ESL Hobbies and Free Time Bingo Card Generator
Print free ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo cards from 40 entries such as Learning languages, Calligraphy and Baking. Each 5x5 card with a free center holds 24 of them, so every card in a set is different; with 30 players the first line usually comes after about 12 calls, roughly 2 minutes at 10 seconds a call.
| B | I | N | G | O |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Traveling | Dancing | Reading | Fishing | Knitting |
Shopping | Crossword puzzles | Origami | Journaling | Baking |
Camping | Photography | FREE | Pottery | Gardening |
Playing video games | Calligraphy | Cooking | Collecting stamps | Playing the guitar |
Magic tricks | Woodworking | Watching movies | Coding | Board games |
Free: up to 30 different cards per set. Pro: up to 1,000.
Free sets stop at 30 different cards. Your 30 cards are ready to print or download now.
Pro ($19 one-time) opens soon: up to 1,000 different cards per set and 2 or 4 cards on a PDF page. No payment is taken now.
Edit words (40)
Cards update as you type. Long entries shrink to fit their square; a very long single word is split over two lines with a hyphen (up to 40 characters each). The PDF uses a built-in font: emoji and non-Latin scripts print best with Print cards.
Caller sheet
Every call in a shuffled order. Tick each one as you read it out; the same share link always gives the same order.
Updated
About ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo
ESL Hobbies and Free Time Bingo is built around the -ing form, with squares like “Gardening”, “Bird watching”, “Playing the guitar” and “Listening to music”, plus crafts such as “Origami”, “Pottery” and “Calligraphy”. It suits teen and adult learners practicing “I like…”, “I enjoy…” and “I'm into…”, and makes a gentle getting-to-know-you game for a new class.
On a 5x5 card with a free center, ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo shows 24 of the 40 entries, so each one lands on about 60% of the cards: in a set of 30, Reading or Drawing appears on roughly 18 cards. Card 1 leaves out 16 of them, including Drawing, Painting and Singing, so no single card can mark everything.
A host reads out one entry at a time from the printed caller sheet (all 40 of them, shuffled); players daub the square if their card has it and call bingo on a full line.
All 40 ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo words
Every entry from Baking to Writing stories, grouped by first letter. Edit them in the generator above: drop Calligraphy if it does not suit your group, or add your own.
- B: Baking 🧁, Bird watching, Board games
- C: Calligraphy, Camping 🏕️, Coding 💻, Collecting stamps, Cooking 🍳, Crossword puzzles
- D: Dancing 💃, Drawing
- F: Fishing 🎣
- G: Gardening 🌱, Going to concerts
- H: Hiking 🥾
- J: Jigsaw puzzles 🧩, Journaling
- K: Knitting 🧶
- L: Learning languages, Listening to music 🎧
- M: Magic tricks 🪄, Model building
- O: Origami
- P: Painting 🎨, Photography 📷, Playing chess ♟️, Playing the guitar 🎸, Playing the piano 🎹, Playing video games 🎮, Pottery
- R: Reading 📖
- S: Scrapbooking, Sewing 🧵, Shopping 🛍️, Singing 🎤
- T: Traveling ✈️
- V: Volunteering
- W: Watching movies 🎬, Woodworking, Writing stories
ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo at a glance
| Entries | 40 words and phrases |
|---|---|
| Card | 5x5 card with a free center: 24 of the 40 |
| How it is played | A caller reads the shuffled caller sheet |
| Different cards possible | about 3.90 × 10³⁴ (order matters) |
| Different selections | 62,852,101,650 sets of 24 entries |
| Shortest entry | Baking (6 characters) |
| Longest entry | Playing video games (19 characters) |
| Multi-word entries | 16 of 40, such as Playing the guitar and Playing the piano |
| Picture squares | 24 of 40 entries have a symbol, e.g. 📖 Reading, 🎨 Painting, 🍳 Cooking |
| Good for | ESL lessons, classrooms, teens and adults |
| Category | Language arts & ESL (61 themes) |
How long ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo lasts
Simulated over 150 shuffled games on cards 1-60 of this set: the median first line arrives on call 12 with 30 players and on call 14 with 10, while a blackout takes 36 calls, roughly 6 minutes at 10 seconds a call.
| Players | First line | Line, 80% range | Blackout | Blackout, 80% range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10 players | 14 calls | 11-18 | 38 calls | 36-39 |
| 30 players | 12 calls | 9-14 | 36 calls | 35-38 |
| 60 players | 11 calls | 7-13 | 36 calls | 34-37 |
| 1 card (exact average) | - | - | 39.4 calls | of 40 |
How to host ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo
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Print the ESL Hobbies and Free Time cards
Give each player one card; a free set prints up to 30, no two alike. Card 1 above starts with Traveling, Dancing, Reading, Fishing and Knitting.
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Print the caller sheet
All 40 entries appear on it in shuffled order, opening with Volunteering, Dancing, Playing the piano, Woodworking and Baking; tick each one as you read it out.
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Before you call a square, ask the room “Who enjoys painting?” and let a volunteer answer in a full sentence, then reveal the word.
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Point out the article in “Playing the guitar” and “Playing the piano”, and contrast it with “Playing chess”, where English uses no article.
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Pair this card with ESL Sports when you teach free time, since the two lists share no squares and together cover most weekend plans.
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Call until someone shouts bingo
With 30 cards, expect the first line near call 12 (Pottery in this set's order) and a blackout near call 36; check the winner's squares against your ticked list.
ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo variations
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ESL Hobbies and Free Time variation
Find-someone-who bingo: players walk around asking “Do you like knitting?” and may only mark a square after a classmate answers yes. They write that person's name in the square to prove it.
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Blackout round
Card 1 needs all 24 squares, Traveling to Board games; on average one card fills after 39.4 of the 40 calls (98% of the deck).
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Picture bingo for pre-readers
Use 3x3 cards with the 24 entries that have a symbol, such as Reading, Painting and Cooking.
First 15 calls of this ESL Hobbies and Free Time set
Seed "esl-hobbies" gives this order, the same one the caller sheet prints. With these calls, card 19 of the first 30 completes the G column (Pottery, Reading, Calligraphy, Baking and Dancing) on call 13, and card 10 is the first full card on call 37.
| Call | Entry | Cards marked (of 30) |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Volunteering | 20 of 30 |
| 2 | Dancing 💃 | 18 of 30 |
| 3 | Playing the piano 🎹 | 16 of 30 |
| 4 | Woodworking | 19 of 30 |
| 5 | Baking 🧁 | 22 of 30 |
| 6 | Going to concerts | 15 of 30 |
| 7 | Playing chess ♟️ | 14 of 30 |
| 8 | Fishing 🎣 | 15 of 30 |
| 9 | Calligraphy | 23 of 30 |
| 10 | Collecting stamps | 20 of 30 |
| 11 | Painting 🎨 | 21 of 30 |
| 12 | Pottery | 19 of 30 |
| 13 | Reading 📖 | 17 of 30 |
| 14 | Model building | 20 of 30 |
| 15 | Gardening 🌱 | 17 of 30 |
Themes like ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo
Ranked by category, occasion and audience; none of them repeats an entry from this list, so pasting two into the Edit words box gives a longer game.
Frequently asked questions
How many words are on the ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo list?
40, from Baking to Writing stories. A 5x5 card with a free center uses 24 of them, so each card leaves out 16. The shortest entry is Baking (6 characters) and the longest is Playing video games (19).
Are all ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo cards the same?
No. Card 1 and card 2 of this set share 18 of their 24 squares, and every card is checked so none of the 30 in a free set repeats. About 3.90 × 10³⁴ different arrangements are possible from the 40 entries (62,852,101,650 different selections of 24).
How many ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo cards per person?
One card each is standard. In 150 simulated games of this list, 30 players on one card each got a first line after a median 12 calls; with two cards each (60 in play) it came after 11, and 10 single cards took 14. Two cards suit adults who want a faster game; young children do best with one. A free set of 30 covers 15 players on two cards each.
How long does ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo take?
An ESL Hobbies and Free Time game with 30 players usually reaches its first line after 12 calls (9-14 in 80% of simulated games), about 2 minutes at one call every 10 seconds. A blackout takes about 36; with 10 players the first line needs about 14.
Can I print ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo cards for free?
Yes. The generator above makes up to 30 cards (5x5 cards with a free center) from the 40 entries; Print cards sends them to your printer and Download PDF saves one card per page, so 30 cards take 30 pages plus the caller sheet. It all runs in your browser with no sign-up.
How do I make my own ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo cards?
Start from this list: the 40 entries are already in the generator, so delete Baking or any other entry, type your own one per line and the cards update as you type. Keep at least 24 entries for 5x5 cards (16 for 4x4); the share link reprints exactly the same set.
Is there a picture version of ESL Hobbies and Free Time bingo?
24 of the 40 entries have a picture symbol (📖 Reading, 🎨 Painting, 🍳 Cooking, 🧁 Baking). Print 3x3 cards with symbol entries such as Gardening and Dancing for children who cannot read yet; symbols show on screen and in browser printing.
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