50 free Albus Dumbledore trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Albus Dumbledore runs Hogwarts for most of the Harry Potter series, founds the Order of the Phoenix and is the one wizard Voldemort is said to fear. J. K. Rowling named him after a dialect word for bumblebee because she pictured him humming, called him "the epitome of goodness" and then spent the last two books showing how Machiavellian a good man can be. Richard Harris, Michael Gambon, Jude Law and Toby Regbo have all played him on screen, with John Lithgow next in line for television. This quiz runs from the doorstep at Privet Drive to the marble tomb by the lake: the Mirror of Erised, the Dementors, the Triwizard judging, the Wizengamot sacking, the Pensieve lessons, the cave, the cursed ring and the ethereal King's Cross. It also covers the family history revealed in Deathly Hallows, the Grindelwald romance Rowling announced at Carnegie Hall, and the long list of actors who were offered the role and said no. Fifty questions, four options each, with a short explanation after every answer. Play on your phone or print it for a quiz night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Who plays Dumbledore in the first two Harry Potter films?
Richard Harris
He had been expected to play the part for the whole series, but died in October 2002.
Q 02Who took over as Dumbledore from Prisoner of Azkaban onwards?
Michael Gambon
He played the part in six films with a slight Irish accent, and never read the books.
Q 03Who plays the middle-aged Dumbledore in the Fantastic Beasts films?
Jude Law
His Dumbledore finally says out loud in The Secrets of Dumbledore that he was in love with Grindelwald.
Q 04Who was cast as Dumbledore in HBO's Harry Potter television series in 2025?
John Lithgow
Rowling once compared her image of the character to the actor John Gielgud.
Q 05Which actor did Rowling compare her image of Dumbledore to in 1999?
John Gielgud
She pictured him elderly and stately, with half-moon spectacles, a silver beard and bright blue eyes.
Q 06In which year was Dumbledore born, according to Rowling's website?
1881
That makes him 115 or 116 at his death, despite her earlier remark that he was a hundred and fifty.
Q 07Which homely hobby is Dumbledore fond of in the books?
Knitting
Rowling describes him as eccentric and slightly effeminate, with eyes that twinkle with kindness or mischief.
Q 08Which Hogwarts House was Dumbledore in as a student?
Gryffindor
He won every prize of note the school offered and did things with a wand an examiner had never seen.
Q 09What does Dumbledore describe as his greatest flaw?
His desire for power
He concludes that those best suited to power are the ones who never seek it, and turns down the Ministry several times.
Q 10What does Dumbledore see when he looks into the Mirror of Erised?
His family alive and together
He also sees himself redeemed in the eyes of his brother; the woollen-socks answer he gives Harry is a dodge.
Q 11The name Dumbledore is a dialect word for which insect?
Bumblebee
Rowling chose it because he loves music and she imagined him humming to himself as he walked.
Q 12Where does Dumbledore leave the infant Harry in the opening chapter of book one?
On the Dursleys' doorstep
A letter tucked in with the baby explains the situation to Vernon and Petunia.
Q 13What lures Dumbledore away from Hogwarts on the night Harry goes after the Stone?
A false message from the Ministry
He realises mid-journey that he is needed at school and returns in time to pull Harry away from Quirrell.
Q 21Whom does Dumbledore take Harry to recruit at the start of Half-Blood Prince?
Horace Slughorn
It is on this trip that Harry first notices the headmaster's blackened, shrivelled right hand.
Q 22How many Horcruxes do Dumbledore and Harry conclude Voldemort made?
Six
Harry himself turns out to be an accidental seventh, a fact Dumbledore keeps for Snape to deliver.
Q 23What attacks Harry in the lake when he tries to fetch Dumbledore water in the cave?
Inferi
Even weakened by the potion, Dumbledore rescues him.
Who disarms Dumbledore on the Astronomy Tower?
Q 14Who pressures the governors into suspending Dumbledore in Chamber of Secrets?
Lucius Malfoy
He is reinstated once it emerges the governors were coerced.
Q 15What is Dumbledore forced to allow onto the Hogwarts grounds in Prisoner of Azkaban?
Dementors
When they make Harry fall off his broom mid-match, Dumbledore furiously slows his fall with his wand.
Q 16Who does Dumbledore discover has been impersonating Mad-Eye Moody?
Barty Crouch Jr
The look on his face as he catches the impostor is described as "cold fury", more terrible than Harry could have imagined.
Q 17Which role does Dumbledore lose in book five for insisting Voldemort is back?
Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot
He is also voted out of the International Confederation of Wizards and nearly loses his Order of Merlin.
Q 18Which Educational Decree lets Fudge install Umbridge as Defence teacher?
Twenty-two
Fudge fears Dumbledore is assembling an underage wizard army to topple the Ministry.
Q 19How does Dumbledore shield the students when Dumbledore's Army is discovered?
He claims it was his idea
The false confession costs him the headmastership for the second time.
Q 20What does Dumbledore use to stop the Death Eaters escaping the Department of Mysteries?
An Anti-Disapparition Jinx
Voldemort then tries to possess Harry so that Dumbledore will kill the boy; the ruse fails and he flees with Bellatrix.
Draco Malfoy
That disarming, not Snape's curse, is what passes the Elder Wand's allegiance on, a detail Voldemort never grasps.
Q 25Where is Dumbledore entombed?
Beside the Hogwarts lake
Harry later places the Elder Wand back in the marble sarcophagus.
Q 26What were the names of Dumbledore's parents?
Percival and Kendra
Percival received a life sentence in Azkaban for attacking the Muggle boys who had traumatised his daughter.
Q 27What was the name of Dumbledore's younger sister?
Ariana
Attacked by Muggle boys at six, she never controlled her magic again and later accidentally killed their mother.
Q 28To which village did Kendra move the family after her husband's imprisonment?
Godric's Hollow
It is the same village where Harry's parents later lived and died.
Q 29What did the young Dumbledore and Grindelwald dream of uniting?
The three Deathly Hallows
Their plan for wizards to rule over Muggles ended with a three-way duel and the death of Dumbledore's sister.
Q 30Which subject did Dumbledore teach when he returned to Hogwarts as a professor?
Transfiguration
He had decided he could not be trusted with power and refused to become Minister for Magic more than once.