18 Fun Websites to Instantly Beat Boredom Online (2024)

Were you looking for websites to go to when bored? Don't let boredom get boring. Even Steve Jobs was a fan of boredom. He believed that boredom allowed room for creativity. But, of course, we all know how that turned out.

Even science says boredom is good for the brain. So, trust the boffins and take on boredom with these fun websites.

1. 100,000 Stars

Open this interactive visualization in the Chrome browser and cure your boredom with a trip through space. The artistic rendition maps the location of over 100,000 nearby stars and our solar system.

The Chrome experiment isn't for astronomy buffs alone, as it gives everyone an idea of the universe around us.

Bonus: If you love interstellar travel with your browser, visit The Map of the Universe to look into the observable universe (almost 200,000 galaxies) out there.

2. History Maps

This educational site is enough proof that you can beat boredom with learning. History may have been boring in school, but not today. History Maps uses interactive maps, YouTube videos, and a Timeline game to teach you visually history. Learn about the origins of different civilizations and events that shaped our world.

The site is the creation of Nono Umas, who combines his love for history and its stories. There's no end to learning about history, so keep visiting as the site evolves with new resources.

3. Museum of Endangered Sounds

Want a dose of serious nostalgia? Maybe a dial-up modem's sound will do it for you, or the dial of a rotary phone. The Museum of Nostalgia will send you back in time. The single-person effort from Brendan Chilcutt aims to preserve the signature sounds of old technologies.

4. A Good Movie to Watch

A good movie is an obvious thing to do online when bored. But the sheer number of options can feel overwhelming. This fun website is a movie recommendation engine with a difference.

It will only filter movies with a viewer score higher than 70% (e.g., 7/10 on IMDb) and a critic score higher than 70% (e.g., on sites like Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic). So, you get to see a selection of the best films that stand above the clutter.

5. Talk to Books

There's a lot of talk about Google Bard, but the internet company isn't a latecomer to Al. Many Google apps use deep learning and artificial intelligence daily. Talk to Books is another example. The unique search engine for book quotes uses AI input to surface ideas from books and look up answers to your questions. You can type your queries, though voice works better as the demo tool is designed for conversational AI.

It's an excellent way to gain wisdom from the millions of books indexed by Googl, and the books themselves.

6. NSA Haiku Generator

The National Security Agency isn't one of the places to go when bored. So you wouldn't connect the NSA and poetry even within a few words of each other. But this automatic haiku generator manages to pull it off. So, stoke your wildest imagination with weird mashups of beautiful syllables.

The source of the random words is the NSA's database of search terms used to red flag terrorist threats.

7. Sketch Something Daily

Creativity is the magic pill to zap boredom. Sketch Something Daily is one of the artistic things to do online when bored. So, pick up a pencil, pen, or even a paintbrush, and test yourself with the daily illustrations on the site.

Try it as a daily habit and stifle the yawns as you interest yourself enough to learn the basics of drawing with the help of other sites on the web.

8. Cloudhiker

Remember StumbleUpon? The makers shuttered the popular site, but several StumbleUpon alternatives rose in its wake. Cloudhiker works on the same principles of random discovery, making it a useful website to go on when you are bored.

The links are carefully curated, and there are at least 7500+ sites in 19 categories as of the last count. For instant random discoveries, try their browser extension too.

9. 2 Kinds of People

Another humorous Tumblr blog. Another dosage of laughter. The site hasn't been updated in a while, but it is still worth visiting. The simple illustrations show that only two kinds of people exist in the world. Those that have a sense of humor and the rest who don't.

If you fall into the former, then you will have cured your boredom. If not, read on.

10. The Evolution of Trust

Mistrust is as deadly as misinformation. And both have been part of our human experience for a long time. This interactive game uses game theory to simplify the problem of mistrust for us.

Game theory is a complex subject, so the visualization uses a "cheating" mode and a "cooperation" mode to reveal the neuroscience of mistrust. If you have time to spare, try this fun link when you are bored.

11. Gross Science

YouTube alone can give you enough things to do on the internet. So, I am cheating by mentioning the Gross Science channel. But I couldn't help myself as I got pulled in by all the bizarre but scientific videos.

So, find out about clothes made of slime. Or why your pee can change the world. As I said, I couldn't help myself.

12. Innovation Station

While we are on science and videos, could I also mention Innovation Station? This is a little-known but fantastic website to go to when you're bored. It showcases the latest videos on innovation and futuristic technologies.

It is an excellent learning platform. Their charter says, "We aim to inspire and educate by putting innovations and innovators in the spotlight."

13. Weird or Confusing

Wonder how unicorn meat tastes. This site will make you wonder about things like that. Press the button, and it will beam you into the crazy aisles of eBay and its shopping universe, where everything can be sold.

Well, it's not all useless. That inflatable unicorn horn for cats sounds like a better deal than unicorn meat. Just hope it's not a new eBay scam. Sometimes, you will hit a page without any funny eBay product. Just click on that pink Please button again.

14. The Symphony of Blockchain

Visuals can help you understand even the most complex of technologies. Blockchain and cryptocurrency are all the rage now. The Symphony of Blockchain takes you on an interactive, visual, and auditory exploration of what it's all about. It's a way to mix online fun with a dose of education.

Try it. It's wonderfully hypnotic as the 3D Bitcoin blocks move and expand against the music background. Click on each block, and it opens to give you more information.

15. The Passive Aggressive Password Machine

Let's not underrate the value of a strong password in keeping the world safe. The PaP Machine is a neat little side project that can quickly bring you out of your boredom with its funny and honest feedback on the strength of your passwords.

16. Arbitrary Awards

Did you know that most awards are paid for? Well, if you didn't, then that's what this site tells you. The developers here made their own awards and gave you a platform to gift yourself one with the many choices available.

You deserve an award if you have scrolled so far down the page. And, if we managed to cure your boredom, we deserve one too. So, just a friendly word in the comments will do for now.

17. What Came First

The head of a skeleton with a burning cigarette or Neil Armstrong's trip to space? This fun game asks you to guess which came first. The simple premise could be your gateway to knowledge and help you use your boredom creatively.

The Google Experiment offers you two choices, and you must select the one which chronologically came before the other. The faster you play, the more you score.

18. Redditle

You won't get bored easily if you land on Reddit. One of the world's largest communities has a subreddit on every topic imaginable. One of the better ways to dive deeper is through this Reddit search engine. Redditle can be used for broader searches or for searching a specific subreddit.

Try "boredom + fun website" to get even more recommendations from the community.

There Are Many More Fun Things to Do Online

Instead of trying to zap it away, you might light up a spark of motivation.

Boredom should be anything but boring. Sounds ironic, doesn't it, when you consider that you can pick up something to do with a mouse click.