This article contains affiliate links — if you buy through them, we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Full disclosure.
6 Nimmt! vs. No Thanks!: Which Filler Should You Buy?
Buy 6 Nimmt! if your group is ever bigger than five. Buy No Thanks! if it’s usually three to five and you like a quieter, tighter game. Both cost about $12, both are decades-proven number-card fillers about avoiding penalty points, and both deserve shelf space — but they produce completely different evenings.
The Core Difference: Simultaneous vs. Sequential
6 Nimmt! has everyone commit a card face down at the same time, then reveals. Nobody reacts to anybody; you’re all guessing together, and the reveal is a group event.
No Thanks! is strictly turn-based. A card is flipped, and you either take it (eating its points) or pay a chip to pass it on. You watch each person’s decision, and information accumulates as the chips move around the table.
The rule of thumb: 6 Nimmt! is a game of simultaneous guessing, No Thanks! is a game of sequential reading. One is a scramble, the other is a staring contest.
Player Count Decides This More Than Taste
This is the honest deciding factor for most buyers.
6 Nimmt! supports 2–10 and peaks around six. Because everyone plays at once, ten players take no longer than four — it’s one of the only games that genuinely works at that size. Below five it’s still good, just less exciting. Our player count breakdown has the full ranking.
No Thanks! supports 3–7 and peaks around four or five. With more than five, the wait between your turns starts to drag and the chip economy gets loose. At three or four it’s razor-tight.
If you host big, this comparison is already over.
Which Is Tenser?
No Thanks!, moment to moment. Watching a 32-point card come around the table with a growing pile of chips on it, knowing you have three chips left and the person before you has two — that’s a slow-motion car crash you can see coming for a full lap.
6 Nimmt!’s tension is spikier and shorter: everyone flips, the groans cascade in ascending order, and it’s over in seconds. Then you do it again. Cutting down on the groans is mostly a matter of releasing your low cards early.
Same table, two games. In No Thanks!, the room goes quiet as a 30-point card gathers chips and everyone does arithmetic. In 6 Nimmt!, the room erupts as four people simultaneously discover they all played into the same row. Pick the noise you want your game night to make.
Check No Thanks! price on Amazon →
Teach Time and Table Feel
Both teach in under five minutes, which is the whole point of a filler. 6 Nimmt! is marginally simpler to explain because there are no chips to track — pick a card, lowest resolves first, don’t be sixth.
No Thanks! demands slightly more attention per turn, and it punishes players who zone out, since the chip counts are public information you’re supposed to be tracking. 6 Nimmt! is more forgiving of a distracted table, which matters at a barbecue — where we rank it first among card games precisely because you can play it while flipping burgers.
Which Should You Actually Buy?
Buy 6 Nimmt! if you host groups of five or more, want something that plays while people wander in and out, or need one deck that can absorb a whole party. Our full 6 Nimmt! review rates it 5/5 Bamboo and 4/5 Pandas.
Buy No Thanks! if your regular table is three to five, you prefer deduction to chaos, and you want the tighter, more agonizing of the two.
Both designs have the pedigree to back this up: 6 Nimmt! comes from Wolfgang Kramer, one of the most awarded designers in the hobby, and both games have stayed in print for decades on word of mouth alone.
Own both if you’re a filler person — they cost $24 together, they cover 2 through 10 players between them, and they’re the two decks we’d grab first for a bag that has to travel light.
Check 6 Nimmt! price on Amazon →
Frequently Asked Questions
Is 6 Nimmt! better than No Thanks!?
For groups of five or more, yes — 6 Nimmt! handles up to ten players with no added time, while No Thanks! peaks around four or five. For small tables that prefer deduction over chaos, No Thanks! is the tighter, tenser game.
What’s the main difference between 6 Nimmt! and No Thanks!?
6 Nimmt! is simultaneous — everyone commits a card at once and reveals together. No Thanks! is sequential, with players taking turns deciding whether to accept a card or pay a chip to pass it. One is a group scramble, the other a reading contest.
Which is better for large groups?
6 Nimmt!, decisively. It supports up to ten players and, because everyone plays simultaneously, a ten-player game takes roughly as long as a four-player one. No Thanks! starts to drag above five.
Which game is easier to teach?
6 Nimmt!, by a small margin — there are no chips to track, so the whole explanation is “play a card, lowest resolves first, don’t place the sixth card in a row.” Both teach in under five minutes.
Are both games the same price?
Roughly — both typically run about $12, which is part of why owning both is a reasonable answer. Together they cover every player count from 2 to 10.
Which has more strategy, 6 Nimmt! or No Thanks!?
No Thanks! has more calculable strategy, since chip counts and taken cards are public information you can reason about precisely. 6 Nimmt!’s skill is read-based — anticipating what a table full of people will do rather than computing an optimal play.