70 free 2010s trivia questions with answers — pop culture quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
The 2010s were the decade the smartphone took over. Instagram, Snapchat, Vine and TikTok all arrived, the iPad launched, and a Korean pop video became the first thing on YouTube to be watched a billion times. These 62 free 2010s trivia questions cover the whole decade: the Arab Spring and Brexit, the Higgs boson and the first photo of a black hole, Superstorm Sandy and the Chilean miners, Leicester City at 5000-1, the Cubs ending 108 years of waiting, the Ice Bucket Challenge, the dress, Harambe and fidget spinners, plus Adele, Frozen, Hamilton, Game of Thrones and Avengers: Endgame. The quiz covers trivia from 2010 to 2020 and is written for anyone who lived through the decade and wants to see how much stuck. Easy questions ask which company bought Instagram; harder ones ask what the Chilean rescue capsule was called or which yacht carried Greta Thunberg across the Atlantic. It works for a pub quiz round, a family night, or a 2010s-themed party. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia and primary records, and each question shows its explanation and source once you answer.
30 of 70 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01On May 2, 2011, Osama bin Laden was killed by US special forces in which Pakistani city?
Abbottabad
The mission was codenamed Operation Neptune Spear, a nod to the Navy SEAL trident insignia.
Q 02How many Chilean miners were rescued in October 2010 after 69 days trapped at the San José mine?
33
Each man rode to the surface alone in a 54-centimetre-wide steel capsule named Fénix, watched live by an estimated billion people.
Q 03What was the name of the steel capsule that lifted the Chilean miners to the surface one at a time?
Fénix
Fénix means phoenix; the Fénix 2 capsule was just 54 centimetres across.
Q 04What maximum rating did the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident receive on the International Nuclear Event Scale?
7
Only Chernobyl in 1986 had previously been rated a Level 7 major accident.
Q 05In the June 2016 referendum, what share of UK voters chose to leave the European Union?
51.9%
Prime Minister David Cameron, who had called the vote, resigned the next month.
Q 06On 4 July 2012, CERN announced the discovery of a new particle consistent with which long-predicted one?
The Higgs boson
Peter Higgs and François Englert shared the 2013 Nobel Prize in Physics for predicting it half a century earlier.
Q 07LIGO's first direct detection of gravitational waves, in 2015, came from the merger of what?
Two black holes
The signal, GW150914, came from black holes of about 36 and 29 solar masses 1.4 billion light-years away, confirming a century-old prediction of Einstein's.
Q 08Which NASA spacecraft flew past Pluto on July 14, 2015, returning the first close-up images?
New Horizons
It passed 12,500 km above the surface and went on to fly by the Kuiper Belt object Arrokoth on New Year's Day 2019.
Q 09NASA's Curiosity rover, lowered by a 'sky crane', landed in which Martian crater in 2012?
Gale
The descent stage hovered and lowered the car-sized rover on a 20-metre tether before flying off to crash a safe distance away.
Q 10Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 vanished on 8 March 2014 while flying from Kuala Lumpur to which city?
Beijing
The Boeing 777 with 239 people aboard has never been found, making it the deadliest unresolved aviation mystery.
Q 11The cruise ship Costa Concordia capsized in January 2012 after striking rocks off which Italian island?
Giglio
Captain Francesco Schettino was later convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to 16 years.
Q 12Jorge Mario Bergoglio, elected pope in March 2013, was the first pope from which religious order?
The Jesuits
He was also the first pope from the Americas and took the name Francis after Benedict XVI became the first pope to resign in nearly 600 years.
Q 13A fire on 15 April 2019 destroyed the roof and spire of which Paris landmark?
Notre-Dame Cathedral
The spire fell at 19:50; the cathedral reopened on 7 December 2024 after a five-year rebuild.
Q 21Who scored Germany's extra-time winner against Argentina in the 2014 World Cup final?
Mario Götze
The substitute chested down Schürrle's cross and volleyed home in the 113th minute, the first European win at a World Cup held in the Americas.
Q 22Leicester City won the 2015-16 Premier League after starting the season at what odds with bookmakers?
5000-1
Claudio Ranieri's side clinched the title on 2 May 2016 when Tottenham drew at Chelsea.
Q 23The Chicago Cubs won the 2016 World Series, their first title since which year?
1908
Game 7 went to ten innings after a 17-minute rain delay, and Ben Zobrist's double won it 8-7.
Q 14The Ice Bucket Challenge that swept social media in summer 2014 raised money to fight which disease?
ALS
It raised more than $115 million for ALS research in 2014 alone, and helped fund the discovery of a gene linked to the disease.
Q 15Which company developed Pokémon Go, launched in July 2016?
Niantic
It hit $600 million in revenue in 90 days, the fastest mobile game ever to do so.
Q 16Which 13-employee photo-sharing app did Facebook agree to buy for about $1 billion in April 2012?
Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger had launched it in October 2010; it passed a billion users by 2018.
Q 17What was the starting price of the original iPad when it went on sale in April 2010?
$499
Steve Jobs unveiled it on January 27, 2010; Apple sold 300,000 on launch day.
Q 18In December 2012, which song's video became the first on YouTube to reach one billion views?
Gangnam Style
Psy's horse-dance hit had been out only five months, released in July 2012.
Q 19The 2012 Summer Olympics made which city the first to host the modern Games three times?
London
Danny Boyle directed the opening ceremony; the United States topped the table with 48 golds.
Q 20Which country won its first World Cup in 2010, beating the Netherlands 1-0 in the final in South Africa?
Spain
South Africa was the first African nation to host the tournament, and the drone of the vuvuzela became its soundtrack.
Q 24The 2016 Cavaliers were the first team to win the NBA Finals after trailing by what margin?
3-1
They beat a Warriors team that had gone 73-9 in the regular season, ending Cleveland's 52-year title drought.
Q 25Which sprinter won the 100 m and 200 m at three straight Olympics, finishing in Rio 2016?
Usain Bolt
His 9.58-second 100 m world record from Berlin in 2009 still stood at the end of the decade.
Q 26Prince died on April 21, 2016, at his home and recording complex in Minnesota. What was it called?
Paisley Park
He was 57; the cause was an accidental overdose of counterfeit pills laced with fentanyl.
Q 27The dress that divided the internet in February 2015 was actually which colours?
Blue and black
Retailer Roman Originals sold out within 30 minutes and later auctioned a one-off white-and-gold version for charity.
Q 28Harambe, the gorilla shot in May 2016 after a boy fell into his enclosure, lived at which zoo?
Cincinnati Zoo
The 17-year-old western lowland gorilla became one of the biggest memes of the year.
Q 29In May 2010, Laszlo Hanyecz made the first known commercial bitcoin purchase, paying 10,000 BTC for what?
Two pizzas
May 22 is now celebrated by enthusiasts as Bitcoin Pizza Day.
Q 30Greta Thunberg sailed across the Atlantic to a UN climate summit in August 2019 aboard which racing yacht?
Malizia II
She had begun her school strike outside the Swedish parliament a year earlier, at 15, and was Time's Person of the Year in 2019.