48 Fun Facts About Greta Thunberg

In which city was Greta Thunberg born in 2003?

Stockholm. She did not have to travel to start her protest: the Swedish parliament whose steps she sat on in 2018 stands in her home city.

How did Thunberg spend the first day of her school strike?

By herself. She had tried to bring other young people with her, but no one was interested; on the second day, she says, people started joining her.

Thunberg's strike inspired which worldwide youth movement?

Fridays for Future. Once her daily sit-in ended she went back to class four days a week and kept the fifth for the parliament steps, a routine students in hundreds of cities soon copied.

Thunberg's mother, Malena Ernman, is famous as what?

An opera singer, one of Sweden's most celebrated. Malena Ernman gave up her international career, and the air travel it depended on, after her daughter persuaded the family to change how it lived.

Thunberg's middle name Tintin echoes the creation of which cartoonist?

Hergé. Her full name is Greta Tintin Eleonora Ernman Thunberg; the cartoonist's own name was invented too, from his initials reversed, R.G., said aloud in French.

Thunberg has described which diagnosis as her "superpower"?

Asperger syndrome. She has called being different a gift, saying that if she had been like everyone else she would never have started the school strike.

Which three words did Thunberg hurl at world leaders at the UN Climate Action Summit in New York in 2019?

How dare you. She said she should have been back in school on the other side of the ocean, and accused the leaders of stealing her dreams and her childhood with their empty words.

Which influencer's boast about his 33 cars drew a sarcastic reply from Thunberg that became one of Twitter's most-liked posts?

Andrew Tate. He offered to send her a list of his cars' 'enormous emissions'; her reply, inviting him to write to a mocking email address, was liked several million times.

Thunberg says the idea of a strike came from student activists responding to what in the U.S. in 2018?

School shootings. Students in Parkland, Florida, refused to go back to class after the massacre there, and someone Thunberg knew wondered aloud what would happen if children did the same for the climate.

What did Thunberg win in May 2018, three months before her strike?

An essay contest. Her piece for Svenska Dagbladet asked how she could feel safe in 'the greatest crisis in human history', and after it ran a climate activist got in touch with her.

Asked to testify to the US Congress in 2019, Thunberg offered no prepared remarks and submitted what instead?

An IPCC climate report. She told the hearing she did not want members to listen to her but to the scientists, and left the panel's 2018 warning on 1.5 degrees of warming as her testimony.

What did Thunberg's original protest sign say, in Swedish?

Skolstrejk för klimatet, Swedish for 'school strike for climate'. Strikers around the world have since translated her hand-painted banner into dozens of languages.

Thunberg's initial strike lasted three weeks, until which event?

The Swedish general election, held on 9 September 2018. Afterwards she said the result 'didn't matter', because no party was offering the politics the climate needed.

Thunberg cut ties with the company We Don't Have Time after learning what?

It used her name to raise money. Founder Ingmar Rentzhog cited her more than eleven times in material for a share issue worth almost 10 million kronor; her father said the family had never been told.

At the January 2019 World Economic Forum in Davos, Thunberg declared what?

"Our house is on fire" was her opening line. She told the business leaders she did not want their hope: she wanted them to panic, and to act as they would in a crisis.

Which religious leader thanked Thunberg and encouraged her to continue when they met briefly in April 2019?

Pope Francis. She joined his weekly general audience in St Peter's Square during a week that also took her to the European Parliament and the Italian Senate.

In August 2019 Thunberg sailed to New York from Plymouth aboard which racing yacht?

Malizia II. The 60-foot yacht was built for round-the-world racing, not comfort: it had no toilet, shower or proper beds, only blue plastic buckets.

Thunberg returned to Europe in 2019 aboard La Vagabonde, a catamaran owned by a couple from which country?

Australia. Riley Whitelum and Elayna Carausu, sailing the world with their young son, answered her online plea for a lift across the Atlantic, and a professional British yachtswoman joined them for the crossing.

Why was COP25 moved at short notice from Santiago to Madrid in 2019?

Public unrest in Chile, which led its government to pull out as host. Thunberg had already reached California on her way to the summit, and had to ask online for a way back across the Atlantic.

Thunberg and 15 other young petitioners filed their 2019 climate complaint against five countries under which treaty?

Child Rights Convention. They accused Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany and Turkey of cutting too little themselves and of failing to press the world's biggest emitters to do more.

Thunberg led a 2019 climate march that the mayor called the largest protest in which Canadian city's history?

Montreal. Organisers put the crowd at about half a million; the city made public transport free for the day, and the mayor presented Thunberg with its keys.

After Trump tweeted that she seemed "a very happy young girl," what did Thunberg do?

Changed her Twitter bio to match. For a while she was 'a very happy young girl looking forward to a bright and wonderful future', and she repeated the trick when Vladimir Putin called her kind but poorly informed.

Which Time magazine title went to 16-year-old Thunberg in December 2019, making her its youngest ever holder?

Person of the Year. She was also the first holder born in the 21st century; Donald Trump called the choice 'so ridiculous' and told her to 'Chill Greta, Chill!'

Thunberg was guest editor of which BBC Radio 4 programme in late 2019?

Today. Her edition brought her first conversation with Sir David Attenborough, who told her: 'You have aroused the world.'

Which 2019 honour, known as Sweden's alternative Nobel Prize, did Thunberg receive?

Right Livelihood Award. It earned its nickname at birth: its founder set it up in 1980 after the Nobel Foundation turned down his proposal for new prizes, one of them for the environment.

Thunberg was the first winner of which €1 million award in 2020, and gave the money away?

Gulbenkian Prize for Humanity. Her foundation pledged the whole sum to climate causes, starting with 100,000 euros for a youth-led campaign against Covid-19 in the Brazilian Amazon.

Thunberg was first nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 by deputies from which parliament?

Norway's. Three Socialist Left deputies put her name forward, arguing that unchecked climate change 'will be the cause of wars, conflict and refugees'.

Amnesty International gave Thunberg and her movement its top honour in 2019, called what?

Ambassador of Conscience Award. The name comes from 'From the Republic of Conscience', a poem Seamus Heaney wrote for Amnesty in 1985; earlier winners include Nelson Mandela.

Thunberg's 2019 collection of speeches is titled what?

No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference. Penguin rushed the eleven speeches out as a £2.99 paperback, and Waterstones named the 16-year-old its author of the year.

Thunberg's 2022 compilation of more than a hundred experts is titled what?

The Climate Book. She gave its royalties to her foundation, then pulled out of an Edinburgh book festival event promoting it, accusing the festival's main sponsor of greenwashing.

At COP26 in Glasgow in 2021, Thunberg dismissed leaders' promises with which three-word phrase?

"Blah blah blah" was her verdict. She told a youth rally in the city that leaders had held 26 of these summits and had 'decades' of talk, and asked where it had got anyone.

Thunberg was detained by German police in 2023 protesting a coal mine near which village?

Lützerath. The abandoned village was being cleared for the Garzweiler mine; three officers carried Thunberg away from the pit's edge, and she was released after an identity check.

How did Thunberg mark finishing secondary school in June 2023?

With a final strike in her white gown. It was her last school strike, held in the traditional Swedish graduation dress and cap; she said her 'fight has only just begun' and started a university degree that autumn.

A Malmö court fined Thunberg in 2023 for disobeying police at a protest blocking what?

Oil tankers. She accepted the facts but called the road blockade self-defence against the fossil fuel industry, and within hours of the verdict she was back at another one.

What became of the charge against Thunberg after her arrest outside a London oil conference in October 2023?

She was cleared. A judge ruled that she and four fellow protesters had no case to answer over the demonstration outside the Energy Intelligence Forum, an industry summit dubbed the 'Oscars of oil'.

Thunberg boycotted COP29 in 2024, hosted by which country?

Azerbaijan. She called it 'nauseating' hypocrisy to hold a climate summit there, citing its treatment of Armenians, and joined protests in neighbouring Georgia and Armenia instead.

In June 2025 Thunberg joined a Gaza-bound aid flotilla aboard which UK-flagged vessel?

Madleen. Israeli forces boarded the vessel in international waters on 9 June and took it to the port of Ashdod; Thunberg was deported the following day.

In November 2025 Thunberg and Extinction Rebellion activists dyed which famous waterway green?

Venice's Grand Canal. The activists said the dye was harmless and timed it to the close of the COP30 climate summit; each was banned from the city for 48 hours and fined 150 euros.

The Swedish buzzword for the anti-aviation movement Thunberg spearheaded translates as what?

Flight shame, or flygskam. As the word caught on, Swedish Railways reported an 8 per cent rise in journeys, and a companion hashtag urged travellers to stay on the ground.

Nelloptodes gretae, named after Thunberg in 2019, is what kind of creature?

A beetle. It is less than a millimetre long and has neither eyes nor wings, but its two long antennae look rather like pigtails.

The genus Thunberga, named in Thunberg's honour in 2020, contains what animals?

Huntsman spiders. The genus, known only from Madagascar and nearby Mayotte, has since gained species named for other young campaigners, among them Thunberga malala and Thunberga boyanslat.

Which climate science pioneer do Thunberg and her father claim as a distant relative?

Svante Arrhenius. In 1896 he first calculated how carbon dioxide emissions warm the planet; Thunberg's father, who is named after him, believes the chemist was a cousin of his own great-grandmother.

Thunberg contributed a spoken-word track in 2019 to a release by which English band?

The 1975. She was the first outside voice the band had ever put on a record; the track ends with her call for civil disobedience, and its proceeds went to Extinction Rebellion at her request.

Which environmental prize did Thunberg turn down in October 2019, along with its money?

Nordic Council Environment Prize. She said 'the climate movement does not need any more awards', and that the Nordic countries bragged about their green record while their real emissions told another story.

The 2020 Hulu documentary I Am Greta had its world premiere at which film festival?

Venice. Director Nathan Grossman had begun filming in the first days of her strike, when nobody knew her name, and handled camera and sound himself all the way to the Atlantic crossing.

What does 'pirralha', the Portuguese word Jair Bolsonaro used for Thunberg in 2019, mean?

Brat. Brazil's president was complaining that the press gave her a voice after she tweeted that indigenous people were being murdered for trying to protect the Amazon forest.

Thunberg's paternal grandfather, Olof Thunberg, was known for what profession?

Actor and director. Olof Thunberg was the voice of the Bamse bear cartoons, and his son, Greta's father, followed him on to the stage.

Which English city gained a 15-metre mural of Thunberg in 2019, her face half-submerged by rising water?

Bristol. Jody Thomas spent eight days painting it, and the following February Thunberg herself came to the city to join a school strike.