7 funny pranks to play on your housemates

No uni experience is complete without a good old prank war. Here's the best of the best...

Credit: Leriaphoto (left), Anatoliy Karlyuk (right) - Shutterstock

As a student, you're basically in the prime of your pranking life. You're living with your best mates, and never again will you get such an opportunity to wind them up, night and day.

Having multiple housemates means you're spoilt for choice when choosing who to target (if you can't choose, prank them all).

If you pull off some good pranks, they're bound to create some of your funniest uni memories – just remember to keep it safe...

Funny pranks to do at home

Here are our best pranks to play on your housemates without ruining friendships:

1. Cover their room in wrapping paper

   A classic uni prank! Use old newspapers or used wrapping paper to wrap everything in your housemate's bedroom. If you're going to do it, you have to do it properly, and that means wrapping the floors, walls, ceiling, bed, furniture and anything else on show.

   If nothing else, it's good practice for when Christmas comes around...

   Other great bedroom pranks include covering the floor with millions of water-filled cups, or sellotaping everything to the ceiling.

   You may find these pranks take a lot longer to create than for your friend to put right, so you're just pranking yourself really. But if you're a true prankster, it'll be worth it.

2. Change their laptop screen to a fake cracked desktop

   

   Credit: Collin Anderson - Flickr

   For any laptop-loving student, a broken screen is an absolute nightmare.

   Download an image like one of these and set it as their desktop picture – make sure to hide desktop icons for the full effect!

3. Hide an alarm clock in their room

   Is your housemate not a morning person? Buy a mini alarm clock, set it for 5am, and hide it somewhere in their room.

   You can then enjoy sweet dreams of them stumbling around trying to find the source of noise in the early hours.

   Ramp up the evil genius factor by hiding multiple alarm clocks, with their alarms set an hour apart. Just be aware that depending on how soundproof your house is, you could annoy quite a few housemates with this one...

4. Mess with their social media

   Getting your hands on someone's Facebook profile if they accidentally leave themselves logged in is old news – you probably did it hundreds of times back in school.

   But avoid the obviously fake statuses confessing undying love for someone, and go more subtle.

   For example, an easy one is to go on your friend's Instagram or TikTok profile and like all of their posts at the same time. This prank is even more effective if all your housemates like their posts as well so they get hundreds of notifications in quick succession.

5. Autocorrect their words

   

   Credit: Dusan Petkovic – Shutterstock

   This one is best to play on more technologically-incompetent parents, but works well at uni too.

   You basically set autocorrect on their phone or laptop to replace certain words with another phrase.

   If you manage to get hold of their iPhone, go to Settings > General > Keyboard and click 'Text Replacement'. There, you can make words they type autocorrect to something totally different.

   You can do the same on Google Docs or Microsoft too. In 'Tools' select 'Preferences' for Google Docs or head to File > Options > Proofing > AutoCorrect Options in Microsoft Word. You'll then be given the option to enter a word that you'd like to be replaced with something different.

   If they're studying Medicine, something like replacing 'health' with 'butt' would work well (e.g. 'smoking is bad for your butt') or if they're doing a teaching course, switch 'education' with 'toilet paper'.

   This one is particularly effective if you're on the same course, as you'll get to watch the confusion/frustration/embarrassment unfold like the cruel master prankster you are.

6. Paint all their pens with nail varnish

   Clear nail varnish is a godsend when it comes to pranking – try lacquering up a bar of soap so it doesn't lather in the shower, for example.

   Our favourite prank in this department is the pen prank. Go through whichever bag they take to uni and paint the ends of their pen with a dot of clear nail varnish.

   They'll have a hard time trying to take notes in lectures the next day... until they work out they need to remove the nail varnish.

7. Freeze their things or put them in jelly

   Taking inspiration from The Office here, get something small of theirs and either put it in a big blob of jelly or freeze it. It's easy to do, and super inconvenient for your friend.

   Try it with things like their keys or (the classic) stapler. You could even lock up their rucksack with a padlock and freeze the key.

   Evil but funny.

Are your housemates in the habit of doing any of these annoying pet peeves?