Guide
How to Write a General Knowledge Quiz People Actually Enjoy
The craft behind fair, fun, unambiguous questions, and how to order them.
Anyone can write a quiz question. Writing one that’s fair, fun and has exactly one right answer is harder than it looks. Here’s how we do it.
One question, one answer
The most common quiz argument comes from a question with two defensible answers. “What’s the longest river in the world?” starts a fight between the Nile and the Amazon camps. “What’s the longest river in Africa?” doesn’t.
Before you keep a question, ask: could a clever person give a different answer and be right? If so, tighten the wording until they can’t.
Aim for “I know this”
The best questions make people feel clever. The worst make them feel stupid. Aim for questions where most of the room could know the answer, with a few that only one or two teams will get.
A useful mix for a ten-question round:
- Three easier questions almost everyone can get
- Five medium questions that split the room
- Two hard questions that decide the round
Our free general knowledge quiz questions are pitched at medium to hard, with a proper hard round at the end.
Write it like you’d say it
Quiz questions are read aloud, so write them for the ear. Put the important part at the end: “Which planet is known as the Red Planet?” beats “The Red Planet is which planet?” Avoid double negatives, long lists and anything that needs a diagram.
Check everything twice
Every fact goes wrong eventually: records get broken, capitals move, and “the tallest building in the world” changes every few years. Check each answer against a reliable source, and avoid anything that might have changed since you last looked. Note down acceptable alternatives (“Severn” for “the River Severn”) before you need them.
Order the rounds
Start with something welcoming, put a round most people enjoy in the middle, and save the hardest for last. Variety matters more than theme: follow science with sport, history with music.
Or let us do it
The 100-Question General Knowledge Quiz is ten rounds of new questions, every one fact-checked and marked easy, medium or hard, with team answer sheets and tie-breakers. The free general knowledge page is the free version: questions and answers only.
Full version
Skip the prep.
Ten rounds of general knowledge, with difficulty marked on every question, team answer sheets and two tie-breakers.