Generation Z has notably grown up with a plethora of internet-based pastimes, including social media platforms like YouTube, TikTok (or more appropriately, its deceased predecessor Musical.ly), video games, or, more nostalgically, online computer games. Before we could be trusted with our own gaming systems or software, we used the desktop computers in the school computer lab or our parents’ offices to play games on the likes of sites like CoolMath, NitroType, Club Penguin, Poptropica, Movie Star Planet, Disney (Pixie Hollow, anyone?), Nickelodeon, or even on children’s toy manufacturer sites like Barbie and American Girl Dolls. Many of these sites ran on the Adobe Flash Player, which notably perished in 2020. Some of these brands and companies’ gaming sites are still available, but for many of our favorites, they’ve been laid to rest as a relic of an earlier internet.
As veteran users of these sites, we know those eras of our lives where we visited them regularly are over. We can visit some of these spaces when we long for some nostalgia (for example, online time travel via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine), but no longer children, we’re suited to look beyond programs meant to teach us the basics of literacy and logic under the guise of fun gameplay. As young adults, we’ve earned our place on the real internet, where we can engage with online platforms for the sake of knowledge with useful and frankly astonishingly expansive information.
Are you looking for online sites that are new and exciting, but still scratch that itch in your brain for a fun, online interactive? Well, here’s what you’ve been searching for.
New York Times’ Games
This one may seem pretty obvious. The New York Times’ games have grown in popularity over the past few years, and I know personally my family’s group chat changed forever when sharing a daily Wordle score became our daily tradition coming out of the pandemic. NYT’s games have expanded from the Crossword (Mini Crossword, created in 2014) and Wordle (acquired in 2022) to include Connections in 2023 and Strands in 2024. There has been controversy recently surrounding NYT’s choice to revoke free/non-subscriber access to the Mini Crossword in August 2025. For those who can’t settle for just one game per day, though, unofficial unlimited versions of Wordle and crosswords are available.
Tradle — OEC Games
Personally, Tradle is my favorite game on the list. I’ve learned so much about the global economy by guessing countries according to their top exports. Similar to Wordle, one country is chosen daily, with their daily exports organized in a diagram for you to guess. Afterward, if you’d like to learn more, you can view the country’s economic profile on the directly linked Observatory of Economic Complexity website!
World Geography Games
Looking for a new goal? It takes lots of practice and knowledge to memorize all the countries of the world, and geography games are the key to practicing your skills! You can also memorize all the U.S. states, flags of the world, or, if you want to guess the country by its silhouette (which is much harder than it seems!) you can try your hand at Worldle!
Lakeland
If you’re like me and refuse to spend the money on buying Stardew Valley, or you’re looking for a farming simulator that demonstrates the real-life complexities of agriculture and sustainability, Lakeland is an educational agricultural game designed to teach elementary and middle school students about building municipalities and managing the food supply along with other environmental factors.
Google Earth
As a kid, one of my favorite things to do on my computer at home was goof around on Google Earth. I’d look up the houses of people I loved, or drop the little yellow guy in random places and explore a whole different country right from my computer! The best thing is, you can still do that now! If you download Google Earth Pro, there are even more cool features, like the ability to look back in time to see satellite images from decades in the past! I also will admit Google Earth is a great tool to have when you first start off with those geography games!
Astronomy and Meteorology Games
Want to view the world’s entire meteorological outlook in an instant? See the current state of wind on Earth on Ventusky! Explore nearly every aspect of the national weather outlook on the National Weather Service’s Daily Briefing.
NASA’s Climate Change hub hosts interactives like a Climate Time Machine, Global Ice Viewer, and a multimedia library to explore more. NASA’s site also holds several other games, with some more simply-stated options on their children’s site named Space Place, or take a look at scigames.org, where the games are based on exhibits at the Space Science Institute.
Want to roam space freely? Visit the World Wide Telescope to explore photos from the galaxy at your own pace.
Another great game, Starchitect allows you to develop star systems, planets, and even try to formulate life forms! Additionally, Space Engine is a downloadable program that runs an extremely realistic simulation of our universe. The site boasts an incredible ability to recreate practically every known type of astronomical phenomenon. So cool!
Other Science Sites
On One Zoom, you can explore all the links of taxonomy and discover the vast amount of connections in what the site describes as the great tree of life!
Arizona State University hosts a collection of games like a beetle dissection simulation, bone anatomy viewer, and even a pandemic simulator if you’re ever in the mood for some biology-based fun.
The Nobel Prize actually hosts a wide range of education materials, one of them being a surprisingly difficult blood transfusion game — perfect for medical students!
Though climate change is a frightening topic, especially under some of the proposed scenarios presented in this program, the IPCC Interactive Atlas allows you to have your own sort of demented fun clicking through the complex variables of climate change’s effects, including temperature, precipitation, drought conditions, and number of frost days (spoiler alert: many signs point to warmer days for lots of folks).
On a simpler note, Sandboxels is a super fun chemistry game that’s sure to remind you of some very retro gaming programs.
Reading and Writing
Is reading your favorite idea of a good time? Arts and Letters Daily offers a diligently updated and curated collection of articles, books, and essays. It’s also a fantastic master site of renowned magazines, newspapers, and other publications, all for your viewing pleasure!
Have you always wanted to learn more about mythology, but never knew where to start? Are you confused by what’s Greek, what’s Roman, and how other classical tales from Egyptian, Celtic, Aztec, Asian, and Nordic traditions fit into everything? Mythopedia is, as they describe themselves, the “ultimate online resource for exploring ancient mythology.”
On TypeLit.io, you can practice typing by writing out literary classics! If you’re a writer like me and often need to get your fingers warmed up before you can type out another article or essay, or you just want to destress by clacking away at your computer, TypeLit.io is the place to go. If you’re looking for some simpler content to type out, Monkeytype is another great place!
Gone are the days of being told to avoid that Wikipedia link at all costs because it’s “not a reliable source.” While Wikipedia itself isn’t a certifiable academic source because the information can be changed by anyone, Wikipedia editors are actually very diligent about keeping the site accurate and up to date, even if some bad actors and pranksters occasionally get their grimy hands on some pages and get their fifteen minutes of fame with comical or interestingly disturbing misinformation. Wikipedia is a great way to get acquainted with a summary of a new topic, and point you in the right direction for other sources of information to cite instead. So, what are you waiting for? Go down some new rabbit holes! (After finishing this article, of course).
CNN Interactives
While often partisan in nature and sometimes discussing harrowing and devastatingly compelling stories, CNN Digital hosts a site where their reporting is turned into engaging online interactives. The adult responsibility of reading the news and staying informed doesn’t have to feel stale. These interactives host internally navigable graphs and datasets, category selection, unique modules, engaging visuals, and encapsulating audio to create a whole new captivating sensory experience. Here, you can learn more about endangered indigenous languages while actually listening to members of those communities speaking, or even explore the possibility of a world without leap years with charts that explain it all. When we’re able to engage with our news in a way that presents visible consequences, perhaps we can feel as though we’re actually involved with the content, and our civic actions can do the same.
As kids, we usually played computer games to pass the time, indulge in our interests, or even to procrastinate our homework. Becoming older and wiser means we develop the knowledge that gaining an understanding of new concepts isn’t a chore — it’s the core of life itself. Education is everything, and we learn the most when we’re having fun! Even if some of these sites are familiar, maybe some are even your favorites, I hope you’re equipped with some new boredom busters to bring the joys of learning and childlike wonder to your days!