Alex Buscemi
Ouija boards have long been a source of fascination and fear, blending curiosity with the eerie unknown.
Whether you’re a skeptic or a believer, creepy stories of spirits answering from beyond can leave anyone unnerved.
From mysterious messages to unsettling experiences, the board’s power lies not in the cardboard and planchette, but in the chilling moments that follow.
It’s a game that plays on our deepest fears, drawing us in with the question: Who or what is really on the other side?
In the spirit of spooky season, people have taken to Reddit to share their haunted ouija board experiences.
Scroll on for the most bone-chilling of these tales — if you dare.
1.
“My mom and aunt Lucy used one. It told my mom that my dad cheated on her in MX, that she would never finish school because she would start working, and that she would have a son (she had 3 girls at this point). She literally walked into the room where my dad was and he confirmed that yes, he messed around. And no she didn’t finish school, she is still working to this day. And (then) she had my brother.”
2.
“My friends and I played with one once. We were all about 16-17. To make a long story as short as possible, I don’t even remember what was asked, but one friend started chanting something unintelligible, the board sort of flung itself across the room, and the mother of the girl, who’s house we were hanging out in, came flying down the stairs, screaming/demanding to know, what the (heck) we were doing. We were in the basement. She had been asleep, but had a nightmare of a man, who was literally on fire – flesh cooking and peeling – that yelled at her, they are doing something they shouldn’t be.”
3.
“I fully 100% believe that Ouija boards are real. When I was in high school, I had two friends and we would do all that kind of stuff – seances, spells, candles, fortune telling, etc. The main focus was Ouija boards. And we decided to test to make sure that none of us was influencing the outcome. So, one of us would go write something down (a word, random numbers/letters; whatever came to mind), come back, lie down on the ground, and the other two would put the Ouija board on that person’s back and ask the spirits to spell what they had written down. It was right every. Single. Time. Even when one of us wrote down the most random iPhone generated password string of stuff.”
4.
“I played with a group of 15-20 people and only 5-6 could fit with our hands on the planchette. One spirit had a message for a friend that didn’t have his hands on the board. When we asked for his name, he spelled out the full name of my friends grandpa, on his moms side. No way any of us knew his mother’s maiden name. The second spelled out another friends name (also not touching the board) and then kept repeated the same set of numbers. My friend started crying and explained that it was his mothers birthday who’d died a few years prior. There was also someone that came on that said it was our friend who was currently in a coma. I have played many times and most of them felt like nonsense, but that night was different and made me a believer. You could feel the energy shift when talking to the different spirits. I think some people are more attuned to that side of things, so boards are more likely to work when they’re around, and there needs to be someone there who wants to talk to you in the first place. Only other explanation I can think of for that night is the collective unconsciousness.”
5.
“No dude. I believe my older brothers constant use of the Ouija board caused him to experience a possession. He didn’t tell me about what he experienced until I was older but I remember him showing up to a birthday party of mine when I was younger asking where my Ouija board was. He had a rosary around his neck. I thought he was going to set me up with something cool with it to contact spirits easier. When I brought it to him he told me I was never to touch one again and left and took it with him. I’ve only tried using a Ouija board one other time since but once I got the full possible possession story from him I felt way too uneasy using one again.”
6.
“I played the Ouija board, the one you find in the toy-store, with a friend not so long ago. If anything it’s clear that you can never trust what you’re talking with via one. One day, my friend and I talked with a ghost named Fee. They didn’t speak french (we spoke french) and so, we asked Fee if they knew someone that could translate for them. They said yes and went to goodbye when prompted to go get them. They returned after a few minutes saying they were back. When asking about that friend of theirs, it was hard to get an answer. Until finally it spelled demon. We ended the session right then. The next day, we played again during the day and surprise, Fee was there. However, Fee had now a perfect french. At some point, my gut was telling me something was odd about this. So I asked, Fee, did you learn french? It immediately went to goodbye. I personally would avoid asking questions that are too personal or about yourself. But from what I can tell, it is true.”
7.
“We had friends staying with our family and the kids decided to have a seance. With the Ouija board we contacted a spirit that said it was a great aunt of my brother and I. She said her last name was Swan. We asked my dad later and he was shocked. He had an aunt who died very young that he never spoke about to us. During the same seance, now without our participation a spirit came that said he was a friend of my brothers from school. He spelled out his name, when asked how he died he said he was hit by a train. Nobody in that room except my brother and I knew that and we were on the other side of the room. We never used the Ouija board again.”
8.
“My friends and I used one in a cemetery this last Samhain. I was always a skeptic. The spirit told us what year they died which matched the surrounding graves. We had a few of our teenage kids with us and they asked questions I wouldn’t have thought about which eventually lead us to the spirits grave. Name and dates matched. We brought a few dozen roses and left them on the graves as we left so they could feel remembered and loved.”
9.
“My parents took me and our Ouija board to one of our family friends house. My dad and the other man sat watching a football game in their TV room. My mom and her friend used the Ouija board and I was sitting in front of them facing the bay windows and it was nighttime outside. Half way though the session I saw a gray figure walk out of the family room and watch us. I couldn’t turn as I was scared. After a minute the figure went back into the room.”
10.
“My mom and her friend played with one when I was a kid, and apparently it was answering really weird questions nobody else would know and the lights started flickering. From my bedroom all I heard was my mom and her friend screaming, and then a week later I found the board in the freezer (and yes, for some reason my mom did actually throw it in the freezer). I don’t actually remember all the details of that night, but I know it freaked out my mom and she’s a pretty chill person.”
11.
“(I was) 13 years old.I decided to do a Ouija board seance in my mother’s bedroom with three other girls, same age. We lived in an old 3 floor terraced house that had spooky fireplaces in each of the rooms with the chimney breast in. Outside the house was an old Welsh statue in a church yard, of a man holding out a book, his book pointed right to my mother’s bedroom window and we saw that as ominous. We set up the makeshift board on a dressing table and lit candles. 30 seconds in and the glass moved to spell stop, then after furious giggles and nervous glances we ignored it. The second we all had our fingers back onto the glass, the girl in front of me screamed and flipped the glass and bolted out of the door and actually ran out of the house. The other girls ran after and my mother ran out of the living room to check on us. I caught up with the girls outside, and the girl who had screamed said there was an old man stood at the bottom of my mother’s bed. Long coat and a trilby on his head. The parents came to get my friends and we never spoke of it again. Fast forward 15 years and my mother was deep in her cups and fighting alcoholism. During those darker days she was often bed ridden and had some very vivid hallucinations. Some of very odd stuff like spiders and bugs, but it wasn’t until she was sober she told me of the ones of her Dad stood at the bottom of her bed in the coat and hat she buried him in.”
12.
“Here’s the thing about Ouija boards. My dad is as big a skeptic as they come. He’d never believe in a ghost if one was staring him in the face, but one thing he’s always said to me is not to mess with Ouija boards. He and a friend used one when they were kids and whatever happened put him off them forever. He never used one again. He didn’t tell me what it said, which is super strange for him, just that it knew things his friend could not have known, so he knew for a fact it wasn’t her making it move. I’ve never used a Ouija board partly for this reason, because what in the world could have happened that makes my staunch skeptic father this weird about them?”
13.
“Once I heard the story from my neighbors and they seemed really serious when they told me about it. The father used one but he was skeptical about it. Not much time later his son died from an unknown illness but he was a healthy 20 something man, it was sudden and the father immediately said it was from the Ouija because he felt something following him. Then, he had an accident that left his leg permanently injured. It was like an event after another, I don’t remember what else but their story always stopped me from getting near any Ouija board. Ouija boards are erratic and powerful, don’t play if you don’t know what you are getting into.”
14.
“I also had a Ouija experience that involved information that only I knew. When we were probably 12ish, my two friends were the ones using the board at my house and I was observing. When they asked it about who they were talking to, it spelled out the last name of the people who lived in the house that was demolished on the plot where my dad built our house. I only knew it because I had driven by the lot with my parents when they bought it and had seen it written on the mailbox when it was still up. Not a common name. It also knew that the previous house was green. My friends had definitely not been there before. We also got other answers about them that I couldn’t verify. Definitely weird. I haven’t touched a Ouija board since, and I never will.”
15.
“Look, I’m not gonna make any definite judgments here, but my friends did one in a cemetery when we were in high school, I was there too but did not participate. It started drizzling as they started, just very gently raining, and as they asked it more questions the rain started picking up, after they asked it if it had good intentions the rain and wind started really picking up, I think it said yes but then it went to goodbye. As soon as it went to goodbye it was like this tension broke and it went back to the drizzle it was before, in a very short time. Strange occurrence.”
16.
“One thing I do have to say about Ouija boards is that my dad who is strictly a non-believer won’t let me or my sister near them because as a kid he used one and swears blind the planchette flew off the table and hurt his friend. Knowing my dad, this would’ve happened and that’s all I need to know there’s something strange with them.”
17.
“When I was 13, I woke up in the middle of the night standing in front of my dresser mirror. I was repeating, the gift is coming, the gift is coming, over and over, which is what woke me up. I talked in my sleep all the time (still do), but had never walked in my sleep before. I thought this was unusual, but was like oh well, guess I was dreaming. I didn’t think anything of it, hopped back in bed, and fell asleep. A couple of days later, my two friends came over. One of them had a Ouija board, which I had never seen and didn’t know anything about. I played on it with one of the girls, but it was dumb and just sort of gave random letters. After a while, I got bored and went in my room while my 2 friends kept playing. I came out a little later and my friends were putting the board away. It hadn’t been very interesting, and they wanted to walk up to Dairy Queen. We were walking up there and I asked if anything happened when they were playing. What were they doing? My friend said they were just asking random questions about our futures, like, will Heather get a boyfriend? and what will Elizabeth’s job be? They said the answers were either gobbledygook, or the planchette moved a bit and then stopped. They said it seemed like a scam. I asked if they asked about me. They said they did, just a general question about what does the future hold? They said it did actually spell out a word that time, but it didn’t really relate to the question, and after that they gave up and wanted onion rings. What was the word? I asked. Gift, they said. Gift. I hadn’t told anyone at all about waking up in front of my dresser mirror. I had thought so little of it that I had basically forgotten about it. It was interesting to me that, when they told me about this, my response was the opposite of what it normally is. I’m a talker, and a compulsive storyteller, and something like this would normally be like catnip to me. I’d typically go around telling everyone about it, because it’s weird and creepy. But this time, my response was to clam up completely. I just said oh, and then moved on. I wasn’t scared, or bothered by it, or worried about what they’d think. I didn’t go home and obsess about it. I guess I just felt this was something that belonged to me, and that I didn’t feel like sharing. I’m 53 now and only told this story for the first time about a year ago. It’s popped into my head randomly over the years, and I still wonder what it means. Have I gotten the gift, and, if so, what was it? If it happened, did I know it? Or am I still waiting? I don’t know.”
18.
“Years ago I was bored one night and decided to Ouija. I asked it if there was anything I needed to know and it spelled out, “watch out for a dog”. Over and over. It made absolutely no sense, until someone poisoned my dog in her own back yard via hamburger with ground glass in it. Whether it was coincidence or not, it remains one of the creepiest things to happen to me. The dog recovered 100%. We took her to the vet, she received the care she needed and recovered. I should mention she was a retired police dog and the person who poisoned her was a criminal who remembered her from her active duty days.”
19.
“She (my friend) was a preteen and had a sleepover. Someone brought a Ouija board and they decided to play. They supposedly contacted a young girl about their age. Talked with her for a while. Accused one another of pushing the planchette. Nothing really happened during the session. Later on, when it was time to fall asleep, there was a squeaking sound coming from the closet. My friend went to see what the noise was. There was a dog toy in the closet that was squeezing itself. It continued to squeak for the rest of the night, terrifying all the girls at the slumber party. No one got a wink of sleep that night.”
20.
“My mum told me this story. When they were teenagers, she and her 2 sisters went to an abandoned house next door. They set up candles and started to ask basic questions, my mum then tells me everything felt heavy. Like the energy in the room felt weighted like you were sinking. She said that she saw the shadows move up the walls but told me she was young and it was possibly just the candles. I asked her what did she ask the board? She got silent and said, well we asked who was going to get married first. It said i was going to be first, even though i was the youngest and your auntie Ally afterwards but your auntie Jen would never get married. Sure enough that prediction did come true.”
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