50 free Backstreet Boys trivia questions with answers — music quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
47 free Backstreet Boys trivia questions with answers. The Backstreet Boys are the best-selling boy band of all time, and this quiz covers the whole run: the Orlando Sentinel ad that assembled them, the flea market that named them, the Swedish sessions with Max Martin, the European breakthrough, the record-smashing Millennium, the Pearlman lawsuit, Kevin Richardson's departure and return, the Vegas residencies and their 2019 comeback to number one with DNA. The easy questions ask who the five members are and which album contains I Want It That Way. The hard ones want the first-week sales figure Millennium set, the venue of their very first show, which Disney characters Kevin played before the band, and how much Pearlman kept versus what the group earned. No lyrics are quoted, just the history and the numbers. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the group, its members and its albums, and each question carries the sentence that backs it up.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In which city did the Backstreet Boys form in 1993?
Orlando, Florida
Two of the five, Kevin and Brian, are cousins from Kentucky who moved south to join.
Q 02Which two members of the group are cousins?
Brian Littrell and Kevin Richardson
Both come from Lexington, Kentucky, and were inducted into the Kentucky Music Hall of Fame together in 2015.
Q 03Lou Pearlman's 1992 newspaper ad sought a group with a certain boy band's look and which act's sound?
Boyz II Men
He ran it in the Orlando Sentinel and held auditions in his blimp hangar in Kissimmee.
Q 04Where did Pearlman hold the open casting calls that produced the group?
A blimp hangar
Pearlman's first business was airships, which he had loved since watching them as a boy in Queens.
Q 05What was the group named after?
An Orlando flea market
The Backstreet Market near International Drive was also a teen hangout.
Q 06Where did the Backstreet Boys play their first show, on 8 May 1993?
SeaWorld Orlando
That summer they played malls, restaurants and a charity gala in Fort Lauderdale.
Q 07Which established artist reportedly killed a 1993 Mercury Records deal by threatening to leave the label?
John Mellencamp
Jive Records signed them the next year after seeing them at a high school in Cleveland.
Q 08The group flew to which country at the end of 1994 to record with Max Martin and Denniz PoP?
Sweden
The sessions produced their first single, 'We've Got It Goin' On'.
Q 09The Backstreet Boys' 1996 debut album was released everywhere except which two markets?
The US and Canada
They broke first in Europe; a Montreal radio station brought them home.
Q 10Which single, released in Europe in 1996, became their US breakthrough the next year?
Quit Playing Games (with My Heart)
The US debut album of 1997 combined tracks from the international debut and Backstreet's Back.
Q 11Which member underwent open-heart surgery in May 1998, in the middle of a tour?
Brian
Doctors had found that a congenital hole in his heart had enlarged dangerously.
Q 12Roughly how much did the band earn in 1993-97 while Pearlman's company took about $10 million?
$300,000
Brian Littrell sued Pearlman and Trans Continental in 1998.
Q 13Lou Pearlman was later convicted of running what?
A Ponzi scheme
It left more than $300 million in debts; he got 25 years and died in federal custody in 2016.
Which famous singer was Lou Pearlman's cousin?
Q 21Which of these was NOT one of the four singles from Millennium?
Shape of My Heart
That one came from Black & Blue a year later.
Q 22The Into the Millennium Tour featured how many sold-out shows in 84 cities?
115
Extra dates were added because of demand.
Q 23Black & Blue made the group the first act since whom to post back-to-back million-plus opening weeks?
The Beatles
The album was recorded in Stockholm in the summer of 2000.
Q 24Which was the first single from Black & Blue?
Art Garfunkel
Garfunkel's success helped inspire Pearlman's interest in music; he later built NSYNC too.
Q 15Millennium was released on which date in 1999?
18 May
The group marked the day with a heavily publicised appearance on MTV's Total Request Live.
Q 16How many copies did Millennium sell in its first week in the US, then a record?
1,134,000
It beat Garth Brooks's Double Live; NSYNC then beat it in 2000.
Q 17How many Grammy nominations did Millennium receive?
Five
It has sold about 24 million copies worldwide.
Q 18How many weeks did Millennium remain on the Billboard chart?
93
It shipped a record 11 million copies in the US in 1999 alone and is certified 13 times platinum.
Q 19Who co-wrote 'I Want It That Way' with Max Martin?
Andreas Carlsson
Martin and Lundin produced it; the song was nominated for three Grammys.
Q 20What was 'I Want It That Way's peak position on the US Billboard Hot 100?
Sixth
It hit number one in more than 25 other countries and topped the Eurochart for seven weeks.
Shape of My Heart
The Call and More than That followed.
Q 25In which year did the Backstreet Boys sing the US national anthem at the Super Bowl in Tampa?
2001
The Tampa game came a week into the Black & Blue Tour.
Q 26Which member entered rehab in 2001, pausing the Black & Blue Tour?
AJ
Kevin Richardson had staged an intervention at a Boston hotel.
Q 27What was the group's 2005 comeback album called?
Never Gone
Its lead single, 'Incomplete', reached number 13 in the US.
Q 28Which member left the group in 2006 and returned in 2012?
Kevin
The group made Unbreakable and This Is Us as a quartet in between.
Q 29Before the band, the eldest member worked at Walt Disney World playing which character among others?
Aladdin
He also played Prince Eric, Tigger and a Ninja Turtle.
Q 30With which other boy band did the Backstreet Boys tour as NKOTBSB in 2011?
New Kids on the Block
The joint tour grossed over $40 million from 51 shows.