50 free Holi trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Holi trivia quiz covers the Hindu festival of colours, love and spring, celebrated on the last full moon of the month of Phalguna, usually in March. The easy questions handle the basics: what people throw at each other, the divine couple the festival honours, the bonfire lit the night before, the month it falls in and the countries where it is a public celebration. From there it moves through the stories: Prahlada surviving the pyre while his aunt Holika burned, Vishnu as Narasimha killing Hiranyakashipu at dusk on a doorstep, Yashoda telling Krishna to colour Radha's face, and Shiva burning Kamadeva to ashes. The harder half is for festival buffs: the flowers that make natural gulal, the cannabis drink served in thandai, the half-moon pastry gujiya, the women of Barsana who beat men with sticks, the Sikh martial festival of Hola Mohalla, Bengal's swing festival Dol Jatra, Aurangzeb's 1665 ban, Ranjit Singh's 300 mounds of colour, Tagore's Basanta Utsab, and the varying spellings that reached the Oxford English Dictionary. If you enjoyed our Diwali or Hinduism quizzes, this is the deep dive on the day the whole subcontinent turns pink. Every answer was checked against the encyclopaedia entries for Holi, its legends, foods, regional variants and related festivals before publishing.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Holi is best known as the Hindu festival of what?
Colours, love and spring
It also marks the end of winter and is an invocation for a good spring harvest.
Q 02Holi celebrates the love between Krishna and which cowherd girl of Braj?
Radha
In the Braj region where the pair grew up, celebrations run on for days after the main festival.
Q 03Holi begins on the evening of the full moon in which month of the Hindu calendar?
Phalguna
That falls around the middle of March, though sometimes in late February.
Q 04What is the bonfire ceremony held the night before Holi called?
Holika Dahan
Also known as Chhoti or 'Little' Holi, it symbolises the victory of good over evil and the burning of the old.
Q 05In the legend behind the bonfire, Holika tricked her nephew into sitting on a pyre with her. What was his name?
Prahlada
Her fireproof cloak flew off her and wrapped him, so the boy survived and she burned.
Q 06Which demon king, the father of Vishnu's boy devotee, was killed by the god in the form of the man-lion Narasimha?
Hiranyakashipu
He had a boon that he could be killed by neither man nor animal, day nor night, indoors nor out, so Vishnu found a loophole for each.
Q 07To dodge the demon king's boon, at what time of day did Narasimha kill him?
At dusk
Neither day nor night, on a doorstep that was neither indoors nor out, on his lap, with claws that were neither handheld nor thrown weapons.
Q 08In which chapter of the Bhagavata Purana is the legend of the boy devotee and his aunt Holika found?
The 7th
The story sets up Holi as a festival of the triumph of good over evil in honour of Vishnu.
Q 09According to legend, why did the young Krishna despair that Radha would not like him?
Because of his dark skin colour
His mother Yashoda told him to ask Radha to colour his face any way she liked, and the two became a couple.
Q 10Which puranic work by a sage was the first to describe the divine couple playing Holi?
The Garga Samhita
The festival itself is mentioned in the Narada and Bhavishya Puranas and by the poet Kalidasa in the 4th century.
Q 11In Shaivite tradition, Holi marks the return of which god of love, burned to ashes by Shiva's third eye?
Kamadeva
His wife Rati fasted for forty days after Vasant Panchami until Shiva relented, and Holi falls on the fortieth day.
Q 12What is the traditional name for the coloured powders thrown at Holi?
Gulal
Also called abir, it was traditionally made from medicinal herbs and flowers recommended by Ayurvedic doctors.
Q 13The flowers of which tree, called the flame of the forest, are the traditional source of Holi's red and orange colours?
Palash
Red sandalwood, hibiscus, madder and pomegranate give alternative reds; boiling saffron in water makes orange.
Q 21Lathmar Holi's festivities in Barsana and Nandgaon usually end on which day?
Rang Panchami
Legend says Krishna, treated as a son-in-law of Barsana, came to spray colour on Radha and was chased off with lathis.
Q 22Which city in the Braj region is the birthplace of Krishna, and a Holi tourist magnet along with Vrindavan?
Mathura
In Vrindavan the festival lasts sixteen days, with special worship of the divine couple.
Q 23The Braj Holi game of Matki Phod, in which human pyramids break a hanging pot of dairy, honours Krishna under which nickname?
Makhan chor, the butter thief
Q 14Which spice powder is the typical traditional source of yellow Holi colour?
Turmeric
It is sometimes mixed with chickpea flour to get the shade right; bael fruit and marigolds are alternatives.
Q 15Which vegetable is the traditional source of magenta and purple Holi colours?
Beetroot
It is often boiled straight in water to make coloured water; dried tea leaves give brown and indigo gives blue.
Q 16A 2007 study blamed which synthetic dye, used in some Holi colours, for severe eye irritation in Delhi?
Malachite green
Later studies found metal-based industrial dyes causing skin problems, prompting campaigns for natural colours.
Q 17What is the half-moon-shaped deep-fried sweet pastry traditionally offered at Holi?
Gujiya
It is stuffed with sweetened khoa, coconut and dried fruit, and looks rather like an empanada.
Q 18Which cold milk drink of almonds, fennel, rose petals, saffron and spices is the centrepiece of Holi refreshments?
Thandai
Sikhs drink it at Hola Mohalla too, and the notorious variant is laced with bhang.
Q 19Bhang, traditionally distributed at Holi, is an edible preparation made from the leaves of which plant?
Cannabis
It was used in food and drink in India as early as 1000 BCE and is also handed out at Maha Shivaratri.
Q 20In Barsana's Lathmar Holi, women famously do what to the men who arrive from neighbouring Nandgaon?
Beat them with sticks
It re-enacts Radha and her friends driving out Krishna and his gang; the men carry shields and sing provocative songs.
Women throw coloured water at the climbers to make the job harder; the sport survives in diaspora communities.
Q 24Which Sikh leader turned Holi into Hola Mohalla, a three-day festival of martial arts and mock battles at Anandpur Sahib?
Guru Gobind Singh
Sikh soldiers competed in horsemanship, archery and military exercises the day after Holi.
Q 25According to Sikh court records, how many mounds of colour did Maharaja Ranjit Singh and his officials use for Holi in Lahore in 1837?
300
Sir Henry Fane, commander-in-chief of the British Indian army, joined the celebrations that year.
Q 26Which Mughal emperor banned the public celebration of Holi by decree in November 1665?
Aurangzeb
Earlier emperors let citizens of all castes throw colour on them; the ban lapsed after his death and Bahadur Shah Zafar even wrote a Holi song.
Q 27By what names was Holi known at the Mughal court in Delhi's Red Fort?
Eid-e-gulaabi or Aab-e-Pashi
Mehfils were held across the walled city, with aristocrats and traders alike joining in.
Q 28In West Bengal, Holi is celebrated as Dol Jatra, meaning what?
Swing festival
Icons of the divine couple are placed on a decorated swing and rocked while worshippers throw abir at them.
Q 29Which 16th-century saint brought the Holi tradition from Vrindavan back to Bengal, telling followers to smear colour on Krishna's idol and eat malpoa?
Chaitanya Mahaprabhu
His biographies say he was very fond of the sweet.
Q 30Basanta Utsab, the elegant spring version of Holi celebrated at Santiniketan since 1923, is associated with which poet?
Rabindranath Tagore
Students dress in saffron or white with flower garlands and dance to the ektara and veena.