From Hannah Gadsby to Sacha Baron Cohen: the 30 best living comedians
10 Seriously Easy Pranks For April Fools' Day
April Fools' Day is tomorrow, which mainly means one thing: you don't have much time to prepare.
Everyone knows the Fools Rules(™): if you do not prank others, they will mercilessly prank you. Just in case your creativity is running low, we've compiled a list of easy pranks literally anyone could pull off.
Here are some simple pranks you should definitely try at home:
Becoming "Mom"Go into your friend's phone and swap your contact info with the name "Mom." Then, send them weird messages and just watch the show.
Morning SoyReplace coffee in a morning coffee pot with diluted soy sauce. Mmm, delicious.
Salt & SwitchIs your roommate an at-home chef? Get them with an old classic: replace their kitchen sugar with salt. Muhahahaha.
Mashable Top Stories
The DoNOT eat thisBuy a Bavarian cream donut at your local coffee shop. Squeeze out the sweet cream and replace it with minty toothpaste or mayo.
The fake ETAText your friend and ask what time they're getting to a location for a hang out that doesn't exist. Any prompt friend (us) will hate this.
The carbonated shakeHere's one that takes almost no preparation at all. Shake up all the sodas and beer in your home/office and let science do your dirty work.
Autocorrect madnessSteal your friend's phone and truly go ham with their autocorrect.
Let the remote drive them crazyPut some tape over the sensor on your home TV remote, and watch your loved one slowly lose their mind.
Pandora's drawerPrint out a picture you know will scare your prankee, and hide it in one of their drawers. No one expects a fright when they're opening their sock drawer in the morning.
Credit: Shutterstock / Kjetil Kolbjornsrud
I can't believe it's not deodorantReplace your victim's deodorant with butter. They might hate you for this one, but the video could maybe be worth it.
Remember: prank or be pranked, friends.
Featured Video For You
4 April Fools pranks to trick your friends
15 Easy April Fools' Pranks To Pull On Facebook
Easy April Fools' Pranks for 2025: Online April Fools' Pranks for FacebookSkip to main content
These online April Fools' pranks will trick your friends and leave you laughing
Jessica Peterson/Getty Images Easy April Fools' pranks for FacebookIf you really want to mess with someone in 2025, tricking them on social media is the way to do it. These sneaky and easy April Fools' pranks for Facebook are fun, harmless ways to cause a little social media mayhem for April Fools' Day.
You can pull some of these easy April Fools' pranks from your own account, fooling all of your followers. For the others, you'll need access to a friend's account. As with any prank, assess your relationship with the prankee beforehand to be as sure as possible that they'll take the prank in stride. Not everyone will laugh along with you after learning you've tampered with their social media!
Not on Facebook? These online April Fools' pranks work for any social networking site, including Instagram and X (formerly Twitter). Keep reading for genius pranks to trick everyone from your closest pals to your social media followers.
Get Reader's Digest's Read Up newsletter for more humor, cleaning, travel, tech and fun facts all week long.
ⓘ
Surprise engagementThis easy April Fools' prank is your chance to "put a ring on it." Snap a photo of yourself rocking a friend's bling or even some fake jewelry, and slyly drop the hint that you're getting hitched. Now imagine this: Your partner sees the posts and even leaves a comment. It's a great April Fools' prank for boyfriends too—he'll be just as confused as your followers.
Pascale Gueret/Getty Images An unexpected moveStir up some excitement by posting a photo of a far-flung country or city. For this easy April Fools' prank, you'll be dropping the unexpected news of your big move. Then sit back and wait for the comments to roll in: Where did you move … and when? What will you tell them?
I'm pregnant!?Ready to send shock waves through the internet? Snag a picture of a positive pregnancy test and share it as your own, or opt for simply announcing there's a "bun in the oven." Either way, get ready for some major reactions!
Celebrity meetupGot some Photoshop skills? If so, this easy April Fools' prank is for you. Edit a photo to make it seem like you met your favorite celebrity. It'll have everyone doing a double-take. This also makes a great April Fools' prank for kids, especially if there's a certain celeb they're dying to meet.
Whet their curiosityWant to make your Facebook friend incredibly curious? With a practical joke that does double duty as an April Fools' text prank, you'll tease your pal with the smallest nugget of news. Here's how it works: Send a slightly cryptic message to a (good-natured) friend on Facebook. Notes like "Thanks for the flowers and remembering my big day" and "I'm celebrating the big news with those chocolates you sent" hint at something special. When the person has responded (likely in confusion) quickly message again that it was meant for someone else. See how long it takes them to ask about the message before you reveal the joke.
Also, check out these best pranks to pull based on your zodiac sign—and let the practical joking begin!
Culture Club/Getty Images Song lyrics onlyFeeling mischievous? Pick a song that could pass for normal conversation and use the lyrics in all your responses when chatting on Facebook Messenger or replying to comments on one of your Facebook posts. It's a super-easy April Fools' prank that's worth trying for the laughs it brings in.
picture alliance/Getty Images You have 100 notificationsHere's one of those beautifully annoying yet easy April Fools' pranks you can knock out during your lunch hour. Go to your victim's Facebook profile and "like" every single thing they've ever posted. That's it. The next time they log in or check the app, they will find hundreds of notifications waiting. This is especially effective if they get alerts on their phone, which will be bombarded with notifications while you're pranking them.
Big newsThis online April Fools' prank is an oldie but a goodie. On your Facebook page, post an effusive status: "OMG!!! Congratulations to my bestie [add your friend's name here] on her engagement/pregnancy/new job!!!" Tailor it to your friend's interests and stage of life to really make people fall for it. Don't forget to tag your friend's account rather than just type the name—that way, it will show up on your pal's profile. They'll get swarmed with stunned, congratulatory messages and have to let all of their well-wishers down easily.
Because this is one of the easiest April Fools' pranks to pull off, you'll have leftover time to get others in on the gag. Ask a few of your and your victim's close friends to post a congratulatory comment on your post, or have them make a post of their own. With a few more people involved, the "news" will be more believable.
Getty Images, via npr.Org "Nobody reads anymore!"This is an easy April Fools' prank to play on your parents, pals and pretty much anyone you're connected to on Facebook. First, post this link from NPR, titled "Why Doesn't America Read Anymore?" Include in your status a generic comment, like "So sad" or "Seriously, what is wrong, people?"
Now it's time to wait. See, this "story" is actually a prank devised by NPR to poke fun at serial commenters. "We sometimes get the sense that some people are commenting on NPR stories that they haven't actually read," the article says. "If you are reading this, please like this post and do not comment on it. Then let's see what people have to say about this 'story.'" If you see a friend post this same link, like it and keep the joke going.
You're everywhereAn incredibly easy but effective April Fools' prank for Facebook, this is as good as an April Fools' Day joke. Tag yourself in a whole bunch of your friend's photos—photos that you're not in, that is. Tag any untagged people as you; tag their pet as you (that'll really drive them nuts!); or if they don't tag themselves in their own photos, tag them as you.
Your friend will be spammed with notifications letting them know you're tagging yourself in their photos. For some, er, subtle nudging, tag yourself in photos of get-togethers they hosted but didn't invite you to. It's all in good fun, of course.
The unguarded profileFor the next batch of easy April Fools' pranks, you'll need access to your friend's profile while they're already logged in so that you can make some sneaky tweaks. If you work in an office, chances are you can navigate to Facebook on any coworker's computer and find them already logged in to their account. If they are, now's your chance to really alter their profile (and probably their opinion of you as a person). The first quick prank you can pull with an unguarded profile: Change your friend's name and profile picture to reference an inside joke. (Keep it clean and respectful!)
Douglas Sacha/Getty Images Shalom, mayhemWhile logged in as your friend, go to "Language and Region" under Settings and change your friend's display language to Hebrew or Mandarin—really any language that uses a completely different alphabet than ours, leaving your victim no clues as to how to change it back.
Dmitry Ageev/Getty Images Do I know you?If you're able to access a friend's or family member's Facebook account, send a friend request to everyone on their "people you may know" page. This feed refreshes endlessly, so keep adding to your heart's content (just don't get caught). Your friend will be baffled by the influx of new friends over the next few days.
Klaus Vedfelt/Getty Images Merry un-birthday!Change your friend's date of birth to April 1 while you're logged in to their account, confusing them with a tide of erroneous well-wishes. The real butt of this easy April Fools' prank? All of your friend's friends, who have no idea when your pal's real birthday is.
OLIVIER DOULIERY/getty images Keep it hiddenThis is an easy April Fools' prank to pull on any social media user who loves racking up the likes—and whose account you have access to. Click "Privacy Settings and Tools," under "Privacy," and in the drop-down menu, under "Who can see your future posts," click "Only me." None of your friend's friends will be able to see their new posts. See how long it takes them to notice they're not getting any likes.
Why trust usReader's Digest has been telling jokes for more than 100 years, curated and reviewed over the past 20 years by Senior Features Editor Andy Simmons, a humor editor formerly of National Lampoon and the author of Now That's Funny. We've earned prestigious ASME awards for our humor—including comical quips, pranks, puns, cartoons, one-liners, knock-knock jokes, riddles, memes, tweets and stories in laugh-out-loud magazine columns such as "Life in These United States," "All in a Day's Work," "Laughter Is the Best Medicine" and "Humor in Uniform," as well as online collections such as short jokes, dad jokes and jokes so bad, they're great. You can find a century of humor in our 2022 compendium, Reader's Digest: Laughter, the Best Medicine. Read more about our team, our contributors and our editorial policies.
We are no longer supporting IE (Internet Explorer) as we strive to provide site experiences for browsers that support new web standards and security practices.
We recommend our users to update the browser.
Some Of The Best April Fools' Day Pranks In History
Defying gravityThis prank was out of this world.
In 1976, renowned astronomer Patrick Moore appeared on BBC Radio 2 and announced that at 9:47am, we would feel what he called the 'Jovian-Plutonian gravitational effect'.
He said that at that exact moment, the planets would align and gravity on Earth would get a tiny bit weaker, so if you jumped in the air at exactly the right moment, you would almost float.
Evidently this was a load of rubbish, but it doesn't stop the pseudo-science from being recirculated every so often by people who fall for it.
Comments
Post a Comment