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50 free 40th Birthday trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
44 free 40th birthday trivia questions with answers. Turning forty in 2026 means you were born in 1986, the year of Chernobyl, Challenger, Top Gun, Halley's Comet, the Hand of God and the Mets' comeback. This quiz is built for a 40th birthday party: forty questions split between the world your guest of honour was born into, the celebrities blowing out the same number of candles this year, and the number forty itself, from Ali Baba's thieves and the forty days of Lent to WD-40, UB40, the Roaring Forties and the ruby wedding. The easy rounds ask which comet swung by in 1986 and what Andy sells in The 40-Year-Old Virgin; the harder ones want the temperature where Fahrenheit and Celsius agree, the country whose name means 'land of forty tribes' and the self-help bestseller that gave us 'life begins at forty'. Read them out over cake or hand the link round the table; every question is multiple choice with an explanation, so nobody has to argue with the quizmaster. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the year 1986, the number 40 and the films, bands and events involved, and each question carries the sentence that backs it up. That mix of 1986 and the number forty is exactly what people mean by trivia for 40 year olds: the world they were born into, plus a bit of fun at the number's expense.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which famous visitor made its once-in-a-lifetime pass through the inner Solar System in 1986?
Halley's Comet
It will not be back until mid-2061; ESA's Giotto probe photographed its nucleus that March.
Q 02Which nuclear power plant suffered the world's worst reactor disaster on April 26, 1986?
Chernobyl
At least 350,000 people were resettled and traces of the fallout reached nearly every country in the northern hemisphere.
Q 03Which schoolteacher was among the seven crew killed on Space Shuttle Challenger in 1986?
Christa McAuliffe
US Navy divers found the crew compartment on the seabed six weeks later.
Q 04Which film was the highest-grossing movie in the world in 1986?
Top Gun
Kenny Loggins' Danger Zone helped push the soundtrack to seven million US sales.
Q 05Diego Maradona scored his 'Hand of God' goal in June 1986 against which team?
England
Four minutes later he dribbled past the whole team for the 'Goal of the Century'; Argentina won the tournament.
Q 06A roller through Bill Buckner's legs in Game 6 of the 1986 World Series handed a comeback to which team?
New York Mets
The Mets took Game 7 too, winning the series four games to three.
Q 07Which animation studio was founded on February 3, 1986, by John Lasseter and Steve Jobs?
Pixar
Microsoft held its stock-market flotation just five weeks later, on March 13.
Q 08Which daytime talk show went national on September 8, 1986, and ran for 25 seasons?
The Oprah Winfrey Show
It clocked 4,561 episodes before ending in May 2011.
Q 09Which space station did the Soviet Union launch on February 19, 1986?
Mir
It stayed in orbit until 2001 and hosted the first long-term international crews.
Q 10On May 25, 1986, about five million people held hands from New York City to which city?
Long Beach
Hands Across America raised money to fight hunger and homelessness; the western end was at the Queen Mary's mooring.
Q 11Which musical, later Broadway's longest-running, opened at Her Majesty's Theatre on October 9, 1986?
The Phantom of the Opera
The same day, News Corporation completed the Metromedia deal that launched the Fox network.
Q 12Which manager was appointed by Manchester United on November 6, 1986?
Alex Ferguson
He stayed for more than 26 years.
Q 13Which two countries joined the European Community on January 1, 1986?
Spain and Portugal
The same month, Britain and France announced plans for the Channel Tunnel.
Q 21Which Twilight star was born on May 13, 1986?
Robert Pattinson
Megan Fox followed three days later on May 16.
Q 22Which Canadian rapper, born October 24, 1986, is a 1986 baby?
Drake
The former Degrassi actor shares his birth year with Emilia Clarke and Kit Harington.
Q 23Which tennis champion was born on June 3, 1986?
Rafael Nadal
The Olsen twins came along ten days later, on June 13.
Q 24Which Game of Thrones star, born October 23, 1986, played Daenerys Targaryen?
Q 14Which country's president fled into exile in Hawaii in February 1986 after the People Power Revolution?
The Philippines
Corazon Aquino became the first Filipino woman president; the same month Baby Doc Duvalier fled Haiti.
Q 15Which Swedish prime minister was shot dead walking home from the cinema in Stockholm in February 1986?
Olof Palme
His deputy Ingvar Carlsson took over the following day.
Q 16Which magazine introduced the Big Mac Index, a semi-humorous purchasing-power measure, in 1986?
The Economist
The idea is that a burger sold everywhere makes a handy yardstick for comparing currencies.
Q 17The 1986 Rutan Voyager flight was the first to do what?
Circle the world nonstop, unrefuelled
Dick Rutan and Jeana Yeager took nine days, three minutes and 44 seconds.
Q 18The M25 motorway, opened by Margaret Thatcher in October 1986, encircles which city?
London
It became Europe's second-longest orbital road on completion.
Q 19Which pop superstar was born on March 28, 1986?
Lady Gaga
Rihanna arrived two years later and Taylor Swift three.
Q 20Which sprinter, the fastest man in history, was born on August 21, 1986?
Usain Bolt
The fastest man in history was born the day the Lake Nyos disaster killed nearly 2,000 people in Cameroon.
Emilia Clarke
Kit Harington, her on-screen nephew, was born two months later on December 26.
Q 25Which actress, born July 2, 1986, starred in Mean Girls and The Parent Trap?
Lindsay Lohan
Amanda Bynes is also a 1986 baby, born on April 3.
Q 26What is Andy's job in the 2005 comedy The 40-Year-Old Virgin?
Stock supervisor at an electronics store
Judd Apatow cast Steve Carell after seeing him in Anchorman; the film was Apatow's directing debut.
Q 27What does the '40' in WD-40 stand for?
The 40th formula attempted
It was made in 1953 to keep the Atlas missile's skin from rusting, and the recipe has never been patented.
Q 28The reggae band UB40 took their name from what?
A British unemployment benefit form
They formed in Birmingham in 1978 and have sold more than 100 million records.
Q 29Which gemstone marks a 40th wedding anniversary?
Ruby
Silver is 25 and gold is 50, a pairing recorded in Germanic countries since the 1500s.
Q 30The 1932 bestseller that made 'life begins at forty' a catchphrase was written by whom?
Walter B. Pitkin
When it came out, US life expectancy at birth was only around 60, up from about 40 fifty years earlier.