforts. Lack of experience and a poor plan can lead to wasted resources and time. But don’t worry, we’ve got your back. Let’s rethink team building.

Building a team doesn't happen in one long sitting. It's a journey that's taken one short step at a time.

You don't need a weekend retreat, a full day of activities, or even an afternoon to boost team morale. You also don’t need to hire a high-priced professional team to do it for you. Repeating a well-planned 5-minute team-building activity routine over time can make a big difference, transforming a disparate group into a strongly bonded team that is supportive, genuinely shares and cares, and demonstrates professional behavior and collaboration.

👏 Below are the 10+ team-building activities you could do for a fun 5-minute games session, to start building a team that works.

Full Disclaimer: Some of these 5-minute building activities might last 10 minutes, or even 15 minutes. Please don't sue us.

5-Minute Team Building Activities For Icebreaking

1. Quiz Competition

Location: Remote / Hybrid

Everyone loves a quiz. Easy to set up, fun to play, and everyone on the team gets involved. What’s better than that? Toss in a cool prize for the winner, and it gets even more exciting.

You can quiz your team on anything—company culture, general knowledge, pop science, or even the hottest social trends on the internet.

Just make sure to clearly explain the rules so it’s fair for everyone, and throw in some surprise twists to keep things spicy. It’s a guaranteed good time and a great way to build team memories without breaking a sweat.

Also, turning it into a team competition makes it even more fun and strengthens the bond between members.

Simple team quizzes are made for the virtual workspace or school. They're remote-friendly, teamwork-friendly and 100% wallet-friendly with the right software.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Use AhaSlides’ AI quiz generator, pick a ready-made quiz from the template library, or create your own if you have something in mind.
Set the scoring and time limits, and add some fun twists of your own.
Start the session, display the QR code, and invite your team to join on their phones.
Kick off the quiz and see who comes out on top! Too easy, right?

2. Yearbook Awards

Location: Remote / Hybrid

Yearbook awards are playful titles that your classmates in high school used to give you that perfectly (sometimes) captured your personality and quirks.

Most likely to succeed, most likely to marry first, most likely to write an award-winning comedic play, and then stuff all their earnings on vintage pinball machines. That kind of thing.

Now, even though we're grown up, we still occasionally look back on the years we were so carefree and thought we could rule the world.

This is an excellent opportunity to break the ice with your coworkers by sharing your yearbook awards and seeing theirs; we can all have a laugh at ourselves.

Take a leaf out of those yearbooks. Come up with some abstract scenarios, ask your players who's the most likely, and take in the votes.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Create a new presentation by clicking “New Presentation.” .
Click “+ Add Slide” and choose “Poll” from the list of slide types.
Enter your poll question and response options. You can adjust settings like allowing multiple answers, hiding results, or adding a timer to customize the interaction.
Click “Present” to preview your poll, then share the link or QR code with your audience. Once live, you can display real-time results and engage with participant feedback.

3. Bucket List Match-Up

Location: Remote / In-Person

There's a wide world outside of the 4 walls of the office (or the home office). It's no surprise that most of us have dreams, big or small.

Some people want to swim with dolphins, some want to see the pyramids of Giza, while others just want to be able to go to the supermarket in their pyjamas without being judged.

Have you ever wondered what your colleagues are dreaming about? See who dreams big in Bucket List Match-up.

Bucket List Match-Up is great for team icebreaking, you get to know your fellow colleagues better, understand them more, which can create a bond between you and your team members.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Click "New Slide", choose "Match Pair" feature.
Write the names of people and the bucket list item, and put them in random positions.
During the activity, players match the bucket list item with the person who owns it.

Make online and offline team building activities with AhaSlides' interactive engagement software 💡 Click the button below to sign up for free!

Engage your Team

4. Zoomed-in Favourites

Location: Remote

Zoomed-in Favourites is an excellent icebreaker game. It's designed to spark curiosity and conversation among team members.

Zoomed-in Favourites gets team members to guess which colleague owns an item by a zoomed-in picture of that item.

Once guesses are made, the full image is revealed, and the owner of that item in the image will explain to everyone why it's his or her favourite item.

This helps your colleagues understand each other better, thus creating a better connection in your team.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Get each team member to secretly give you an image of their favourite workplace object.
Open AhaSlides, use "Short Answer" slide type, type in the question.
Offer a zoomed-in image of the object and ask everyone what the object is and who it belongs to.
Reveal the full-scale image afterwards.

short answer 5-minute team building activities ahaslides

5-Minute Popular Team Building Activities for Building Trust

5. Never Have I Ever

Location: Remote / In-Person

The classic university drinking game. Players take turns sharing statements about experiences they've never had, beginning with "Never have I ever..." For example: "Never have I ever slept in the street." Anyone who has done it raises their hand or shares a quick story.

Never Have I Ever has been around for decades in our highest educational institutions, but is often forgotten about when it comes to team-building.

This is a great, quick game to help colleagues or students understand the kind of outlandish characters they're working with, thus building trust among them. It usually ends up with a lot of follow-up questions.

Check out: 230+ Never Have I Ever Questions

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Use AhaSlides's "Spinner Wheel" feature, enter random Never Have I Ever statements, and spin the wheel.
When the statement is chosen, all those who have never done what the statement says will have to answer.
Team members can question the people about the sordid details of the thing they have done by spinning the wheel.

Protip 👊 You can add any of your own never have I ever statements on the wheel above. Use it on a free AhaSlides account to invite your audience to join the wheel.

6. 2 Truths 1 Lie

Location: Remote / In-Person

Here's a titan of 5-minute teambuilding activities. 2 Truths 1 Lie has been getting teammates familiar with each other since teams first formed.

We all know the format - someone thinks of two truths about themselves, as well as one lie, then challenges others to figure out which one is the lie.

This game fosters trust and storytelling, usually resulting in laughter and conversation. It’s simple to play, requires no materials, and works well for in-person and virtual team meetings.

There are a couple of ways to play, depending on whether or not you want your players to be able to ask questions. For the purposes of a quick team-building activity, we'd recommend letting those players ask away.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Open AhaSlides, choose "Poll" slide type, and enter the question.
Choose someone to come up with 2 truths and 1 lie.
When you kick off the team building, ask that player to announce their 2 truths and 1 lie.
Set a timer for however long you want and encourage everyone to ask questions to uncover the lie.

2 truths 1 lie 5-minute team building game ahaslides

Location: Remote / In-Person

Share an embarrassing story is a storytelling activity in which team members take turns telling an awkward or embarrassing moment in their lives. This activity can create lots of laughter among your team members, making it one of the best 5-minute team-building activities.

Furthermore, it can increase trust in your team members since they now know what you are as a person.

The twist to this one is that everyone submits their story in writing, all anonymously. Go through each one and get everyone to vote on who the story belongs to.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Give everyone a couple of minutes to think of an embarrassing story.
Create AhaSlides's "Open-Ended" slide type, enter a question, and display a QR code for everyone to join.
Go through each story and read them aloud.
Take a vote, then click "call" when hovering over a story to see which person it belongs to.

share an embarassing story 5-minute team building activity

💡 Check out more games for virtual meetings.

8. Baby Pictures

Location: Remote / Hybrid

On the theme of embarrassment, this next 5-minute team-building activity is sure to evoke some blushed faces.

Get everyone to send you a baby picture before you kick off the proceedings (bonus points for ridiculous attire or facial expressions).

Once everyone has made their guesses, the real identities are revealed, often with a quick story or memory shared by the person in the photo.

This is an excellent 5-minute team-building activity that helps you and your teammates relax and have a laugh. It can also foster bonds and trust between you and your colleagues.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Open AhaSlides and create a new slide, choose "Match Pair" slide type.
Gather one baby picture from each of your players, and enter the name of your players.
Show all of the pictures and ask everyone to match each one with the adult.

baby pictures 5-minute team building activity

5-Minute Team Building Activities For Problem-Solving

9. Desert Island Disaster

Location: Remote / In-Person

Imagine this: You and your team have just crash-landed on an island in the middle of nowhere, and now you have to salvage what's left to survive until a rescue crew comes.

You know precisely what to salvage, but what about your team members? What do they bring with them?

Desert Island Disaster is all about guessing exactly what those comforts are.

This engaging activity strengthens teams by encouraging collaborative problem-solving under pressure, revealing natural leadership roles, and building trust as colleagues share personal priorities, creating a foundation of mutual understanding that directly translates to improved workplace communication, enhanced creativity in tackling real business challenges, and greater resilience when facing obstacles together.

How to prepare in 5 minutes

Open AhaSlides, and use the "Open-Ended" slide type.
Tell each player to come up with 3 items they would need on a desert island
Pick one player. Each other player suggests the 3 items they think they would take.
Points go to anyone who correctly guesses any of the items.

desert island challenge for team members

10. Brainstorming Session

Location: Remote/ In-person

You can't leave out brainstorming if you talk about 5-minute team building for problem-solving. This activity helps team members work collaboratively to come up with ideas to solve problems together. According to a 2009 study, team brainstorming can help the team conceive many creative ideas and methods.

You first choose an issue, and let everyone write out their solutions or ideas to that problem. After that, you'll show everyone's answer, and they will have a vote on what the best solutions are.

Employees will develop a deeper understanding of diverse thinking styles, practice constructive idea-building, and strengthen psychological safety that translates directly to increased innovation when tackling real business challenges together.