Algeria Trivia
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49 free Algeria trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Algeria is the largest country in Africa and the tenth largest on earth, and most of it is Sahara, which is why nine in ten Algerians live along the Mediterranean strip that produced Numidia, Saint Augustine, the Barbary corsairs and one of the twentieth century's most bitter wars of independence. This quiz covers the geography, from the Tell Atlas to Mount Tahat in the Hoggar, and the whole sweep of the history: Masinissa and Jugurtha, the Barbarossa brothers, the fly-whisk incident of 1827, Emir Abdelkader, Setif in 1945, the FLN's Toussaint Rouge, the Evian Accords and independence on 5 July 1962, then Ben Bella, Boumediene, the Black Decade and the Hirak that toppled Bouteflika. Culture and modern life get equal room: couscous and the fennec fox, rai from Oran, Camus and Fanon, the world's tallest minaret in Algiers, the UNESCO sites of Timgad, Djemila, Tipasa, the M'zab and Tassili n'Ajjer, Sonatrach and the gas that heats Europe, and the Desert Foxes' 1982 upset of West Germany and two Africa Cup of Nations titles. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on Algeria, its cities, history and culture, so the dates and figures will hold up.
30 of 49 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Algeria became Africa's largest country in 2011, when which nation split in two?
Sudan
Sudan. When South Sudan broke away in July 2011, Sudan slipped from first to third in Africa by area, behind the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Algeria inherited the top spot without gaining an inch.
Q 02The name Algeria derives from Algiers, whose Arabic name al-Jazā'ir means what?
The islands
The islands. Small islets once lay just off the city, but from 1525 they were joined to the shore by harbour works, so the capital named for its islands has all but lost them.
Q 03French is widely used in Algeria but has no official status; which language became official beside Arabic in 2016?
Tamazight
Tamazight. The Berber language was recognised as a national language in 2002 and made official in 2016, which means it can now appear on government documents beside Arabic.
Q 04Which mountain system separates Algeria's populous coast from the Sahara?
The Atlas
The Atlas. In Algeria its two chains run parallel to the Mediterranean and wall the fertile north off from the Sahara, which begins on their far side and covers more than four-fifths of the country.
Q 05Algeria's highest peak, Mount Tahat, stands in which Saharan mountain range?
The Hoggar
The Hoggar. Many of its jagged peaks are the hard plugs of extinct volcanoes, left standing after the softer cones around them wore away, which is why the massif bristles with dark towers and needles of rock.
Q 06Numidian king Masinissa's cavalry helped Rome defeat which Carthaginian general at Zama in 202 BC?
Hannibal
Hannibal. Masinissa had fought for Carthage in Spain before switching sides, and at Zama the returning cavalry's charge into Hannibal's rear decided the day; Rome then backed his claim to the throne of Numidia.
Q 07Numidia's capital Cirta is today which Algerian city?
Constantine
Constantine. Laid in ruins during a Roman civil war, the city was rebuilt in 313 and took the name of the emperor who restored it; its spans over a deep gorge now earn it the nickname City of Bridges.
Q 08Saint Augustine was bishop of Hippo Regius, which is now which Algerian city?
Annaba
Annaba. Augustine was bishop of the city for 34 years and died there in 430, in the early months of a long siege, as an invading army closed in on Roman Africa.
Q 09Which emperor founded Timgad, the 'Pompeii of Africa' in the Aurès Mountains, around 100 AD?
Trajan
Trajan. He created the town from nothing as a colony for retired legionaries, laid out on a strict grid, and worked his own name into its official title, Colonia Marciana Ulpia Traiana Thamugadi.
Q 10Which Berber queen of the Aurès Mountains routed an invading Umayyad army in the 7th century?
Kahina
Kahina. Her Arab enemies gave her that title, meaning priestess or seer, because she was said to foretell the future; her birth name was Dihya, and she ruled until a second invasion defeated her.
Q 11Which Allied operation of November 1942 put American and British troops ashore at Algiers?
Operation Torch
Operation Torch. After the landings Algiers became the headquarters of Allied forces in North Africa and, for a time, the provisional capital of France while Paris was still under occupation.
Q 12The Zayyanid dynasty, which ruled the central Maghreb for three centuries from the 1230s, made which city its capital?
Tlemcen
Tlemcen. Caravan routes from across the Sahara ended there, and its trade and brilliant court made it one of the Maghreb's great cities, until Spain seized its outlet to the sea in 1509 and choked the commerce.
Q 13Which Algerian port, a medieval exporter of beeswax, gave French its word for candle, 'bougie'?
Béjaïa
Q 21Who was elected independent Algeria's first president in 1963?
Ahmed Ben Bella
Ahmed Ben Bella. Decorated for bravery in the French army during the Second World War, he went on to fight France, and in 1965 his own defence minister overthrew him and kept him locked away for some fourteen years.
Q 22Algeria's 'Black Decade' civil war began in 1992 after the army did what?
Cancelled an election
Cancelled an election. The Islamic Salvation Front had dominated the first round and was heading for power when the generals stepped in and banned it, setting off a war with Islamist rebels that lasted a decade.
Q 23Weeks of mass protests forced which Algerian president to resign in April 2019, after 20 years in power?
Béjaïa. Known to Europeans as Bugia or Bougie, it shipped so much wax that its name came to mean the candle itself; it is also where the young Fibonacci learned the Hindu-Arabic numerals he took home to Italy.
Q 14The Regency of Algiers was founded in 1516 by which corsair brothers?
Aruj and Hayreddin Barbarossa
Aruj and Hayreddin Barbarossa. Invited by the city's ruler to drive out a Spanish garrison, the corsair brothers seized Algiers for themselves, and Hayreddin then placed it under the Ottoman sultan.
Q 15In 1827 the Dey of Algiers struck the French consul with what, handing France its pretext to invade?
A fly-whisk
A fly-whisk. The Dey lost his temper when the consul stonewalled him over debts France had owed for army supplies since the 1790s; Paris answered with a three-year blockade and then the invasion of 1830.
Q 16Who led Algerian resistance to the French for fifteen years until 1847 and later saved Christians in Damascus?
Abdelkader
Abdelkader. He surrendered on a promise of exile in the East, but France broke its word and held him for almost five years; his rescue of Christians in 1860 later won him honours from several countries.
Q 17The 1945 massacre that catalysed Algeria's independence movement took place in Guelma and which other town?
Sétif
Sétif. On 8 May 1945, the day Europe celebrated victory over Germany, police fired on marchers who had been told not to carry nationalist flags, and the reprisals that followed killed thousands.
Q 18The Algerian War began on 1 November 1954, 'Toussaint Rouge', with attacks by which newly formed movement?
FLN
FLN. The National Liberation Front struck across Algeria before dawn on All Saints' Day, and France's interior minister, the future president François Mitterrand, replied that the only possible negotiation was war.
Q 19Which March 1962 agreement between France and Algeria's provisional government led to a ceasefire and an independence referendum?
The Évian Accords
The Évian Accords. Named for the French lakeside spa where the talks were held, they ended more than seven years of war, and about 91% of French voters endorsed them in a referendum.
Q 20Which French leader, returned to power in 1958, granted Algeria independence in 1962?
Charles de Gaulle
Charles de Gaulle. The settlers and officers who engineered his return felt betrayed when he offered Algerians self-determination; independence on 5 July 1962 ended 132 years of French rule.
Abdelaziz Bouteflika
Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Rarely seen in public since a stroke in 2013, he dropped his plan to seek a fifth term at 82, but the marches went on until the army chief told him to go at once.
Q 24Algeria's flag sets a red star and crescent on halves of white and which other colour?
Green
Green. It is the colour of Islam; the wartime government in exile had flown a version of the flag since 1958, so it was simply kept when independence came in July 1962.
Q 25What is Algeria's currency?
The dinar
The dinar. Its name descends from the denarius, the silver coin of ancient Rome, by way of the gold coins of the caliphs, while its small change, now too worthless to use, kept the French name centime.
Q 26Which state-owned energy giant was founded in 1963, the year after Algeria's independence?
Sonatrach
Sonatrach. Founded in 1963, it took charge of the Saharan fields when Algeria nationalised the industry in 1971, over loud French protest, and it remains a major supplier of natural gas to Europe.
Q 27Which animal is the national animal of Algeria?
The fennec fox
The fennec fox. The smallest member of the dog family, it sheds the Saharan heat through ears that are huge for its body, and Algeria's national football team is nicknamed Les Fennecs.
Q 28Which dish is recognised as Algeria's national dish?
Couscous
Couscous. In 2020 UNESCO added the craft of making and sharing it to its heritage list, after Algeria and three of its North African neighbours put their rival claims aside and applied together.
Q 29Raï, the Algerian pop sung by artists styled cheb and cheba, took shape in the 1920s in which port city?
Oran
Oran. Rooted in the songs of rural western Algeria, raï found its voice in the port's nightclubs and cabarets, among the poor, and its taboo-free lyrics made it the music of the young.
Q 30Which writer, born into poverty in French Algeria in 1913, won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1957?
Albert Camus
Albert Camus. He set The Stranger and The Plague in the Algeria of his youth and took the prize at just 44, only to die in a car crash little more than two years later.