Cuba Trivia
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119 free Cuba trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
56 free Cuba trivia questions with answers. Cuba packs an extraordinary amount into one island: five centuries of Spanish rule, the wars that produced José Martí, the revolution that produced Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, and the thirteen days in 1962 when the world nearly ended over it. This quiz covers all of that plus the everyday Cuba: the Malecón, cigars, rum, mojitos and daiquiris, baseball, ballet, Buena Vista Social Club, the flag and the smallest bird on Earth. Early questions are for anyone who has heard of Havana. The later ones ask about Batista's Sergeants' Revolt, the Guantánamo rent cheque, the peso's ISO code and which US president visited before Obama. Good for a geography round, a history class or a Cuban-themed party. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia and shows its citation once you have answered.
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Q 01In 1763 Britain handed captured Havana back to Spain in exchange for which territory?
Florida
Florida: the British had taken Havana in 1762 after a siege, and the swap emptied Florida of its Spanish settlers, most of whom sailed for Cuba.
Q 02As of 2025, which two Caribbean neighbours have more people than Cuba, the region's largest country by area?
Haiti and the Dominican Republic
Haiti and the Dominican Republic: they share Hispaniola, an island smaller than Cuba, yet each now has more people.
Q 03Where had Columbus made his first landfall in the Americas, two weeks before he reached Cuba in October 1492?
The Bahamas
The Bahamas: he named his landing island San Salvador, and when he sailed on to Cuba he took its long coast for part of the Asian mainland.
Q 04Which conquistador sailed from Cuba to Mexico in 1519 in defiance of the island's governor?
Hernán Cortés
Hernán Cortés: he had twice been a town mayor in Cuba, and when Governor Velázquez cancelled the expedition at the last moment he ignored the order and sailed.
Q 05Carlos Manuel de Céspedes began Cuba's 1868 war of independence with which act?
Freeing his slaves
Freeing his slaves: the planter rang his estate's bell, told them they were free and asked them to join the fight, and the revolt had 12,000 volunteers within weeks.
Q 06Which country was last in the Americas to end slavery, after Cuba?
Brazil
Brazil: the emperor's daughter signed its abolition act in 1888 while he was away in Europe, and the monarchy fell the following year.
Q 07José Martí ran the Cuban Revolutionary Party from which city, his home in exile from 1881 until 1895?
New York City
New York City: Martí wrote there for newspapers across Latin America and toured émigré cigar factories, raising money from Cuban workers for the war of 1895.
Q 08The explosion of which US battleship in Havana harbour in 1898 drew the United States into Cuba's war with Spain?
USS Maine
USS Maine: the blast killed more than 250 of her crew, and although its cause is still disputed, 'Remember the Maine!' became the cry for war.
Q 09Spain relinquished sovereignty over Cuba in an 1898 agreement signed in which city?
Paris
Paris: Spain also gave up Guam there and sold the Philippines for $20 million, while Cuba passed to US military rule instead of straight to independence.
Q 10Which US president, a veteran of the 1898 fighting in Cuba, was in office when the island became independent?
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt: he had led his Rough Riders up the San Juan Heights in 1898, and reached the White House in 1901 only because William McKinley was assassinated.
Q 11The US lease of Guantánamo Bay was set up under a 1901 provision named after which senator?
Platt
Platt: Cuba had to write his amendment into its own constitution to end the US occupation, and it let Washington intervene in the island's affairs until 1934.
Q 12Since 1974 the US has sent Cuba a yearly rent cheque for Guantánamo Bay worth roughly how much?
$4,085
$4,085: Cuba calls the base illegal and has banked only one cheque since 1959, which Fidel Castro put down to confusion in the revolution's first days.
Q 13Fulgencio Batista first seized power in Cuba in 1933 by leading an army revolt of which rank?
Sergeants
Sergeants: Batista was a sergeant stenographer when the mutiny began, and he promptly made himself a colonel and chief of the armed forces.
Q 21The failed 1961 invasion of Cuba by CIA-trained exiles is known by the name of which landing site?
The Bay of Pigs
The Bay of Pigs: the exiles of Brigade 2506 were beaten within three days, and Cuba later freed more than 1,100 prisoners in return for $53 million of food and medicine.
Q 22How long did the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 last?
13 days
13 days: at the crisis's most dangerous moment a Soviet submarine officer, Vasily Arkhipov, refused to approve the launch of a nuclear torpedo at US warships.
Q 23What word did Kennedy use instead of 'blockade' for the naval cordon around Cuba in 1962?
Quarantine
Quarantine: a blockade counts as an act of war in international law, so Kennedy chose a milder word, and Soviet ships bound for Cuba changed course away from the line.
Q 14What was the name of the yacht that carried Fidel Castro and about 80 supporters to Cuba in 1956?
Granma
Granma: the secondhand cruiser was built to carry about 12 people, not 82, and it reached Cuba two days late, running aground in a mangrove swamp.
Q 15Castro's 26th of July Movement took its name from the date of a 1953 assault on which target?
The Moncada Barracks
The Moncada Barracks: the attack failed and Castro got 15 years, but his courtroom speech, 'History Will Absolve Me', made his name, and an amnesty freed him within two years.
Q 16From which mountain range did Castro's rebels wage their guerrilla war before breaking out in late 1958?
Sierra Maestra
Sierra Maestra: fewer than two dozen of the 82 rebels who landed in 1956 reached the range, yet two years later their army was closing in on the cities.
Q 17Batista fled Cuba on 1 January 1959 after Che Guevara's column captured which central city?
Santa Clara
Santa Clara: the rebels derailed an armoured train carrying troops and weapons, and Batista flew into exile within hours of the city's fall.
Q 18Che Guevara was born in 1928 in which Argentine city, also the birthplace of footballer Lionel Messi?
Rosario
Rosario: Guevara suffered severe asthma from childhood, yet he became a keen rugby player and swimmer before qualifying as a doctor.
Q 19Which Cuban photographer took the 1960 picture of Che Guevara known as 'Guerrillero Heroico'?
Alberto Korda
Alberto Korda: he shot it at a memorial for the victims of a ship explosion and never earned royalties, but sued in 2000 when the image was used to sell vodka.
Q 20In which country was Che Guevara executed in October 1967?
Bolivia
Bolivia: troops advised by the CIA captured him, and after he was shot his body was flown to a nearby town, shown to the press and then buried in secret.
Q 24In return for the Soviet withdrawal from Cuba in 1962, the US secretly agreed to remove Jupiter missiles from which country?
Turkey
Turkey: the missile swap was not admitted until 1989, so at the time the world saw only the Soviet side backing down.
Q 25The 1980 exodus of around 125,000 Cubans to the US is named after which port?
Mariel
Mariel: Castro opened the port after thousands of asylum seekers crowded into Peru's embassy, and he sent some prisoners and psychiatric patients out with the emigrants.
Q 26In 1961, Cuba's 'Year of Education', about 100,000 young volunteers went into the countryside to do what?
Teach reading
Teach reading: the young volunteers lived with farm families and gave lessons by lantern after the day's work, and within a year illiteracy had fallen to about 4 per cent.
Q 27Fidel Castro's father, Ángel, first came to Cuba in the 1890s in what role?
A Spanish soldier
A Spanish soldier: he served in the army fighting to keep Cuba Spanish, went home after the defeat of 1898, then returned to seek his fortune and became a rich landowner.
Q 28Who took over from the ailing Fidel Castro in 2006?
His brother
His brother: Raúl Castro had run the armed forces since 1959, and as president he restored diplomatic ties with the United States in 2015 after more than 50 years.
Q 29Who was the last sitting US president to visit Havana before Barack Obama went in March 2016?
Calvin Coolidge
Calvin Coolidge: his 1928 trip to address a conference in Havana was the only time he left the US as president, and the break in relations in 1961 kept his successors away.
Q 30Which engineer became Cuba's president in 2018, the first holder of the post born after the 1959 revolution?
Miguel Díaz-Canel
Miguel Díaz-Canel: he was the first Cuban leader not named Castro since the revolution, yet he waited until 2021 for the more powerful job of party leader.