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Capital Cities Quiz — 50 Questions with Answers

5 rounds · 50 questions

Round 1 of 5 · Question 1 of 50

Asia

What is the capital of Japan?

Show all 50 questions with answers and explanations

Every question, answer and explanation

Asia

  1. What is the capital of Japan?

    Answer Tokyo

    Tokyo means "eastern capital" — it was renamed from Edo in 1868 when the emperor moved there from Kyoto. Curiously, no Japanese law actually names it the capital; the status rests on custom and on where the institutions sit.

  2. What is the capital of China?

    Answer Beijing

    Beijing means "northern capital", which is why Nanjing means "southern capital" — the two cities traded the role several times across Chinese history.

  3. What is the capital of Thailand?

    Answer Bangkok

    Bangkok is the name outsiders use; in Thai the city's full ceremonial name runs to over a hundred letters and is recognized as the longest place name in the world. Thais themselves usually say Krung Thep.

  4. What is the capital of Vietnam?

    Answer Hanoi

    Hanoi is the capital, but Ho Chi Minh City in the south is the larger city and the commercial center — the same split you see in several countries on this quiz.

  5. What is the capital of India?

    Answer New Delhi

    New Delhi was built as a new imperial capital after the British moved the seat from Calcutta, and it was formally inaugurated in 1931. It sits inside the wider Delhi metropolis rather than replacing it.

  6. Jakarta is the capital of which country?

    Answer Indonesia

    Jakarta sits on Java, the most crowded of Indonesia's islands. The country has been building a new capital, Nusantara, on Borneo, so this is one answer that may not stay still.

  7. Manila is the capital of which country?

    Answer The Philippines

    Manila is the capital, but Quezon City held the title for a stretch of the twentieth century before it was handed back. Both are now part of Metro Manila.

  8. Kuala Lumpur is the capital of which country?

    Answer Malaysia

    Kuala Lumpur is the capital, yet most of the government moved out to purpose-built Putrajaya at the end of the 1990s — so the seat of parliament and the seat of administration are different cities.

  9. Ulaanbaatar is the capital of which country?

    Answer Mongolia

    Ulaanbaatar is the coldest capital city in the world by mean annual temperature. Roughly half of Mongolia's population lives there.

  10. What is the capital of Saudi Arabia?

    Answer Riyadh

    Riyadh sits inland on a desert plateau, while Jeddah on the Red Sea is the historic port and the gateway for pilgrims heading to Mecca.

Europe

  1. What is the capital of France?

    Answer Paris

    Paris has been the seat of French power since the Capetian kings, with only brief interruptions — one of the longest unbroken runs of any capital on this list.

  2. What is the capital of Germany?

    Answer Berlin

    Berlin is the answer today, but Bonn served as West Germany's capital for forty years. Parliament voted to return after reunification and the move was completed in 1999.

  3. What is the capital of Italy?

    Answer Rome

    Rome is a capital with a second state inside it: Vatican City is an independent country of well under a square kilometer sitting entirely within the city limits.

  4. What is the capital of Spain?

    Answer Madrid

    Madrid became the permanent seat under Philip II in the sixteenth century, chosen partly because it sits almost exactly in the geographic middle of Spain.

  5. What is the capital of the United Kingdom?

    Answer London

    London is the capital of the United Kingdom as a whole, while Edinburgh, Cardiff and Belfast are the seats of the devolved administrations — a distinction quiz questions often blur.

  6. Vienna is the capital of which country?

    Answer Austria

    Vienna sat at the center of the Habsburg empire, which is why a city of under two million has a palace and museum quarter built for a state many times Austria's present size.

  7. Amsterdam is the capital of which country?

    Answer The Netherlands

    Amsterdam is the constitutional capital, but the government, parliament and the royal working palace are all in The Hague. Both answers feel right; only one is the capital.

  8. Athens is the capital of which country?

    Answer Greece

    Athens took the role in the 1830s when the new Greek state moved its seat there — at the time it was a small town, chosen for its classical name rather than its size.

  9. Lisbon is the capital of which country?

    Answer Portugal

    Lisbon sits at the mouth of the Tagus. Much of it was rebuilt on a grid after the 1755 earthquake, which is why its downtown looks planned in a way older European capitals do not.

  10. What is the capital of Poland?

    Answer Warsaw

    Warsaw replaced Kraków as the royal seat around the end of the sixteenth century. Its old town is a post-war reconstruction, rebuilt from paintings and photographs.

The Americas

  1. What is the capital of the United States?

    Answer Washington, D.C.

    Washington, D.C. deliberately sits inside no state — the district was created as neutral ground so that no single state would host the federal government.

  2. What is the capital of Canada?

    Answer Ottawa

    Ottawa was picked as a compromise when Toronto, Montreal and Quebec City all wanted the honour. Being smaller and further from the American border counted in its favor.

  3. What is the capital of Mexico?

    Answer Mexico City

    Mexico City is built on the site of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital, which stood on an island in a lake. The lake was drained, and the city has been sinking into the old lakebed ever since.

  4. What is the capital of Brazil?

    Answer Brasilia

    Brasilia was built from nothing in the interior and inaugurated in 1960, moving the capital away from coastal Rio de Janeiro. Its street plan was laid out in the shape of an aeroplane.

  5. What is the capital of Argentina?

    Answer Buenos Aires

    Buenos Aires is an autonomous federal district, separate from the surrounding province that shares its name — a common trap in questions about Argentina.

  6. Lima is the capital of which country?

    Answer Peru

    Lima was founded by Pizarro in the 1530s and named the City of Kings. It is one of the world's largest cities sitting in a desert.

  7. Santiago is the capital of which country?

    Answer Chile

    Santiago is the capital, but Chile's National Congress meets in Valparaiso on the coast — another country where the legislature and the government are in different cities.

  8. Bogota is the capital of which country?

    Answer Colombia

    Bogota sits on a high plateau in the Andes at roughly 2,600 meters, high enough that visitors sometimes feel the altitude on their first day.

  9. Havana is the capital of which country?

    Answer Cuba

    Havana was founded by the Spanish in the sixteenth century and grew rich as the assembly point for treasure fleets sailing back to Europe.

  10. What is the capital of Uruguay?

    Answer Montevideo

    Montevideo faces Buenos Aires across the Rio de la Plata, and roughly half of all Uruguayans live in and around it.

Africa & Oceania

  1. What is the capital of Egypt?

    Answer Cairo

    Cairo sits beside the Nile next to the Giza pyramids. Egypt has been building a new administrative capital in the desert to its east, so the government's address is shifting.

  2. What is the capital of Kenya?

    Answer Nairobi

    Nairobi is the only capital in the world with a national park inside its boundaries — lions and rhinos live within sight of the city skyline.

  3. What is the capital of Nigeria?

    Answer Abuja

    Abuja took over from Lagos in 1991. It was built in the center of the country partly so that no single region would feel the capital belonged to its rivals.

  4. What is the capital of Morocco?

    Answer Rabat

    Rabat is the capital, but Casablanca is far larger and is the country's economic center — the split that catches people out on this question.

  5. Addis Ababa is the capital of which country?

    Answer Ethiopia

    Addis Ababa hosts the headquarters of the African Union, which makes it the diplomatic center of the continent as well as Ethiopia's capital.

  6. What is the capital of Ghana?

    Answer Accra

    Accra sits on the Gulf of Guinea. Ghana was the first country in sub-Saharan Africa to gain independence from colonial rule, and Accra was where that was declared.

  7. What is the capital of Australia?

    Answer Canberra

    Canberra was created as a compromise because Sydney and Melbourne both wanted the capital. The site was chosen in 1908, roughly midway between them, and parliament moved there in 1927.

  8. What is the capital of New Zealand?

    Answer Wellington

    Wellington became the capital in the 1860s, taking over from Auckland because it sat closer to the middle of the country and to the South Island.

  9. Suva is the capital of which country?

    Answer Fiji

    Suva is on Viti Levu, the largest of Fiji's islands, and serves as a hub for much of the South Pacific.

  10. What is the capital of Tunisia?

    Answer Tunis

    Tunis grew up beside the ruins of Carthage, the city that fought Rome in the Punic Wars — the archaeological site is now a suburb.

Hard Mode — The Tricky Ones

  1. What is the capital of Turkey? (It isn't Istanbul.)

    Answer Ankara

    Ankara has been the capital since 1923, when the new republic moved the seat inland from Istanbul. Istanbul is still much larger, which is why the question catches so many people.

  2. What is the capital of Switzerland?

    Answer Bern

    Bern is the honest answer, but Switzerland has no capital in law — the constitution avoids the word, and Bern is officially the federal city where the government sits.

  3. What is the capital of Myanmar? (It isn't Yangon.)

    Answer Naypyidaw

    Naypyidaw was built inland in the mid-2000s and the government moved there from Yangon almost overnight. Its enormous multi-lane roads are famously near-empty.

  4. What is the capital of Kazakhstan?

    Answer Astana

    Astana replaced Almaty as the capital in the 1990s. It was renamed Nur-Sultan for a few years before the older name was restored.

  5. What is the legislative capital of Tanzania? (It isn't Dar es Salaam.)

    Answer Dodoma

    Dodoma was declared the capital in the 1970s to move the seat inland, though ministries took decades to actually relocate from Dar es Salaam.

  6. What is the capital of Ivory Coast? (It isn't Abidjan.)

    Answer Yamoussoukro

    Yamoussoukro became the official capital in 1983 — it was the home village of the country's first president. Most government business still happens in Abidjan.

  7. What is the capital of Pakistan? (It isn't Karachi.)

    Answer Islamabad

    Islamabad was purpose-built in the 1960s beside Rawalpindi, taking the role from the port city of Karachi, which remains the largest city.

  8. What is the capital of Belize?

    Answer Belmopan

    Belmopan was built inland after a hurricane devastated Belize City in 1961. It is one of the smallest capital cities in the world by population.

  9. What is the capital of the United Arab Emirates? (It isn't Dubai.)

    Answer Abu Dhabi

    Abu Dhabi is the capital and by far the largest of the seven emirates by area, though Dubai is better known abroad and draws more visitors.

  10. What is the official capital of Sri Lanka? (It isn't Colombo.)

    Answer Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte

    Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte holds the parliament and the official title, while Colombo next door remains the commercial center and the city most people picture.

About the Capital Cities Quiz

Capital cities are the one corner of geography that is pure memory. A mountain’s height can be estimated, a river’s course can be reasoned from the shape of the land, but nothing about a country tells you which of its cities the government sits in. You either learned it or you did not — which is why capitals have been the standard drill for two centuries and why they remain the fastest way to find the holes in a mental map.

Fifty questions in five rounds of ten: Asia, Europe, the Americas, Africa and Oceania, and a hard round of the ones that catch people out. The questions run in both directions. Some name the country and ask for the city; others name the city and ask which country it belongs to. That second direction is noticeably harder, because most people learned these as a one-way list and reversing a list is close to learning it again.

The hard round is built on a single pattern: the capital is very often not the largest city. That is not a set of curiosities, it is a policy that governments keep choosing — moving the seat of government inland, away from the port, away from the commercial center, or building a new city for the purpose. Once you notice the pattern, the round stops feeling like a list of trick questions and starts feeling like a list of decisions.

How it works
  1. Four options and no timer. Read which direction the question is going — country to city, or city to country.
  2. Your answer is marked immediately, and a wrong one leaves the correct city up for a few seconds. Tap anywhere to move on before that.
  3. The rounds are geographic, and the last one collects the capitals that trip up people who did well in the first four.
  4. The back arrow revisits earlier questions, but answered ones are locked — you cannot see an answer and then improve on it.
  5. You end on a mark out of fifty with a score for each region, and the full question list with answers is below for drilling the ones you lost.

Frequently asked questions

Some countries have more than one capital. How is that handled?

By saying so in the question. A number of countries split the roles — the legislature in one city, the courts or the head of state in another — and a few have an official capital that almost nobody uses in speech. Where that applies, the question names which capital it is asking for rather than pretending there is only one, and where a country’s arrangement is genuinely disputed the question is not in the set.

Capitals move. Is the answer key current?

It is, and this is the part of geography with the shortest shelf life. Several of the answers in the hard round are cities that became capitals within living memory, some of them purpose-built. Where a country has announced a move that is not yet complete, the answer is the seat of government as it currently stands — that is the honest position, and it is the one that will need revisiting first.

Why ask in both directions?

Because knowing a capital is not one fact but two. Country-to-city is the direction schools teach and the direction that fades slowest; city-to-country is the direction you actually need when a place name comes up in the news. People who score well one way and badly the other have not half-learned the material — they have learned exactly half of it.

Isn’t this the same as your geography quiz?

No, and deliberately not. The geography quiz has no capitals in it at all: it asks about mountains, oceans, deserts and climate, which are understood rather than memorized. This one is a memory drill and makes no apology for it. Country outlines, flags and world culture are three further quizzes, each testing something the others do not.

How many capitals should I know?

Thirty-five, the same bar as most of our quizzes, and a fair one here because this material is learnable in an afternoon. The first four rounds separate people by which continents they have paid attention to; the hard round separates almost nobody, because it is designed so that fifty percent on it is a strong result.

Is the Capital Cities Quiz free, and do I need an account?

Free, with no account and no email. All fifty questions load with the page and the marking happens in the browser, so nothing you answer leaves the device. Nothing is kept once the tab closes, and there is no history or streak to build up. While the tab is open a refresh puts you back where you were, though for a memory drill a run from the top tells you more.

How long does the Capital Cities Quiz take, and can I stop after one region?

About eight minutes for the fifty at a steady pace. The five rounds are regional — Asia, Europe, the Americas, Africa and Oceania, then the tricky ones — so stopping at the end of a round leaves you with a usable answer about that region rather than a half-finished score.