Getting your questions ready
Getting your questions ready
Beat the crowd
10 questions No timer
50 free Breaking trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Breaking went from a rec room on Sedgwick Avenue to the Place de la Concorde in fifty years. It began at DJ Kool Herc's Bronx parties in 1973, when dancers waited for the drum break to do their best moves, and it reached the Olympic programme in Paris 2024, where a Japanese b-girl and a Canadian b-boy took the first gold medals and an Australian academic's kangaroo hop became the most talked-about routine of the Games. These 50 questions cover the whole arc: the four elements, the Balti-free vocabulary of toprock, freezes, windmills and 1990s, Rock Steady Crew and Crazy Legs, the films that carried the dance around the world (Flashdance, Wild Style, Breakin'), and the competitions that rebuilt it in the 1990s: Battle of the Year, Red Bull BC One and the Korean scene that started with a single VHS tape. The expert tier asks about a 1933 headspin, the Juba dance and the crew that gave Phil Wizard his name. Every answer is cited to a page we checked and comes with a short explanation, so you learn something even when you miss. Play it solo or use it for a hip-hop night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Breaking developed in which New York City borough?
The Bronx
African American and Puerto Rican youth shaped the dance there in the 1970s, alongside the birth of hip hop.
Q 02Breaking made its Olympic debut at which Games?
Paris 2024
Battles were staged over two days in August on the Place de la Concorde.
Q 03Which DJ coined the terms 'b-boy' and 'b-girl' for the dancers at his parties?
DJ Kool Herc
He said 'breaking' came from slang for someone going to the breaking point, not from the breaks on a record.
Q 04Along with footwork, power moves and freezes, what is the fourth element of breaking?
Toprock
It is the standing opener, and transitions from it to the floor are called drops.
Q 05What is a held, motionless pose used to hit a strong beat called?
Freeze
Chaining several together into a 'stack' shows off musicality and upper-body strength.
Q 06Who threw the August 1973 back-to-school party at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue?
Cindy Campbell
Her older brother was the DJ; the rec-room parties grew until dance halls had to be rented by 1975.
Q 07Which Incredible Bongo Band track became a staple of early breaking parties?
Apache
It was one of the records Herc played back to back to extend the drum breaks for dancers.
Q 08Which artist did many early Bronx breakers name as 'the first b-boy'?
James Brown
Kool Herc said Brown was his favourite artist even while he was still living in Jamaica.
Q 09Films starring which martial artist are cited as an influence by early breakers?
Bruce Lee
Many acrobatic moves are said to echo kung fu kicks from the ground.
Q 10Which two b-boys formed Rock Steady Crew in the Bronx in 1977?
Jimmy Dee and Jimmy Lee
The name meant keeping 'the Rock' (the dance) steady, or alive, as older dancers moved on.
Q 11Which power move did Rock Steady Crew's president discover by accident?
Windmill
He overshot a chair freeze into a continuous back spin, and the move has been a foundation ever since.
Q 12Rock Steady Crew's part in which film propelled breaking to worldwide fame?
Flashdance
Breaking 'hit the West Coast with a fury' in 1982 after the crew's appearance.
Q 13Who doubled for Jennifer Beals in the breaking move of her 1983 audition scene?
Crazy Legs
Beals' main dance double was the French actress Marine Jahan; a gymnast did the slow-motion dive.
Q 21Who won the first women's Olympic breaking gold medal?
Ami Yuasa
She had already won the first b-girl Red Bull BC One title in 2018 and two WDSF world championships.
Q 22Which Lithuanian b-girl took silver in the Olympic women's final?
Nicka
Dominika Banevič was just 17 and had won the world title in Leuven at 16.
Q 23Which country's breaker won the first men's Olympic breaking gold?
Canada
Phil Wizard swept three rounds against France's Danny Dan, with the judges voting 23–4.
Q 24Which crew's street shows in Vancouver inspired Phil Wizard to start breaking in 2009?
Q 14Which 1984 film, released as Breakdance in the UK, gave Ice-T his screen debut?
Breakin'
Its sequel, Electric Boogaloo, came out the same year and lent its name to a running joke about sequels.
Q 15The 1984 Cannon film with dancers Ozone and Turbo was set in which beach community?
Venice
The setting was inspired by a documentary about the Radio-Tron club near MacArthur Park in Los Angeles.
Q 16Which country hosted the first international breaking competition, in the early 1990s?
Germany
Founder Thomas Hergenröther's event has been called the 'World Cup of B-Boying'.
Q 17Which French city hosted BOTY's world finals in 2015?
Montpellier
Crews won regional qualifiers from Zimbabwe to Indonesia to reach Montpellier's Sud de France Arena, BOTY's home for much of the 2010s.
Q 18Red Bull BC One held its first event in 2004 in which Swiss city?
Biel
The competition returned to Switzerland in 2018, at Zurich's Hallenstadion.
Q 19How many breakers compete in the Red Bull BC One main knockout event?
16
Six earn places through regional qualifiers; the rest are the holder, wild cards and expert picks.
Q 20In which year did Red Bull BC One first feature a 16-b-girl bracket in its main event?
2018
B-Girl Ayumi had been invited as a competitor the year before.
Now or Never
His own name came by accident: people shortened 'Phil from the Wizards crew'.
Q 25Which landmark square hosted the Olympic breaking battles in 2024?
Place de la Concorde
The same square hosted skateboarding, BMX freestyle and 3x3 basketball.
Q 26How many judges scored each battle round at the Paris Olympics?
Nine
Each judge voted for one breaker per round; the majority took the round.
Q 27Which Olympic judging criterion covered the number and variety of a breaker's moves?
Vocabulary
The other criteria were technique, execution, musicality and originality, each weighted equally.
Q 28Which b-girl's 'kangaroo hop' at the 2024 Olympics went viral and drew widespread mockery?
Raygun
She received no judges' votes in three round-robin battles and retired from competition that November.
Q 29Australian b-girl Rachael Gunn lectured at which university?
Macquarie
Her PhD thesis examined gender in Sydney's breaking scene.
Q 30Which comedian satirised the Australian b-girl's routine on The Tonight Show?
Rachel Dratch
Team Australia's chef de mission Anna Meares publicly defended the dancer against online abuse.