Digital games such as Minecraft, FIFA and Fortnite are an important part of the everyday media lives of children and young people. Their popularity continues to grow. They now have an undeniable cultural and social relevance. The games are used for entertainment or to pass the time, as well as a meeting place to cultivate (virtual) friendships. For some years now, digital games have also been gaining importance in an educational context. When used in the classroom, they can be linked to children's and young people's lives, thus opening up new didactic potential. Like books or films, games are everyday media that are used as a matter of course and can convey a wide range of learning content. Digital games thus broaden the methodological spectrum of teachers and can complement or even replace conventional approaches. Their use is subject to the same didactic and pedagogical premises as analogue teaching objects. Accordingly, they should also follow principles such as relevance to life, age appropriateness, promotion of autonomy, competence orientation and clarity. On the one hand, the use of digital games in the classroom pursues concrete subject-specific learning goals. On the other hand, risks associated with video games can be addressed, for example, by addressing gaming addiction and teaching media literacy in dealing with game content. The didactic potential lies especially in the support of action- and solution-oriented teaching. There are already many examples of the use of computer games in the classroom. Nevertheless, their use is not yet a matter of course in Germany. Targeted teacher training, the inclusion of the topic in teacher training curricula, the development of teaching materials and uniform technical standards could facilitate the use of computer games in the classroom and contribute to a stronger development of the potential of digital games in education.