Escape rooms are fun to visit, but I find that creating my own game with a theme I know my players will love and materials that I already have on hand makes the ultimate escape room. When you sit down and start planning your own game, in any location you choose, you find should decide on a theme. This list of 20 of the most interesting escape room themes is the best place to start!

You’ll look through the ideas, pick one, plan your game with a variety of puzzles and then play! Choose a theme that you know your players will enjoy. The theme may fit a party you are planning, a special event or simply a theme that your kids or players are currently hooked on. I hope with the themes below you get some inspiration for your room.

Once you know your theme, and have puzzle ideas, you can alter the puzzles so that they also it your theme. You can use simple things like paint and stickers to make each puzzle fit your theme, or you can give it a fun name to fit. A locked container becomes a treasure chest for a pirate theme, beads become gems or diamonds for a fairy princess theme.

Escape rooms work best when you have at least 5 puzzles for players to solve. Look through the popular collection of over 50 escape room puzzles that you can create. Choose puzzles that you already have the materials for, or add something special to your game.

Haunted House Escape Room Themes

Each of the themes below also link to an escape room that you can draw inspiration from or fully use my ideas and premade escape rooms to keep it simple. Click the images for more ideas and to see the associated example of an escape room with the theme. Happy planning! Keep in mind that you can always use a clue that you love and change it so that it fits your theme.

A haunted escape room is a classic theme. Use spooky images and the idea of ghosts, supernatural vibes and a little bit creepy. Make sure to know your audience so that young children don’t get too scared, but for older audiences, the spookier the better.

Use candles, suggestions of abandoned spaces, spooky sounds and skeleton keys and images. Old dolls, foggy portraits and old diary entries. The haunted escape room below can be printed for free. You can use all of the puzzles or choose your favorites.

Party Games

Party or birthday party escape rooms are always a favorite and perfect for almost any age! They’re a great way to make a party even more fun and exciting and a chance for everyone to work together. I love giving goodie bags or prizes for everyone at the end when all of the puzzles are solved.

Use cupcakes, balloons, locked presents and lots of colorful clues. You can do a mix of hands-on puzzles or grab a copy of a printable party escape room.

Mystery Themed Escape Rooms

Most escape rooms have a theme of mystery, but a focus on a mystery, such as a mysterious death is always a popular choice. Use puzzles and codes for this theme.

Add suspect files, evidence folders, hidden symbols and secret codes. One of my kids favorite for mystery escape rooms is using invisible ink or UV ink pens.

Outdoor Style Game

Bring the fun of an escape room outside with an outdoor escape room. You can play most printable escape rooms outside on a table or ground, but an escape room with an outdoor theme is even better.

Use parts of the environment, such as leaves and trees as part of your escape room. Use materials that are commonly found outside to keep with your theme. Using natural elements also adds to the challenge of an outdoor escape room because the clues will blend in.

Camping Escape Room Game

This is one of my favorite escape room games. I love camping and finding activities to keep my kids busy around our campsite. With a camping themed escape room using materials that you have on hand since you’ve already packed so much!

A cooler becomes a treasure chest, a flashlight holds a clue and ingredients for smores becomes the ultimate prize for players when they finish their puzzles and escape room.

School Adventure Theme

Since I’m a teacher, and my kids love escape rooms, I created a few different school escape rooms. You can easily bring the fun of an escape room to your classroom. Whether you use puzzles as part of a review before a test, or take kids on an adventure around the school, the engagement and learning that can happen with this theme is endless.

Choose a topic, such as math or language and create questions for kids to solve. With each right answer part of the box will be unlocked.

Princess Themed Escape Room

What kid wouldn’t love a princess themed escape room? Perfect for a birthday party, make everything pink, glittery and fancy for this game. Use fancy clothing, refer to the room as part of a castle and match jewels for a great hands-on puzzle.

Detective Escape Room Themes

Often kids find that they take on the role of detective when they do an escape room. They look for clues as they solve a case. Fingerprint clues, locked drawers and the hunt for a lost valuable item are all key elements. Decorate the room with magnifying glasses, maps and lots of folders and files.

Animal Themed Escape Room

If your child is an animal lover, then an animal themed escape room will be the perfect choice. Use a printable set of puzzles with lots of adorable animals, or create your own clues each with an animal theme. Use paw prints around the room, vines for a jungle theme and even a locked cage for the locked puzzle.

One of my favorite animal themed puzzles was one that incorporated my dog into the game. Our pets tend to always be in the same room as us, so the players didn’t think anything of our dog being in the escape room as they played. However, when one of the clues lead them to our dog who was proudly wearing a key on their collar, it was the ultimate animal themed clue!

Educational Escape Room

Some of the escape rooms are great to be played at school, but if you simply want a game that kids will love that also had a strong academic focus then try an educational escape room. Create puzzles and clues that each require kids to solve a math or academic based question. You can make the questions easier, or harder based on your group and their ages.

Use these educational escape room themes to engage kids because they will want to play and they’ll work hard to solve the problems/puzzles.

Space Escape Room Themes

A space station or general space theme is always a hit. You can try a “Mission to Mars” or “Lost in Space” type theme. Challenge players with questions about space and even aliens.

Decorating and preparing a space themed game is easy! Use black table cloths to create a dark and galaxy theme. Add glow and the dark elements and even flashing lights to set your theme.

Dinosaur Escape Room

I love the idea of a dinosaur escape room for a kids birthday party. Use vines (streamers) and large leaves as well as large dinosaur footprints to give it a Jurassic feel. Add giant eggs and skeleton pieces to also decorate the room. Even dinosaur stuffed animals are a great addition.

You can make a fossil with sand, a bit of glue, and some water. Hide a clue or another clue inside for players to have to break apart or carefully open. Add maps and dinosaur masks for the ultimate room.

Pop Star Escape Room

My tween loved this escape room theme! The pop star theme is a bit like the princess theme but with an older more teenage feel. This theme can include everything glittery and glam mixed with pop stars and make up. Everything your tween loves!

This is also the perfect game for a sleepover or teens birthday party. Play the kids favorite music in the background, roll out a red carpet and add lots of costumes and make up around the room.

STEM Escape Room Theme

Create a STEM escape room that mixes, science, technology, engineering and math. Each puzzle can include at least one of these subjects as their focus. Mix different liquids to get a new color, solve math equations and challenge children to build something using a limited number of supplies.

Adventure at Home Escape Room

Turn any room in your home, or your whole house into an escape room. Use a child’s bedroom and all of their familiar items into something magical and filled with mystery. Escape rooms with this theme typically send kids on an adventure around there home to places that they eat, sleep and even watch tv.

Adventures at home are perfect for rainy days and family game nights. A few ideas for how to make this theme work well is to have a favorite toy or game go missing and children have to work to get it back.

Suggest that the house has a secret room or a hidden mystery that kids didn’t know about. It’s a great way to turn something as simple and familiar as your home into a whole new space.

Tape a door or create a mini secret door, use old keys and hide clues in places and things that kids have seen and used a hundred time. Clue can be hidden behind photographs, or move an object from one room to another so that it stands out as being out of place.

Tape clues and puzzles under chairs and furniture and decorate your house to look like a whole new space.

Preschool Puzzles

As much as my own kids love escape room, I knew that if I wanted to do an escape room in my preschool and kindergarten class that I needed to drastically change the content and puzzles. There are lots of ways to involve young children in the fun of an escape room just by simplifying the puzzles.

Make puzzles involve numbers to only 10 or 20 and have them match letters or beginning sounds. Make sure that you include concepts that children are familiar and comfortable with and make sure that the focus is on fun. Give kids lots of clues when they ask and support them as they solve the puzzles.

Use materials that young children already love, such as teddy bears and their own toys. Keep the focus on fun and cute versus spooky and mysterious. Make patterns, match colors and challenge kids to find an object.

Seasonal Escape Rooms

Try creating an escape room for each season. Take the fun of an escape room outside in the spring and summer and use things that represent the season that kids love like water balloons and flowers.

Fill the room or space with materials that you have around your house, or yard to decorate for your seasonal theme.

Use seasonal materials, like pumpkins and colorful leaves for the puzzles. Kids will love using hands on materials that they don’t see year round for their clues.

Use a white blanket or sheet to create the illusion of snow with blue streamers to help set the mood. Cotton balls become a special puzzle that players have to count to solve and a key can be found inside a frozen block of ice.

Holiday Escape Room Themes

I find around the holidays I am often looking for something exciting to add to our holiday plans. A holiday themed escape room in addition to any celebrations is a great way for family to celebrate together and create some memories.

From Christmas and Halloween to Thanksgiving and even St. Patrick’s Day, there’s always room for an escape room on your holiday.

Have the kids play a game at the kids table, or have everyone work together before dinner is served. It’s a great way to bring family together. I also find that you don’t have to worry about decorating for the escape room because you’ve probably already decorated for the holiday.

A Christmas tree can hold clues and mystery and on New Year’s Even everyone can race to solve the puzzles before midnight.

A few of the holiday themed escape rooms are shared here, however, there are escape room ideas and printables for almost every holiday if you search on Hands-On Teaching Ideas.

Pirate Themed Escape Room

A pirate theme is always a popular theme for an escape room. A locked box becomes a treasure chest and coins become treasure. Create aged treasure maps with tea, rope and messages in a bottle.

Underwater Escape Room Themes

For an underwater theme, you can use anything from the sea, like fish and shells or extend the theme with a mermaid or boat theme. Fishing rods, blue lights, rocks and bubbles are a great idea. Look for puzzle ideas that use water or sand.

I hope that this collection gives you lots of ideas for your own escape room. Use the above ideas for puzzles and clues as inspiration for your own game. Keep in mind that one of the best things about creating your own escape room is that you can be in the room as players work their way through the game. You get to watch their excitement and their problem solving. You can also jump in and help if players are truly stuck or something doesn’t go as planned. Make sure to enjoy it as much as the players do.

Grab Free Escape Room Printables

There are lots of escape room printables available through Hands-On Teaching Ideas. From full escape room kits that are printable to completion certificates. There are lots of freebies available, or visit the shop to purchase a printable game that fits your theme and saves you time. Click the box below and subscribe through Grow. Once you subscribe the free certificates will download right away for you to use.

When you subscribe through Grow you will also unlock all of the other freebies available throughout this site. You will also receive an email with the link to the Free Resource Library where all of the freebies can be found.