100 Most Common Escape Room Theme Ideas

As an escape room designer, you have a plethora of creative escape room themes to choose from when designing your experience. Some of the most common themes include prison breaks, bank heists, and Egyptian Tombs. The best escape room themes are popular for a reason – they offer a level of excitement and intrigue that appeals to a broad audience. However, while focusing on traditional escape room tropes will make your game more marketable, relying solely on these themes can limit your creativity, leave your audience unable to get immersed in the theme, and make your experience feel generic and uninspired.

To stand out from the crowd, it’s essential to think outside of the box when choosing a theme for your escape room. Consider unique and unexpected themes that will pique the interest of your target audience. For example, you could create an escape room based on a movie genre, or pop culture trends, or incorporate elements from different genres to create a one-of-a-kind experience.

Here is our space escape room: Lola 2 Mars

100 Escape Room Theme Ideas

Without further delay, here are the 100 most common escape room themes:

  1. Prison Escape
  2. Zombie Outbreak
  3. The Secret Agent’s Office
  4. The Bank Robbery
  5. Ancient Egypt Tomb
  6. The Casino Escape
  7. The Diamond Heist
  8. The Museum Break-in
  9. Da Vinci’s Code
  10. Spy Mission
  11. Medieval Castle
  12. Murder Mystery
  13. Treasure Hunt
  14. Time Travel
  15. Jungle Adventure
  16. Pirate’s Treasure
  17. Zombie Apocalypse
  18. Sherlock Holmes Mystery
  19. Haunted House
  20. Indiana Jones Adventure
  21. Harry Potter Wizarding World
  22. Superhero Hideout
  23. Escape from Alcatraz
  24. Ghost Ship
  25. FBI Investigation
  26. Arctic Expedition
  27. Atlantis Adventure
  28. Secret Agent Mission
  29. Alien Invasion
  30. Lost City of Atlantis
  31. Escape from Pompeii
  32. Wizard’s Tower
  33. Escape from the Apocalypse
  34. The Matrix
  35. Submarine Adventure
  36. Espionage
  37. The Titanic
  38. Escape from the Circus
  39. The Wild West
  40. The Inca Empire
  41. Trapped in a Snowstorm
  42. The Secret Laboratory
  43. The Bermuda Triangle
  44. The Black Plague
  45. Virtual Reality Game
  46. Casino Heist
  47. Escape from a Nuclear Bunker
  48. The Great Pyramid of Giza
  49. The Wizard of Oz
  50. The Underwater City
  51. Time Machine
  52. The Pirates of the Caribbean
  53. The Hobbit’s Lair
  54. The Lost Kingdom
  55. The Wizard’s School
  56. The Upside-Down Room
  57. The Arabian Nights
  58. The Matrix Reloaded
  59. The Sherlock Holmes Adventure
  60. The Vampire’s Lair
  61. Space Station
  62. The Titanic Sinking
  63. The Cyber Crime
  64. The Lost Island
  65. The Zombie Attack
  66. The Atlantis Temple
  67. The Haunted Hotel
  68. The Ghost Train
  69. The Ninja’s Hideout
  70. The Super Villain’s Lair
  71. The City of Gold
  72. The Jungle Temple
  73. The Ghost Ship Pirate’s Treasure
  74. The Time Travel Experiment
  75. The Virtual Reality Maze
  76. The Medieval Castle Siege
  77. The Zombie Survival
  78. The Black Ops Mission
  79. The Haunted Forest
  80. The End of the World
  81. The Secret Society
  82. The Lost Pyramid of the Mayans
  83. The Escape from the Underworld
  84. The Haunted Asylum
  85. The Alien Experiment
  86. The Apocalypse Survival
  87. The Zombie Hospital
  88. The Abandoned Mine
  89. The Deserted Island
  90. The Haunted Mansion Mystery
  91. The Carnival of Horrors
  92. The Secret Agent’s Hideout
  93. The Treasure of El Dorado
  94. The Jungle Safari
  95. The Sherlock Holmes Investigation
  96. The Upside-Down Mansion
  97. The Wizard’s Tower Siege
  98. The Zombie Outbreak Response Team
  99. Bank Heist Escape Room
  100. Lost Treasure Hunt

25 Extra Escape Room Ideas

Okay, we couldn’t just limit ourselves to 100. Here are a few more great escape room themes!

  1. The Cyber Crime Investigation
  2. The Escape from the Mafia
  3. The Haunted Lighthouse
  4. The Ghost Train Robbery
  5. The Superhero Training
  6. The Treasure Hunter’s Quest
  7. The Alien Abduction
  8. The Space Odyssey
  9. The Space Station
  10. The Escape fromThe Volcano Eruption
  11. The Lost Temple of the Aztecs
  12. The Ghost Town Mystery
  13. The Crystal Maze
  14. The Underwater Adventure
  15. The Abandoned Theme Park
  16. The Secret Island
  17. The Time Warp
  18. The Haunted Dollhouse
  19. The Escape from the Zoo
  20. The Interstellar Adventure
  21. The Lost World
  22. The Secret Society Conspiracy
  23. The Circus Escape
  24. Escape a Plane About To Crash
  25. Murder on the Orient Express

Tips On Building An Awesome Escape Room Game

In addition to choosing a unique theme, there are other ways to make your escape room experience stand out. Consider offering customization options, such as allowing customers to choose their own music or lighting preferences or creating special challenges for birthdays or other celebrations. You can also create holiday themes for escape rooms that lean into what you have already built but can then add a new layer to fit the time of year, such as a scary escape room for Halloween where the players must find clues that solve the same escape room puzzles but have been replaced with creepier props or riddles that lead to the same answer but are steeped in mystery. 

Another way to make your escape room stand out is to incorporate technology and interactive elements. Many escape rooms rely solely on traditional puzzles and clues, but incorporating technology such as augmented reality or motion sensors can add an extra layer of excitement and engagement to your experience. By combining technology and unique themes, you can create an immersive and unforgettable experience that keeps customers coming back for more.

Lastly, think about who your target audience will be. If you want to build a family-friendly escape room, you may want to make a more family-friendly choice such as a pirate-themed escape room rather than choosing say a military-themed escape room like “escape a POW camp”. If you are building your escape room in an area that already has its fair share of escape rooms where bandits have robbed the bank in town, or zombies are handcuffed to a chair in a room, choose room scenarios that won’t overlap with the current market such as escape the clutches of a dragon instead. 

Conclusion

While there are many popular escape room themes to choose from, it’s important to think outside of the box and come up with unique and exciting ideas that will set your experience apart from the rest. By incorporating technology, offering customization options, and balancing difficulty levels, you can create an immersive and unforgettable experience that keeps customers coming back for more.

Don’t be afraid to take risks and experiment with new ideas while incorporating classic escape room ideas. Also, don’t be discouraged if it takes time for you to create a theme offering a unique take on a common idea. Whether you are a DIY escape room artist, an industry veteran, or someone looking to get started in the escape room business, if you’re up to the challenge, we’re happy to chat and compare notes – the possibilities for thrilling escape room themes are endless!