Geography
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
8correct to beat the crowd
This geography quiz covers the whole planet in 149 free questions with answers: continents and oceans, capital cities, the longest rivers and highest mountains, deserts, islands, borders and the flags and landmarks that make each country recognisable. It opens with easy geography trivia that kids and middle schoolers can answer and works up to hard geography trivia on obscure capitals, enclaves and physical geography that will test seasoned quizzers. Every answer has been checked against atlases, encyclopaedias and official sources, and each question shows an explanation and its citation after you answer. Play it solo for a shareable score, or use it as a ready-made geography round for a classroom or trivia night.
30 of 149 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What is the largest continent by land area?
Asia
Asia is the largest continent, covering approximately 44.6 million square kilometers, which is about 30% of Earth's total land area.
Q 02Which river is the longest in the world?
Nile
The Nile is traditionally ranked the longest river, but its length depends on where the measuring starts and ends, so some scientists dispute the title.
Q 03Which purpose-built city became Australia's capital as a compromise between Sydney and Melbourne?
Canberra
Canberra wasn't ready for decades, so Parliament sat in Melbourne until 1927, when it finally moved into Canberra's Provisional Parliament House.
Q 04Which ocean is the largest by area?
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean covers more of the planet than all of Earth's land put together.
Q 05Which European country is nicknamed 'the land of a thousand lakes'?
Finland
Finland's nickname undersells it: the country has more than 160,000 lakes bigger than 500 square metres.
Q 06What is the smallest country in the world by area?
Vatican City
Vatican City only became an independent state in 1929, through the Lateran Treaty signed with Mussolini's government.
Q 07Which peak is the tallest in the world measured from sea level?
Mount Everest
Mount Everest stands at 8,849 meters above sea level, making it the tallest mountain in the world by elevation.
Q 08Which African country was formerly known as Abyssinia?
Ethiopia
Ethiopia and Liberia are the only African states counted as never fully colonised; Mussolini's forces occupied it in the 1930s but never controlled all of it.
Q 09What is the driest non-polar desert in the world?
Atacama
The Atacama Desert in Chile is considered the driest non-polar desert in the world. Some weather stations there have never recorded rainfall.
Q 10Which country is home to the ancient city of Petra?
Jordan
Petra is located in southern Jordan. This ancient city was carved into rose-red cliffs by the Nabataeans over 2,000 years ago and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Q 11What strait separates Europe from Africa?
Strait of Gibraltar
The Strait of Gibraltar separates Spain in Europe from Morocco in Africa, connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea.
Q 12Which country has the longest coastline in the world?
Canada
Canada's coastline runs to more than 200,000 kilometres, though no coastline has one true length: the finer the map, the longer it measures.
Q 13What is the capital of Mongolia?
Ulaanbaatar
Ulaanbaatar is the capital and largest city of Mongolia, home to nearly half of the country's entire population.
Q 21Which city replaced Auckland as New Zealand's capital?
Wellington
Wellington took over in 1865 because commissioners judged its central location and good harbour better for governing the whole colony.
Q 22Which is the largest hot desert in the world?
Sahara
The Sahara Desert is the largest hot desert in the world at approximately 9.2 million square kilometers across North Africa. The Antarctic Desert is larger overall but is a cold desert.
Q 23Which country is home to the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu?
Peru
Peru's Machu Picchu was largely forgotten outside its own valley until Hiram Bingham brought it to world attention in 1911.
Q 14Which waterfall is the tallest in the world?
Angel Falls
Angel Falls is named after pilot Jimmie Angel, whose plane got stuck in the marshy ground when he landed on the plateau above the falls in 1937.
Q 15Which country is entirely surrounded by South Africa?
Lesotho
Lesotho is completely enclosed by South Africa, making it one of only three countries in the world that are entirely surrounded by a single other country.
Q 16The Great Barrier Reef stretches along which country's northeast coast?
Australia
Australia's Great Barrier Reef, in the Coral Sea, is the world's largest coral reef system, stretching over 2,300 kilometres.
Q 17What is the largest island in the world?
Greenland
Greenland is about 80% covered by an ice sheet that would raise global sea levels by roughly 7 metres if it all melted.
Q 18Which two countries share the longest international border?
United States and Canada
The United States and Canada's border strands Minnesota's Northwest Angle, a piece of US territory that can be reached by land only through Canada.
Q 19What is the deepest lake in the world?
Lake Baikal
Lake Baikal in Siberia is about 1,642 metres deep and holds more than a fifth of the world's fresh surface water.
Q 20Which European country had the most UNESCO World Heritage Sites as of 2025?
Italy
Italy's World Heritage Sites range from the historic centre of Rome to Venice and its lagoon and the ruins of Pompeii.
Q 24Counting overseas territories, which country spans the most time zones?
France
France uses 12 time zones, 13 counting its Antarctic claim, because its overseas territories are scattered across the globe.
Q 25Which river hosted the swim leg of the triathlon at the Paris 2024 Olympics?
Seine
The Seine got a €1.4 billion cleanup for the Games, yet one triathlon race was still postponed when the river failed a pollution test.
Q 26Which Central American country's only coastline faces the Caribbean Sea?
Belize
Belize was called British Honduras until 1973, when it took its new name in anticipation of independence.
Q 27What is the largest landlocked country in the world?
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan hosts the Baikonur Cosmodrome, which Moscow leases until 2050 and uses for all of its crewed launches.
Q 28Which volcano buried the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum under ash?
Mount Vesuvius
Mount Vesuvius last erupted in 1944, when its hot ash wrecked dozens of Allied B-25 bombers parked at an airfield near Pompeii.
Q 29Which South American country has coastlines on both the Pacific Ocean and the Caribbean Sea?
Colombia
Colombia, named after Christopher Columbus, is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the west.
Q 30Which major city straddles two continents, split by the Bosphorus Strait?
Istanbul
As Constantinople, Istanbul was the Byzantine capital until Sultan Mehmed II captured it in 1453 and made it the Ottoman capital.