While growing up in Ludhiana, Shradha Jain, the founder of Studio.Clock.Works, a creative studio, watched generations bond over tabletop games like tambola, rummy and ludo.
But it wasn’t until her early 20s, during a visit to the Luba Hamied Centre for children in Mumbai, that the 40-year-old gaming enthusiast felt “like stepping into a wonderland”, surrounded by traditional board games.
“I can never forget how I felt. That one visit got me delving deep into the world of board games. I started researching online about all the traditional games that I’d never played,” says Jain.
Today, Jain is part of India’s tabletop community, volunteering with TTOX, the tabletop games expo, supporting Indian designers, and building game libraries everywhere from Bengaluru classrooms to Himalayan villages. “Games are equalisers, spaces where age, background, language and status dissolve.
In cities such as Pune, Delhi, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad and Bengaluru, there are strong gaming communities, and over 100 to 200 exclusive gaming cafes,” adds Jain.
In a world where our thumbs do most of the socialising, scrolling, tapping, the simplest act of sitting around a table, rolling dice, and sharing a laugh makes one feel refreshed. Board games, once a childhood staple tucked away in cupboards for summer holidays, are back at the centre of adult lives, community spaces, corporate cultures, and wellness routines.
The new social glue
While there are communities nurturing this segment, TTOX India is accelerating the demand. With over a hundred tabletop games played and explored, the biennial convention in Bengaluru has rapidly transformed from a community gathering into a critical commercial launchpad for the Indian market.
“India is on the cusp of a tabletop boom,” says Phalgun Polepalli, co-founder of Mozaic Games (formerly Dice Toy Labs), a toy and game startup started in 2018. He started TTOX, a community-driven model in 2024.
“Board games create social spaces that younger audiences look for today. They spend a large part of their time online, but they value real conversations, teamwork and shared experiences. A simple board game gets everyone talking and connecting without screens,” says Polepalli.
Across cafés, co-working hubs, colleges, and even pubs, board games are like a chord that brings strangers together—not for networking or work, but for the joy of play.
“Many creative agencies, and even a recent accounting firm with branches across Bengaluru, Chennai and Coimbatore, have created dedicated game libraries for their teams. These spaces allow employees to unwind while strengthening their social and cognitive skills,” he says.
The weekly reset
One of the most surprising outcomes of India’s board game boom is its connection to mental wellness. “For many young adults and new-age professionals, game nights have become their weekly reset. Games help them slow down, focus, laugh and be fully present,” says Polepalli.
In Bengaluru, the Board Game Company (BGC) is redefining the concept of a ‘third place’—somewhere between home and workplace where people can drop in, belong, and be themselves.
“Board games are a powerful way for community building because they give people structure, stakes and safety at the same time,” says Siddhant Narula, the founder, adding, “You end up negotiating, planning, bluffing and laughing together very quickly, even with complete strangers.”
What started as a passion project in April 2024 has grown into a vibrant ecosystem of events designed for different audiences for Narula. That includes mind games for strategy lovers, lunch and play for newcomers, drunch and play for those who enjoy a drink along with their dice.
BGC also curates corporate events, including a three-hour tournament at St Regis Mumbai. The impact? Real collaborations, and not just posing “team-building” photos. “Even introverts have permission to engage without small-talk pressure. It becomes a ritual of switching off—phones away, laptops away, just physical presence,” says Narula.
Today, Narula runs regular public events while partnering with spaces across Bengaluru, or collaborating with corporates and niche events to further the mission of bringing people together over board games.
“Our current strategy is to slowly build towards what the European and German markets have developed into over the years, conventions for hundreds of thousands of people, publishers with board game sales that would put most SMBs to shame and scores of communities, cafes and bars that use board games as a revenue generation asset,” explains Narula.
Desktop therapy
Data may track screen time, but board games track something more human—joy. “Board games bring people together in the most organic way possible,” says Nidhi Desai, founder of Boardrama, a Hyderabad-based board game community and events company she launched in early 2024 after leaving her corporate job at Facebook/Meta to pursue her passion for board gaming.
The community hosts weekly gatherings, collaborates with cafés, and partners with companies like Google, AMD, and leading startups. For corporates, board gaming is becoming a part of their wellness and team culture.
Games such as Codenames and Decrypto help employees bond, communicate, and de-stress. Strategy games like Terraforming Mars and Ark Nova ignite creative thinking and collaboration.
For many attendees, Boardrama’s events are a form of play therapy— though no one calls it that. “It’s a great stress-buster. It is about laughter across a table, small rivalries that end in high-fives, and friendships built over shared moments,” admits Desai.
However, India’s board game renaissance isn’t just about nostalgia, it’s about bridging the gaps digital life has created.
Take the case of the world’s most famous board game, Monopoly by toy major Hasbro, which has been a symbol of shared memories, marathon sessions with cousins, friendly fights over properties, and the pure thrill of getting rich (even if just on paper).
The game celebrated its 90th anniversary in 2025, and launched its digital avatar of its iconic game Monopoly, to tap into a growing market of younger consumers, who are tech savvy and share passion to play games.
The Monopoly App Banking Edition makes the iconic game a sleek, cashless upgrade. Each player has a digital bank card, while a free mobile app acts as the banker, tracking balances, automating transactions, and speeding up gameplay.
“For generations, Monopoly has been a shared ritual across Indian homes, a game that teaches, connects, and entertains in equal measure. Today, we reimagine the game for the world of today, blending nostalgia with innovation so every new generation continues to learn, laugh, and play together,” says Nilay Verma, head, India & Southeast Asia, Hasbro India.
While the brand is hosting in-store experiences at Hamleys, it is also partnering with Sunday Bricks, a Mumbai-based organisation specialising in workshops and events, to take play-based workshops into schools, showing children how games can build real-world skills like negotiation, communication, and teamwork.
It’s nostalgia with purpose, a reminder that even in a digital world, some of our oldest games still feel timeless.
