If you want to know the best easy magic tricks for kids, you’ve come to the right place!
In today’s post I will be giving you a complete overview of my personal top 7 choices, and how your child can learn them.
Firstly, why magic?
Magic is a great hobby to get kids into at a young age for a few reasons.
It can really help your child’s confidence to have some awesome tricks up their sleeve that they can show off to their friends.
Performing magic is also a great way for your child to work on their communication and ‘people’ skills.
And ultimately, it’s really fun!
One thing that is important to say before we start this out is that it is completely fine if your child struggles with any of these tricks. Most of them are very easy, but a couple require a secret ‘move’ here and there.
Don’t worry if you can’t do it straightaway (no one can!) but just keep on practicing and it’ll soon become second nature.
So let’s get into it…
Trick 7: Make A Coin Disappear
This is a classic of magic and a great place to start out. What says magic more than making a coin disappear right in front of someone’s eyes?
For me, coin magic is a great place for your child to start because it is such a common item.
Almost everyone will have a bit of loose change handy, which also means the trick can be done with THEIR coin. That’s a great way to create a real WOW moment.
Plus, if your child is a little shy about using playing cards right away, a coin is a much more ordinary object and you can do magic with it without looking cliche.
How cool would it be to be able to entertain people with just a regular coin? Making a coin disappear is your first step to making this possible.
The method I’ll be showing you here is based purely on sleight of hand. But don’t worry, it isn’t as hard as it sounds.
You can click on ‘magic tutorials’ and head over to ‘coin tricks’ to get started!
Trick 6: The Floating Card
The floating card is another classic of magic that will impress everyone, regardless of age.
The best part is that the technique will work with other similar objects. For example, you could make a credit card float using the same method (although I doubt your child will be getting access to many of these).
There are a few different ways to accomplish this awesome illusion, you can learn how to do it for free here.
This is a really cool trick but make sure your child understands how delicate the equipment is; you’ve got to be careful with it.
Maybe instead of risking taking it out with you, you could film them doing to floating card trick so they can show other people without breaking it.
This trick is a good one for kids because it doesn’t require a complicated explanation, or lots of memory work. There’s no need to memorize a bunch of cards. In fact, the spectators don’t have to do a thing, they can just watch and enjoy the spectacle.
Trick 5: The Magic Coloring Book
This is one of my favorite tricks of all time, and luckily for you it is actually incredibly easy.
Picture this: a magician shows you an ordinary coloring book filled with black and white pictures just waiting to be colored. He slowly closes the book, says the magic words, and when he reopens it, the drawings are FULL of color.
He flicks through all the pages slowly so you get a good long look, and then closes the book one more time.
Again, he says the magic words. This time when he opens it, there’s no color.
But it doesn’t end there!
There’s no drawings either. The book is completely blank.
This is a really cool trick that will completely baffle anyone who watches it. As I mentioned though, it is in reality very simple to do.
There is no sleight of hand or tricky moves required with this one. It’s as easy as opening and closing the book.
Your child can master this trick very quickly, and they should be ready to try it out within minutes of learning it.
These books are great for kids because the effect is so strong that you don’t actually have to be the most confident or the best performer. Just make sure you take it slow and really emphasize each stage of the trick.
Trick 4: Sponge Balls
Sponge balls! Have you heard of them?
Chances are the only time you’ve seen them has been on the end of a clown’s nose, but they’re actually GREAT for magic tricks. Here’s why:
They can be squished up A LOT
This makes them easy to hide in your hand. You can fit a good few sponge balls in one fist and make it look like one!
They’re visual
Bright red makes them hard to miss, which means when you make them vanish, it has an even greater effect on the audience. You can actually use the SAME techniques to make a sponge ball vanish as you learnt at the start of this post (how to make a coin disappear).
They’re cheap
Sponge balls are pretty easy to make, so you can find them really cheap on eBay or Amazon. You can also pick them up as part of a magic kit, but we’ll talk more about that later.
If you want a good idea of how your child could use sponge balls in their magic tricks, watch this video!
While it might take your child a little while practicing before they can get to this level, it’s definitely worth the time and effort.
Sponge balls are fun and easy to carry around with you; they pack light and can be brought out at a moments notice.
Pick 3: Cardtoon
This is one of MY favorite tricks, but it is also easy enough for kids to learn.
Imagine this:
A magician asks you to THINK of a card. No tricky moves or sleight of hand; you simply picture any card in the deck.
This is a completely free choice and you never tell anyone what card you are thinking of. The magician shows you a unique deck of cards he has. Each card has a little cartoon stickman drawn on the back. When you flick through them, it creates a little animation.
For the first time, the magician asks you to name your card aloud.
After you do, without any funny moves, the magician begins flicking through the cards. In the animation, the cartoon stickman slowly reaches up, pulls off his hat, and removes a single card. He flips the card over.
Guess what?
It’s your card.
This trick is ideal for kids because it’s so fun. The idea of a stickman reading your mind appeals to kids and impresses adults, so it’s a win win.
This trick was used on Britain’s Got Talent and ending up making Simon Cowell admit that he had begun believing in magic. Don’t believe me? Click here for the video evidence.
Now let’s talk about our penultimate trick…
Trick 2: The Invisible Deck
This trick works similar to Cardtoon, with a few key differences.
This trick is simpler and in turn, more impactful in my opinion.
Importantly, it’s just as easy to do, so you kid should have absolutely no issues with it. This trick has been used on shows like America’s Got Talent, and is in the routine of almost every professional magician. But it is simple enough for a kid to do!
So, I’ll keep the explanation for this one brief;
It works very similar to Cardtoon (the magician asks you to think of a card- ANY card – without telling him)
But this time, the reveal is different. The magician pulls out a normal deck of cards, and slowly spreads through them. Every card in the deck is face up, apart from one card. One card is face down; your thought of card.
Crazy, right?
And the best part is that your kid can pick up this trick and learn it in minutes. It really is as good as it sounds. They really can think of ANY card at all, and you get it right EVERY time with zero sleight of hand.
You couldn’t ask for a better card trick for kids in my opinion.
Pick 1: A Magic Kit
I’m cheating here, because this isn’t strictly a magic trick, but rather a whole set of them.
Magic kits are the best way to get your child into magic.
Rather than settling for ONE trick, or taking a chance, you get access to hundreds of tricks.
You also usually get an instructional guide and a DVD full of tutorials on how to perform the tricks which is a great bonus.
And what’s more, the tricks are usually very high quality. Rather than paying out for the individual tricks on this list, you get them all in one place at a great price.
My number one pick would be Jim Stott’s Ultimate Magic Kit.
In this handy set, you get unlimited access to:
The floating card,
Sponge ball magic,
A magic deck of cards,
The disappearing card,
And much more!
As you can see we’ve already ticked off some of the other tricks on this list in one go. All in all you can learn over 300 different magic tricks with this kit along with complete instructions on how to do them.
It’s also very reasonably priced. You can find it for around 30 dollars on Amazon.
Most magic kits are pretty well put together, but you want to do your research first. Some magic kits have awesome tricks that even professionals use (like the set I mentioned above) but others are full of cheap tricks that are likely to break before you get a chance to use them.
But that aside, a magic kit is definitely my top pick for either a parent looking for a gift to get their child into magic, or a kid who’s interested in getting started.
So, there you are! My top 7 easy tricks for kids.
Did you enjoy this article? Do you still have any questions, feedback, or comments? Feel free to get in touch either in the comment section below or by dropping me an email at contact@thedailymagician.com. I will be sure to reply in under 24 hours to any queries you might have!
And don’t forget to share this article if you enjoyed it!
Love this me being a magician at heart when i was a kid this is a great article that brings back memories of back then when i was into this type of stuff loving this!
Glad you enjoyed! Magic is a great way to make some awesome memories.
I always enjoy reading your articles! It is very entertaining and at the same time informative. My son loves magic and I am going to teach him these things you discuss here, he is a toddler still so have to teach him the easy stuff first. Will keep checking back on your site!
Awesome! I hope he enjoys it. These are definitely the easiest tricks for his age group!
Hello Benji, this does sound fantastic. I’ll give a try one of these days. Thanks.
Thanks for the comment! Keep us posted on how it goes.
This is awesome! I have 2 school age grandchildren who would love to impress their friends with these tricks. I will be forwarding this site to them.
I have always been enthralled by magicians and would like to see them get interested as well.
Thanks for including something for kids here.
KyleAnn
It really is a great hobby for kids to get involved in, I hope they enjoy them!
I came across your site and was so pleased to see you offer some easy to do tricks for kids. My granddaughter will love these. How old do you think a child should be in order to embrace doing magic?
There really is no hard and fast rule to it, but if I had to guess I would maybe say around 6? What do you think?
This is so awesome. Not just the magic tricks, but the info on what learning magic, for a young child instills. I never thought of it in that light.
I will be sharing this page with a few of our daughters friends, who have young children.
Thanks for sharing,
Laura
Yep, that is one of the best parts of it. Thanks for stopping by!
Nice article!
My son is at the age of really learning and digesting everything around him and I think he would love some of these tricks. He’s a smart kid and I bet he’d love some of these simple tricks!
I hope so! Let me know if he does.