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60 free Boating trivia questions with answers — trivia quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This boating trivia quiz is for anyone who has ever backed a trailer down a ramp, argued about which side is port, or wondered why boat speed is measured in knots. It covers the language of the water (starboard, bilge, gunwale, transom, fathom), the rules of the road that keep two boats from meeting bow to bow, the colours of navigation lights and channel buoys, and the safety facts every skipper is supposed to know. It also digs into the boats and gear themselves: the farmer who welded barrels together to invent the pontoon boat, the man who dreamed up the outboard motor on an ice-cream run, the Boston Whaler that was sawn in half for a magazine ad, the first Jet Ski, the origins of the kayak, the Danforth and CQR anchors, and the record-setting speedboat built in an Australian backyard. Easy questions cover the basics; the hard end gets into COLREGs rule numbers, buoyage regions and boating history. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on boating, boat types, nautical units and marine safety, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
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Q 01When facing the bow of a boat, which side is starboard?
Right
The word comes from Old English steorbord, the steering side, because ships were once steered with an oar on the right.
Q 02Which colour navigation light does a boat show on its port side?
Red
The rule of thumb is that a red port light tells the other skipper "you must give way".
Q 03What word did the Royal Navy use for the left side of a ship before 1844?
Larboard
Whalers went on using the old word into the 1850s, and Mark Twain still wrote it in Life on the Mississippi.
Q 04One knot is a speed of one nautical mile per hour, which is exactly how many kilometres per hour?
1.852
That is roughly 1.15 mph; a boat doing 1 knot along a meridian covers about one minute of latitude an hour.
Q 05The knot takes its name from what speed-measuring device sailors threw over the stern?
A chip log
Knots tied every 47 feet 3 inches ran through a sailor's fingers while a 28-second sand-glass timed them.
Q 06A fathom, the traditional unit for water depth, equals how many feet?
6
It began as the span of a man's outstretched arms; the Old English fæðm meant "embracing arms".
Q 07In which year did an international conference in Monaco fix the nautical mile at exactly 1,852 metres?
1929
The figure approximates one minute of latitude, which actually varies from about 1,843 m at the Equator to 1,862 m at the poles.
Q 08What is the bilge of a boat?
The lowest compartment of the hull
The water that collects there is often so foul that "bilge" became slang for nonsense.
Q 09The gunwale is the top edge of a boat's hull. What was the original "gun wale" on a sailing warship?
A reinforcing band against the recoil of artillery
On a canoe the gunwale is the widened edge that carries the thwarts; on a canal boat it is the side deck.
Q 10On a small boat, an outboard motor is typically bolted to which part of the hull?
The transom
The transom is the flat surface across the stern; on yachts it may hide a hinged swim platform.
Q 11The word "yacht" comes from a Dutch word meaning what?
Hunt
Jachten were light, fast scouting vessels of the Dutch navy; Charles II brought the taste for them to England after his exile.
Q 12A superyacht is generally defined as any yacht longer than how many feet?
131
That is 40 metres; the Commercial Yacht Code already counts a yacht as "large" from 24 metres.
Q 13The word "dinghy" was borrowed into English from languages of which country?
India
It comes from Bengali, Urdu and Hindi words for a small boat, brought back by the British Raj.
Q 14The Pesse canoe, the oldest boat ever recovered, was found in which country?
Q 21Mercury is the only manufacturer offering a V12 outboard motor. How much horsepower does it produce?
600
The supercharged Verado range also includes V8 and V10 models; the V12 arrived in early 2021.
Q 22Which Japanese carmaker introduced the first four-stroke outboard powerhead, in 1964?
Honda
Yamaha's first four-strokes followed in 1984, and North American makers initially borrowed Japanese four-stroke technology.
Q 23The pontoon boat was invented in 1952 by Ambrose Weeres, a farmer in which state?
Minnesota
He welded steel barrels end to end under a wooden platform; the first boat was called The Empress and he became known as "Mr. Pontoon".
Netherlands
It is a dugout carved from a Scots pine trunk between about 8200 and 7600 BC.
Q 15The word "kayak" comes from the Inuktitut qajaq, which means what?
Hunter's boat
Each kayak was built by the man who used it, sized to his own body for maximum manoeuvrability.
Q 16Which German began mass-producing folding kayaks in 1907, a design still used by special forces?
Johannes Klepper
By 1929 his company was turning out 90 foldboats a day, and Britain's SBS still launches Klepper two-seaters from submarines.
Q 17At which Olympic Games did sprint canoeing become a full medal discipline?
Berlin 1936
It had been a demonstration sport in Paris in 1924; kayak sprint has been in every Summer Games since.
Q 18Who built the first commercially successful outboard motor, reportedly after rowing across a lake for ice cream?
Ole Evinrude
He was rowing on Okauchee Lake, Wisconsin, on a hot day to buy ice cream for his girlfriend Bess, and founded his motor company in Milwaukee in 1909.
Q 19Which teenager who tinkered in Ole Evinrude's Milwaukee machine shop went on to co-found a motorcycle company?
Arthur Davidson
Harley-Davidson, like Evinrude, is a Milwaukee company; both are American icons of engines built for fun.
Q 20Mercury Marine, the only US outboard maker, is headquartered in which Wisconsin city?
Fond du Lac
Founder Carl Kiekhaefer named his motors after the Roman god and, during World War II, made his firm the world's largest chainsaw manufacturer.
Q 24Boston Whaler's famous 1961 magazine ad showed founder Dick Fisher doing what to a 13-foot boat?
Sawing it in half as it floated
The foam-cored hull keeps floating even when cut clean through, hence the trademarked line "the unsinkable legend".
Q 25Which company first produced stand-up personal watercraft under the Jet Ski brand in 1972?
Kawasaki
"Jet Ski" is a Kawasaki trademark that became the generic name; Yamaha sells the WaveRunner and BRP the Sea-Doo.
Q 26Which inventor designed Bombardier's first Sea-Doo of 1968 and later developed the Jet Ski?
Clayton Jacobson II
The 1968 machine had an air-cooled 320cc engine and a top speed of 25 mph; the brand was relaunched in 1988.
Q 27Water skiing was invented in 1922 by Ralph Samuelson on Lake Pepin in which state?
Minnesota
He used two boards and a clothesline for a towrope; the American Water Ski Association recognised him as the first water skier in 1966.
Q 28Which Florida attraction, founded by Dick Pope Sr., made water skiing world-famous through its ski shows?
Cypress Gardens
Pope is called the "Father of American Water Skiing"; his son Dick Pope Jr. invented barefoot skiing.
Q 29What was Tony Finn's 1985 wakeboarding precursor called, a nod to the two sports it combined?
Skurfer
The name crossed "surfboard" and "water ski"; the first true wakeboard, the Hyperlite, followed in the early 1990s.
Q 30Which Australian set the standing 317.6 mph water speed record in 1978 in a boat built in his backyard?
Ken Warby
Spirit of Australia was made of wood and fibreglass, cost about $10,000 and ran a Westinghouse J34 jet engine on Blowering Dam.