Kahoot is great - until it isn't.
For a classroom quiz or a team meeting of 20, it does the job. But the moment you try to scale it to a conference audience, a company all-hands, or a festival crowd, problems start stacking up. The pricing jumps when you add participants. Someone always needs to download an app or create an account. And the format - one screen, one set of questions, everyone racing to tap fastest - starts feeling thin when you've got 300 people in the room.

If you've landed on this article, you're probably past the "should I use Kahoot?" stage and into "what else is out there?" So rather than ranking ten tools from best to worst, here's a more useful approach: what do you actually need, and which tool handles it best?

If You Need Live Polls and Q&A for a Large Audience

Best option: Mentimeter or Slido

Let's be honest upfront: if your main need is live polling, word clouds, or audience Q&A at scale, Kahoot isn't really the right tool and neither is Games for Crowds. This is where Mentimeter and Slido genuinely excel.

Mentimeter handles large audiences smoothly and its word cloud feature is one of those rare things that actually looks impressive on a big screen. Slido integrates directly into PowerPoint and Google Slides, which makes it popular for corporate events where the presentation is the centrepiece.

Both are built for collecting input from a room, not for running competitive games. If that's what you need, use them - they're good at it.

Where they fall short: Neither is designed for team-based competition or high-energy game moments. They're presentation tools with interaction features, not game platforms. If you need to energise a room rather than survey it, keep reading.

If You Need a Quiz But Don't Want to Prepare too Long

Best option: Games for Crowds - AI Quiz

This is Kahoot's biggest pain point at scale: someone has to write all the questions. For a classroom teacher who reuses the same quiz, that's fine. For an event organiser running a one-off conference session on a niche topic? It's hours of work for 15 minutes of play.

AI Quiz solves this by generating questions automatically on any topic, in any language, in seconds. Type "sustainable packaging" or "history of the European Union" or "90s pop music" and the game builds a full quiz round on the spot. The questions are fresh every time, so repeat groups never see the same content.

The host controls the topic and the difficulty - but doesn't have to write a single question. That's the fundamental difference from Kahoot: zero prep time without sacrificing relevance.

Why it works for large groups:

• Browser-based - attendees scan a QR code, no app download, no account creation
• AI generates content in any language, making it ideal for international conferences
• Scales from small teams to thousands of participants
• Team mode splits large groups automatically
• Currently free during the testing period

Try AI Quiz →

If You Need High-Energy Team Competition (Not Just a Quiz)

Best option: Games for Crowds - Logo Quiz Race and classic crowd games

Here's where Kahoot and most of its alternatives share the same blind spot: they're all quiz tools. They assume the format is "questions on screen, individuals tap answers." That works, but it's one format - and after the third time an audience has done it, the novelty wears off.

For large groups, team-based games that go beyond quizzes create a completely different energy in the room.

Logo Quiz Race puts brand logos on the main screen - blurred, fragmented, or gradually revealing - and three teams race to identify them. The buzz-in mechanic means teams are strategising out loud: "Do we know this? Should we wait? GO GO GO!" It's visual, competitive, and designed specifically for big screens at live events. Regional brand sets (European, American, Australian) keep the content relevant to your audience.

Classic crowd games like team Rock Paper Scissors, Tic-Tac-Toe, and Connect Four take familiar formats and scale them to hundreds of players. Each team votes on the next move from their phones. A full round takes 3–5 minutes, needs zero explanation, and gets the room reacting together.

Why this matters for large groups: Kahoot is individual competition - everyone racing against everyone. That creates anxiety for some and disengagement for others. Team-based competition is more inclusive: you're contributing to a group effort, not performing solo in front of 400 people.

Try Logo Quiz Race → · Try Rock Paper Scissors →

If You Need Zero Technical Setup

Every tool on this list claims to be "easy to set up." Here's how they actually compare for a conference scenario where you have 5 minutes and 400 impatient attendees:

• Kahoot: Requires pre-built quiz. Participants need the Kahoot app or to navigate to kahoot.it. Works, but there's friction.
• Mentimeter / Slido: Browser-based, fairly smooth. Slido's PowerPoint integration is genuinely seamless if you're already presenting.
• AhaSlides: Browser-based, room code entry. Straightforward.
• Games for Crowds: QR code scan, no app, no account, no login. Attendees are playing within 10 seconds. Games come ready to play out of the box or can be customised with AI in under a minute.

For large conferences where connection speed matters - where every extra tap loses 10–20% of your audience - the fewer steps the better.

The right tool depends entirely on what you're trying to do with your audience. If you need data and feedback, Mentimeter and Slido are hard to beat. If you need energy, competition, and a room that actually feels alive, Games for Crowds is built for exactly that.

Browse all games →