40 General Knowledge Trivia Questions (With Answers)
Forty general knowledge questions, sorted into four rounds and answered underneath. Read them as a list, or skip to the bottom — they're also a ready-made Jeopardy board you can put on a screen and have people buzz in on.
40 questions, with answers
Geography
1. What is the largest country in the world by land area?
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Russia
2. What is the smallest country in the world?
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Vatican City
3. Which river has traditionally been considered the longest in the world?
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The Nile
4. What is the capital of Australia?
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Canberra
5. What is the largest hot desert in the world?
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The Sahara
6. How many continents are there?
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Seven
7. What is the capital of Canada?
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Ottawa
8. Which is the largest ocean on Earth?
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The Pacific Ocean
9. Mount Everest sits on the border between Nepal and which other country or region?
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China (Tibet)
10. What is the longest above-water mountain range in the world?
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The Andes
Science & Nature
1. What is the chemical symbol for gold?
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Au
2. How many bones are in the adult human body?
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206
3. What is the largest planet in our solar system?
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Jupiter
4. What gas do plants absorb from the air to carry out photosynthesis?
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Carbon dioxide
5. What is the hardest naturally occurring substance on Earth?
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Diamond
6. How many hearts does an octopus have?
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Three
7. What planet is known as the Red Planet?
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Mars
8. What part of a cell is often called its powerhouse?
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The mitochondria
9. At what temperature, in Celsius, does water freeze?
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0 degrees
10. Roughly how fast does light travel in a vacuum, in miles per second?
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About 186,000 miles per second
History
1. In what year did World War II end?
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1945
2. Who was the first President of the United States?
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George Washington
3. In what year did the Titanic sink?
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1912
4. Which ancient civilization built the pyramids at Giza?
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The ancient Egyptians
5. Who painted the Mona Lisa?
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Leonardo da Vinci
6. In what year did the Berlin Wall fall?
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1989
7. Who was the first person to walk on the Moon?
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Neil Armstrong
8. In what year did World War I begin?
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1914
9. Julius Caesar was a famous general and dictator of which ancient civilization?
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Rome
10. In what year did Christopher Columbus first reach the Americas?
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1492
Words & Language
1. What is the most spoken native language in the world?
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Mandarin Chinese
2. How many letters are in the English alphabet?
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26
3. What is a group of lions called?
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A pride
4. What does the abbreviation "www" stand for?
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World Wide Web
5. In grammar, what part of speech describes an action?
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A verb
6. Which language has the most native speakers after Mandarin Chinese?
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Spanish
7. What is a group of crows called?
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A murder
8. What does the abbreviation "CEO" stand for?
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Chief Executive Officer
9. What punctuation mark ends a question?
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A question mark
10. What is the official language of Brazil?
Show answer
Portuguese
Play these instead of reading them
These questions are also a ready-made board — copy it into your own editor, put it on a screen, and everyone buzzes in from their own phone. Free, no account.
Common questions
How many general knowledge trivia questions are in this list?
Forty, split into four rounds of ten: geography, science and nature, history, and words and language.
Can I play these as an actual game instead of just reading them?
Yes. They're written to match a General Knowledge board in the template library — copy it into your own editor for free, put it on a screen, and everyone buzzes in from their own phone.
Are these questions suitable for a classroom?
Yes, they're written at a general adult level with no age-restricted content, which also makes them fine for a family game night or an office trivia round.
Write your own board
A full board with phone buzzers and live scoring, free and without an account.