100 icebreaker questions: first meetings, work, online, question boxes

How to use this list

Icebreaker questions are light questions that help ease the tension with someone you've just met or in a room. In this article, we've gathered 100 ready-to-use icebreaker questions, sorted by situation: small talk with someone new, conversations at school or with friends, work meetings and training, online settings, and social media question boxes. Jump to your situation from the table of contents, then copy and use any questions you like.

Before you look through the 100 questions, there's one thing we'd like you to keep in mind. The goal of an icebreaker isn't "asking an interesting question" but "creating an atmosphere where the other person feels comfortable talking." That's why an easy-to-answer question is a better fit than a quirky one. Every one of the 100 questions in this article was chosen on the basis that "the person answering won't be put on the spot."

3 conditions for a good icebreaker question, and what to avoid

If you want to write your own questions, check whether they meet the following 3 conditions.

Condition 1: Anyone can answer right away. For "What food are you into lately?", some answer comes to mind, but "What's your goal in life?" tends to make people stop and think hard. At the icebreaker stage, the right questions are ones people can answer without thinking.

Condition 2: There's no right answer. Questions that test knowledge ("Do you know about X?") can give people who didn't know a small sense of defeat, the feeling that "I couldn't answer." With questions about preferences or experiences, every answer is a right answer.

Condition 3: The answer leads to the next part of the conversation. "Did you have breakfast?" ends with a yes or no, but "Are you a bread person or a rice person for breakfast?" leads to follow-ups like "Actually, I'm a cereal person."

On the other hand, questions to avoid are ones that intrude on privacy (income, whether someone has a partner, family makeup), ones where answers can be ranked (which university someone went to, which area they live in), and ones only certain people can answer (asking "Do you like soccer?" to someone with no interest in soccer). Questions that come across as prying risk cooling the room down instead of warming it up.

20 questions for first meetings and small talk

When you're talking one-on-one with someone for the first time, the basic approach is to start with light preferences.

1. Is there any food you're into lately? 2. Are you a coffee person or a tea person? 3. Are you a morning person or a night owl? 4. On your days off, do you like to go out or relax at home? 5. Is there anything you bought recently and thought, "I'm glad I got this"? 6. Where would you most like to go right now? 7. What's your favorite kind of noodles? 8. Which do you handle better, heat or cold? 9. What made you laugh recently? 10. What games did you love playing as a kid? 11. Are you a dog person or a cat person? 12. Have you watched any good movies or TV shows recently? 13. Is there a song you often sing at karaoke? 14. If you went on a trip, would you rather go to the sea or the mountains? 15. What's your favorite season? 16. What's your favorite sushi topping? 17. Is there a shop or restaurant you've been curious about lately? 18. What do you do during your commute to work or school? 19. What's your go-to treat for yourself? 20. If you had tomorrow all to yourself, what would you do?

The trick is to respond to their answer with "For me, it's..." If you fire off question after question, it tends to feel like a job interview. Go back and forth 2 or 3 times on one question before moving on to the next.

15 questions to liven things up at school or with friends

With people you know by sight but don't know well yet, questions with a bit of playfulness are likely to fit well.

21. If you could become invisible, what's the first thing you'd do? 22. If you could add just one facility to your school (or workplace), what would it be? 23. What was your favorite school lunch (or packed lunch) dish? 24. What's a present you were really happy to get? 25. If you won 1 million yen in the lottery, what would you spend it on? 26. What's a little talent of yours? 27. What's your favorite onigiri (rice ball) filling? 28. Is there a place you can't help stopping by on your way home? 29. What kind of apps fill most of your phone's home screen? 30. Tell me about a "small happiness" from recently 31. What do you tend to do to escape reality before a test? 32. If you became an animal, what would you want to be? 33. Do you have a routine before going to school (or work)? 34. What music or artist are you into lately? 35. If you went on a school trip (or company trip), where would you want to go?

The questions in this group make it easy to follow up an answer with "Why?" "If I were invisible, I'd do X," then "Why?", and the reason shows their personality. With this flow, the conversation should deepen naturally too.

15 questions for the workplace, meetings, and training

At work, questions that don't dig too deep into private life and connect easily to work topics are a good fit. You can use them in a format where each person answers in 30 seconds at the start of a training session or workshop.

36. Has anything made you a little happy at work recently? 37. What do you do when you want to focus? 38. What's your go-to drink while working? 39. In a word, what made you choose your current job? 40. Is there a favorite item you keep on your desk? 41. What club or student group were you in as a student? 42. Have you learned any handy tools or time-saving tricks recently? 43. Can you focus better at the office or working remotely? 44. For lunch, are you a packed-lunch person or an eating-out person? 45. What do you look forward to after work? 46. Is there a memorable story from your work so far? 47. If you could say one thing to yourself as a newcomer, what would it be? 48. How do you refresh yourself on your days off? 49. Is there a book or article you read recently that you'd recommend? 50. Is there anything you'd like to try this year?

If you're using one at the start of a meeting, choose just one question based on whether "everyone can answer within 30 seconds." Questions that might take longer are better suited to training sessions or lunch gatherings.

15 questions for online and remote settings

One strength of online settings is that the other person's surroundings show up on screen, so you can talk about them. However, avoid bringing up things people may not want to show, such as what their room looks like.

51. Are you working from home or a cafe today? 52. Is there a drink you keep with you during remote meetings? 53. Do you play music when you work (or study) online? 54. Have you had any "aruaru" (relatable, happens-to-everyone) slip-ups in online meetings lately? 55. If you used a virtual background, what kind of scenery would you choose? 56. Is there "one nice thing from today" you can share through the screen? 57. What do you miss most when working remotely (or taking online classes)? 58. Do you have any preferences when it comes to keyboards and mice? 59. Do you have a routine before online meetings? 60. When you lose focus at home, how do you get back on track? 61. In video meetings, are you a camera-on or camera-off person? 62. What did you recently buy online? 63. Which do you use longer each day, your phone or your computer? 64. Is there a subscription you're glad you signed up for? 65. If you could work (or study) anywhere, where would you choose?

In online settings, a "check-in" format, where everyone answers the first question in turn, is an easy option. Once everyone has spoken once, it's easier for them to speak up in the discussion that follows.

20 questions ready to use in question boxes and on social media

In anonymous question boxes, questions that make people think "I want to see how they answer this" may go over well. Sending topics that are easy for the person answering to talk about is good manners, and it's also a way to get things going.

66. What's the funniest thing that happened to you recently? 67. Help me decide what to have for dinner tonight 68. What's the most delicious thing you've ever eaten? 69. If you had a long weekend starting tomorrow, what would you do? 70. Tell us all about your latest oshi (the favorite you passionately support) and win us over 71. Give me your personal motto, or something that sounds like one 72. If you were an animal, what would you be? 73. What's the best thing you've ever bought? 74. If you could take just one thing to a desert island, what would it be? 75. What do you take the most photos of with your apps lately? 76. What was your dream as a kid? 77. What skill do you want most right now? 78. Tell me about your ideal way to spend a day off 79. Is there something you've been working a little hard at lately? 80. What are your favorite snacks or sweets? 81. Is there a place you go to regularly, or one you'd like to make your regular spot? 82. What's the first thing you do when you wake up in the morning? 83. Tell me how you relieve stress 84. Has anything moved you recently? 85. What do you think you'll be like in 10 years?

When you send the first question to a follower's question box, picking from this group is a safe choice. When you're asking for questions as an owner, one idea is to set a theme, like "Today I'm in the mood to answer questions like number 66."

15 deeper questions for getting closer

These are questions for when things have warmed up and you want to take your relationship a step further. Use them while reading how close you are with the other person. Asking them right away at a first meeting can feel heavy.

86. When was a "turning point" in your life so far? 87. What kind of person do you respect? 88. When you're feeling down, how do you bounce back? 89. What do you like about your own personality? 90. Has your way of thinking changed about anything recently? 91. Is there something you won't compromise on, no matter what? 92. Are there any words someone said to you that have stayed with you? 93. Where is a place you'd like to visit again? 94. Compared with yourself 5 years ago, what do you think has changed? 95. If you were to thank someone, who would you thank first? 96. Tell me about your ideal day, from morning to night 97. Is there something you want to try but haven't taken the first step on yet? 98. What warnings should go in your own "user manual"? 99. Is there anything recently that you felt like praising yourself for? 100. If tomorrow were going to be a little more exciting than today, what would make it so?

The trick with deeper questions is to answer them yourself first. Self-disclosure has a reciprocal effect that makes "the other person want to open up too," and if you answer first, the other person finds it easier to feel safe sharing their honest thoughts.

Turning an icebreaker into the next conversation

Whichever of the 100 questions you use, the question is only the entry point. What matters is how you react once the answer comes back. If you add a bit about yourself, like "Oh, really? By the way, for me...", before moving on to the next question, it will likely carry on as a conversation instead of an interrogation.

If you run a question box, you can also use these 100 questions to deal with running out of things to answer. During times when no questions come in, one option is to share the whole list and let your followers pick: "Send me the number of any question you like from this list." Just easing the burden of coming up with a question should lower the barrier to asking one.

If you don't have a place for questions yet, setting up an anonymous question box widens the ways you can use this list. With Q drop, you can create a question box with just an email address, so try starting by inviting people on social media: "Send me any question you like from these 100."

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