Plants vs. Zombies Is Coming to Tabletop: Here Are Other Zombie Board Games to Try
From lawn defense to all-out zombie warfare, here's what else is on the table.
Plants vs. Zombies is making the jump from screens to the tabletop. Mantic Games is bringing Plants vs. Zombies: The Board Game to Kickstarter on October 14, 2026, made together with PopCap, the studio behind the original video game. Apparently tabletop gaming still has room for a few more zombies.
If the Plants vs. Zombies board game has you wondering what else is out there, zombie board games cover a lot more ground than you might expect. Some have the whole table working together. Some fit in a cup of dice. A few would rather you ruin your friends' evening.
Here's a look at the Plants vs. Zombies board game, followed by other zombie games grouped by how they play.
Zombie board games at a glance
| Game | Players | Play time | Style | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Plants vs. Zombies: The Board Game | 1–4 | Not announced | Co-op | Kickstarter from Oct 14, 2026 |
| Zombie Overlord | 2–4 | 30–40 min | Competitive deck-builder | Preorder until Oct 29, 2026 |
| Zombie Dice | 2+ | 10–20 min | Competitive push-your-luck | In print |
| Zombie Fluxx | 2–6 | 10–30 min | Competitive card game | In print |
| Zombie Kidz Evolution | 2–4 | 15 min | Co-op family legacy game | In print |
| Zombicide: 2nd Edition | 1–6 | About 1 hr | Co-op miniatures game | In print |
| Dead of Winter | 2–5 | 1–2 hrs | Semi-co-op with a possible traitor | Can be hard to find new |
| Last Night on Earth | 2–6 | 60–90 min | Heroes vs. zombies | In print |
Plants vs. Zombies: The Board Game
The basics carry straight over from the video game. Zombies shuffle toward your house, and you hold them off with plant cards like Peashooters, Sunflowers, Wall-nuts and Cherry Bombs. Tool cards help too: the Shovel moves plants around, and the Lawnmower can clear an entire lane. It's fully cooperative for one to four players, and if a single zombie reaches the house, everyone loses together.
The bigger draw might be the Zen Garden Campaign, a branching series of levels that adds new plants, zombies, tools and mechanics as you go, with difficulty that scales to your group. Backers will be able to pick between a standard edition and a Deluxe Kickstarter Edition with pre-assembled miniatures and extra campaign content. There's also a standalone Night Edition expansion.
Mantic has plenty of experience turning licenses into tabletop games, including Halo, Hellboy and The Walking Dead. Play time, price and a retail release date haven't been announced yet, so we'll update this once the campaign is live.
If defending your lawn isn't enough zombie chaos for one evening, read on.
Competitive zombie games
Plants vs. Zombies puts everyone on the same side. These games don't.
Zombie Overlord
Zombie Overlord flips the usual zombie setup. You aren't surviving the apocalypse. You're one of the Overlords running it. Each turn you set traps to lure survivors into your base, convert them into zombies, and add them to your deck. Then you send your growing horde after everyone else.
It's a deck-builder for two to four players, ages 14 and up, and a game takes 30 to 40 minutes. If you've played Dominion or Star Realms, the deck-building will feel familiar, but there's far more direct conflict: the other Overlords will attack your base whenever they get the chance. The art is comic-style rather than gory, with 48 different characters in the box (68 with the mini expansion). There's no solo mode, since the whole point is having someone to attack.
In other words, it's the opposite pitch from Plants vs. Zombies. No teamwork, and you're the one with the zombies.
Zombie Overlord funded on Kickstarter in 13 hours and starts shipping in November 2026. Preorders are open until October 29, and the full rules are free to read if you'd like to see how it plays first.
Zombie Overlord is published by Rising Warrior Games, the publisher of this site.
Zombie Dice
Zombie Dice from Steve Jackson Games is about as simple as zombie games get. You're a zombie, the dice are your victims, and you roll for brains. Keep rolling and you might eat more, but three shotgun blasts end your turn with nothing to show for it. It plays two or more people in 10 to 20 minutes, and the whole thing fits in a pocket.
It's the easiest game on this list to teach, and possibly the only one you can play while waiting for a table at a restaurant.
Zombie Fluxx
Zombie Fluxx takes Looney Labs' Fluxx card game and adds the undead. You draw one card and play one card, but the rules and the win conditions keep changing as cards hit the table. Zombie Creeper cards get stuck in front of you and stop you from winning until you deal with them.
Two to six players, roughly 10 to 30 minutes. It's chaotic in a good way, as long as your group doesn't mind the goal changing three times before it's your turn again.
Co-op zombie games
Zombie Kidz Evolution
If you're looking at Plants vs. Zombies for family game night, Zombie Kidz Evolution is probably the closest match already on shelves. Two to four players work together to lock the school's four entrances before the zombies take over, in about 15 minutes, ages 7 and up.
It's a legacy game, so sealed envelopes and stickers add new rules and content the more you play. Publisher Scorpion Masqué says it has sold more than 550,000 copies. Look for "Evolution" on the box; it's the updated version of the original Zombie Kidz.
Zombicide: 2nd Edition
Zombicide is the big miniatures game of the genre. One to six players control survivors working through mission scenarios on modular map tiles, while a card deck spawns and moves the zombies. Games run about an hour, ages 14 and up. Expect a lot of plastic, a lot of dice and a lot of zombies.
The 2nd Edition came out in 2021. Asmodee bought the Zombicide line in 2025 and now publishes it under its Guillotine Games label.
Somewhere in between
Dead of Winter
Dead of Winter: A Crossroads Game puts two to five players in charge of a colony with a shared goal. Everyone also has a secret objective, though, and one of you might be a traitor. Crossroads cards trigger story events tied to the characters in play, so the colony's problems tend to get personal.
Games run one to two hours, ages 13 and up. You'll spend most of it working together and the rest wondering who's lying. It came out in 2014 and can be harder to find new these days, so check stock before you get attached.
Last Night on Earth: The Zombie Game
Last Night on Earth from Flying Frog Productions splits the table into teams. The heroes try to complete a horror-movie scenario, while one or two players control the zombies and try to stop them. It plays two to six people in 60 to 90 minutes, ages 12 and up.
It's been around since 2007, it's still in print, and it leans happily into the B-movie feel.
The horde keeps growing
Zombie games clearly aren't going anywhere. Plants vs. Zombies is bringing the most famous lawn in gaming to the tabletop, and the rest of the genre already covers just about everything: quick dice games, family co-ops, miniature-heavy campaigns and games where your friends are the real threat.
If competitive deck-building sounds more like your kind of game night, take a look at Zombie Overlord.