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Board games were popular with Egyptians of all ages and all social classes. A favourite during the Old Kingdom was Mehen, the game of the snake, which was played on a one-legged table. This board bore the picture of a coiled snake, either carved or inlaid. The body of the snake was divided into squares. Up to six players used three lions, three lionesses, white and red spheres, which were ranged in a box when the game was over. Like all other ancient Egyptian games, its rules are unknown. More than a dozen sets of this game were found in first dynasty tombs, two of them with beautifully carved ivory lions and lionesses. With them other objects were found: some like little ivory houses with pointed roofs, some looking like today's chess king and rook. Other pieces were cylindrical, with a little sphere on top.

Senet was a game for two with five to seven pieces per player. It seems to have been a game of skill and chance, perhaps akin to backgammon and was widely played by people of all social classes. The game table on the right was found in the tomb of King Tutankhamen (18th Dynasty). The picture in the left margin shows Queen Nefertari playing Senet. The Senet board had 30 squares, which were traversed along an S-shaped pathway. The two players placed their pieces alternately on the first 10 to 14 squares of the board. They were advanced according to the results of throws of little sticks, knuckle bones or more rarely of a teetotum. The aim seems to have been to move all one's pieces to the last square of the board and remove them. The 26th square was often called nefer (i.e. good, beautiful - seemingly a "lucky" square), but the following one was some kind of an obstacle which had to be avoided.

The Game of 20 squares (possibly called aseb by the Egyptians) is sometimes found on the reverse side of the Senet board and was played with the same pieces. An ancient game dating from Old Kingdom times, it survived unlike Mehen, into to the Late Period. The oldest extant boards were made during the 17th dynasty. Unlike the descriptions accompanying depictions of Senet there is no information as to the rules of Twenty Squares. Most boards had a few special squares, marked with rosettes or inscriptions such as ankh nefer (good life), hesty merty (you're praised and loved), Amen or heb sed (The Thirty Year festival, this inscription was found on a board found in Tutankhamen's tomb) and the like.

A game, which is called Hounds and Jackals nowadays, may be the original Game of Goose, or Snakes and Ladders. It dates from the New Kingdom and was played with five pieces per player, one using five hound like, the other five jackal like pieces. This roughly made boardgame of clay with 29 holes along two paths, some of which were marked and others connected by lines was found by Petrie. Game pieces, which were originally simple geometrical forms like cones or spools, became more elaborate. Influenced by the militaristic mood of the New Kingdom they were sometimes shaped as archers or bound prisoners of war. Merneptah is depicted playing with jackal shaped pieces. From the Hellenist period onwards game pieces were called "dogs" in Egypt.

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