70 free New Orleans trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
63 free New Orleans trivia questions with answers. New Orleans has been French, Spanish, French again and American, and it never quite let go of any of them. This quiz covers the whole city: its founding on Chitimacha land in 1718, the Louisiana Purchase handover in Jackson Square, Andrew Jackson's improbable victory at Chalmette, the krewes and coconuts of Mardi Gras, Congo Square and the birth of jazz, and the food that makes visitors plan their day around lunch. Expect questions about beignets and chicory coffee, po' boys and muffulettas, the Saints and the Superdome, the world's oldest streetcar line, above-ground cemeteries, Marie Laveau, Storyville, the Lower Ninth Ward and the levee failures of 2005. Some are easy enough for anyone who has walked down Bourbon Street once; a few will only be answered by people who know why the airport code is MSY. Every answer has been checked against the city's documented history and carries a linked source, so you can settle any argument on the spot. Good for a pub quiz round, a classroom, or the drive down I-10.
30 of 70 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In what year was New Orleans founded by French colonists?
1718
The city was laid out on land of the Chitimacha people and served as the capital of French Louisiana before the Louisiana Purchase.
Q 02New Orleans is named in honour of which French royal?
Philippe II, Duke of Orléans
He was regent of France at the time; the Spanish later renamed the city Nueva Orleans until 1800.
Q 03Who founded La Nouvelle-Orléans in 1718?
Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville
Born in Montreal, he was appointed governor of French Louisiana four separate times between 1701 and 1743.
Q 04Before Europeans arrived, the Choctaw name for the area, Bulbancha, translated as what?
Land of many tongues
The name is thought to be a contraction of a phrase meaning 'there are foreign speakers', fitting for a future port city.
Q 05What does the nickname 'Crescent City' allude to?
The course of the Mississippi River
Other nicknames include The Big Easy, NOLA and The City that Care Forgot, used since at least 1938.
Q 06Who is thought to have coined the nickname 'The Big Easy' in the early 20th century?
Musicians who found work plentiful
The phrase dates to the early 20th century, when the city's dance halls and clubs kept players in steady employment.
Q 07Following the Seven Years' War, France handed New Orleans to which country in 1763?
Spain
The city was renamed Nueva Orleans, and most of the surviving French Quarter buildings actually date from the Spanish period after two great fires.
Q 08Why do so few buildings in the French Quarter date from the French colonial era?
Two great fires in 1788 and 1794 destroyed them
As a result, the neighbourhood's signature courtyards and iron balconies are largely Spanish colonial and early American work.
Q 09What is the French Quarter's other common name?
Vieux Carré
It means 'old square', and the city grew outward from this original grid.
Q 10The French Quarter's most famous nightlife street is named after what?
France's royal House of Bourbon
Engineer Adrien de Pauger named it in 1721 when he laid out the street grid; the whiskey connection is pure coincidence.
Q 11New Orleans became part of the United States through which 1803 deal?
The Louisiana Purchase
Napoleon sold the territory for fifteen million dollars, roughly eighteen dollars a square mile, and the handover ceremony took place at the Cabildo.
Q 12On what date was New Orleans formally transferred from France to the United States?
December 20, 1803
Spain had only handed the territory back to France three weeks earlier, so the city changed flags twice in a month.
Q 13Who commanded the American forces at the Battle of New Orleans on January 8, 1815?
Andrew Jackson
Q 21Lake Pontchartrain is technically what kind of body of water?
An estuary
It covers about 630 square miles of brackish water connected to the Gulf.
Q 22What percentage of New Orleans flooded when the levees failed during Hurricane Katrina in 2005?
Over four-fifths
The city lost more than half its population in the aftermath, though it has rebounded substantially since.
Q 23On what date did Hurricane Katrina make its Louisiana landfall?
August 29, 2005
It had peaked as a Category 5 storm the day before and struck as a Category 3, becoming the costliest tropical cyclone in U.S. history.
His statue on horseback now stands in the French Quarter square that bears his name.
Q 14The Battle of New Orleans was fought 15 days after which peace agreement had already been signed?
The Treaty of Ghent
It had been signed 15 days earlier in Belgium, but the news had not yet crossed the Atlantic and the treaty was not ratified until February.
Q 15Which pirate led the privateers who fought alongside the Americans in 1815?
Jean Lafitte
A blacksmith shop bar on Bourbon Street still trades on his name.
Q 16Jackson Square in the French Quarter was formerly known by what name?
Place d'Armes
It is flanked by St. Louis Cathedral, the Cabildo and the Presbytère, and the Louisiana Purchase handover took place there.
Q 17In 1840, where did New Orleans rank among the most populous cities in the United States?
Third
It remained the largest city in the American South from before the Civil War until after World War II.
Q 18New Orleans sits on the Mississippi River roughly how far upriver from the Gulf of Mexico?
105 miles
The city lies in the river's delta, just south of Lake Pontchartrain, which is why drainage has always been a struggle.
Q 19Which engineer's pump system let New Orleans build on former swampland?
A. Baldwin Wood
Some parts of Eastern New Orleans now sit seven feet below sea level, while ground at the river levee in Uptown rises to about 20 feet.
Q 20The Lake Pontchartrain Causeway holds a Guinness World Record for what?
Longest continuous span over water
The longer of its two parallel spans runs 23.83 miles from Metairie to Mandeville.
Q 24Roughly how many people sheltered in the Superdome as Katrina came ashore?
26,000
It was designated a 'refuge of last resort' along with the Morial Convention Center for residents unable to evacuate.
Q 25What distinction does the St. Charles Avenue transit service hold?
The world's oldest continuously operating streetcar route
It has run since 1835 and its cars are painted the same green used to mark it on transit maps.
Q 26Which playwright lived in New Orleans early in his career and set A Streetcar Named Desire there?
Tennessee Williams
The city still hosts an annual literary festival in his name each spring.
Q 27Which open space in Louis Armstrong Park is where enslaved Africans gathered to play music on Sundays?
Congo Square
New Orleans was the only North American city to permit such gatherings, and the rhythms played there fed directly into jazz.
Q 28Louis Armstrong, New Orleans's most famous musical son, was born on which date?
August 4, 1901
For years he claimed a Fourth of July 1900 birthday; the airport was renamed for him on the centenary of the true date.
Q 29The New Orleans airport code MSY comes from what?
Moisant Stock Yards
Daredevil aviator John Moisant died in a crash on the site in 1910, and the stockyard built there afterwards took his name.
Q 30Preservation Hall, the famous French Quarter jazz venue, opened under that name in what year?
1961
It began as an art gallery whose owner let musicians rehearse in the back before it became a full-time music hall.