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50 free Geography Trivia for Seniors trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This geography trivia for seniors quiz is written for people who learned their atlas when Ceylon, Burma, Rhodesia and Siam were still on the map. It covers the classics everyone was taught in school (the longest river, the highest mountain, the largest ocean, the five Great Lakes) and the changes that happened during a long lifetime: the Berlin Wall going up and coming down, Alaska and Hawaii joining the Union, Hong Kong being handed back, the Soviet Union breaking into 15 countries, and cities changing their names from Peking, Bombay, Saigon and Leningrad. The questions are pitched for a senior centre or retirement community quiz, a family game with grandparents, or anyone who likes to travel from an armchair. Most are gentle; a handful will start a good argument. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia and reference sources, and each question shows where it comes from. All 50 questions are free with no sign-up. For more, try our main Geography trivia page or World Geography quiz.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which river is generally listed as the longest in the world, at about 6,650 kilometres?
The Nile
The Nile runs about 6,650 km from the Lake Victoria basin to the Mediterranean; the Amazon carries far more water and, by some measurements, rivals it for length.
Q 02Which two men made the first documented ascent of Mount Everest in 1953?
Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary
Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary reached the summit on 29 May 1953 by the Southeast Ridge as part of John Hunt's British expedition; Hillary was a New Zealand beekeeper, Tenzing a Sherpa mountaineer.
Q 03What is the world's largest hot desert?
The Sahara
The Sahara covers about 9.2 million square kilometres across North Africa; only the cold deserts of Antarctica and the Arctic are larger overall.
Q 04Which city was chosen as Australia's capital as a compromise between Sydney and Melbourne?
Canberra
Canberra was purpose-built after federation in 1901, with construction from 1913, and sits in the Australian Capital Territory, an enclave within New South Wales.
Q 05Which is the smallest sovereign state in the world by both area and population?
Vatican City
Vatican City covers about 44 hectares (109 acres) with roughly 800 residents; it was created as a sovereign state by the 1929 Lateran Treaty with Italy.
Q 06Greenland, the world's largest island, belongs to which kingdom?
Denmark
It is an autonomous territory and its people are Danish citizens. The kingdom's other parts are Denmark proper and the Faroe Islands.
Q 07In what year did the Panama Canal open?
1914
1914: the canal opened on 15 August 1914 after the United States took over the failed French project in 1904; Panama assumed full control at the end of 1999.
Q 08Which US president signed the 1977 treaties that eventually handed the Panama Canal to Panama?
Jimmy Carter
Jimmy Carter signed the Torrijos-Carter Treaties with Panama's Omar Torrijos on 7 September 1977; the US Senate ratified them in 1978 by 68 votes to 32, one more than the two-thirds required.
Q 09Which Egyptian leader nationalised the Suez Canal in 1956, sparking the Suez Crisis?
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Gamal Abdel Nasser announced the nationalisation on 26 July 1956 to fund the Aswan High Dam, prompting the Israeli, British and French invasion that autumn; the crisis ended with a humiliating Anglo-French withdrawal.
Q 10In what year did East Germany begin building the Berlin Wall?
1961
1961: East German forces sealed the border and began building the Wall on 13 August 1961; it stood for 28 years before the border opened.
Q 11On what date did East Germany announce its citizens could freely cross into West Berlin?
9 November 1989
9 November 1989: that evening East Berlin's Günter Schabowski announced the new travel rules at a press conference, and crowds forced the crossings open within hours; Germany reunited on 3 October 1990.
Q 12Route 66 ran from Chicago to which California city?
Santa Monica
Santa Monica: Route 66 covered 2,448 miles through eight states from Chicago to the Pacific at Santa Monica; it was decommissioned in 1985, and Steinbeck called it the Mother Road.
Q 13Which of the five Great Lakes is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area?
Superior
Q 21Which country was officially called Burma in English until 1989?
Myanmar
Myanmar: the military government changed the English name from Burma in June 1989; many governments and news organisations kept using Burma for years afterwards.
Q 22Southern Rhodesia became which independent nation on 18 April 1980?
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe gained independence on 18 April 1980 under Robert Mugabe, and its capital Salisbury was renamed Harare in 1982; the colony had been named after Cecil Rhodes in the 1890s.
Q 23Which country was historically known to the West as Persia?
Iran
Iran: the government asked foreign countries to use 'Iran' rather than Persia from 1935; it borders seven countries plus the Caspian Sea, the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf.
Lake Superior spans about 82,100 square kilometres, the largest freshwater surface area on Earth; Michigan and Huron are technically one body of water joined at the Straits of Mackinac.
Q 14The Mississippi River traditionally rises from which body of water in northern Minnesota?
Lake Itasca
From there it flows 2,340 miles to the Gulf of Mexico. Only the Missouri is longer among American rivers.
Q 15The United States bought Alaska from Russia in 1867 for how much?
$7.2 million
$7.2 million, roughly two cents an acre: Secretary of State William Seward negotiated the purchase from Russia, signed on 30 March 1867, and critics mocked it as 'Seward's Folly'.
Q 16Which was the last state to join the United States, in August 1959?
Hawaii
Hawaii became the 50th state on 21 August 1959; it had been a kingdom until 1893 and a US territory from 1898, and Alaska had joined seven months earlier.
Q 17Which sculptor carved Mount Rushmore, working from 1927 to 1941?
Gutzon Borglum
Gutzon Borglum led the carving from 1927 until his death in March 1941, and his son Lincoln finished the work that October; the Lakota name for the mountain means Six Grandfathers.
Q 18Which river carved the Grand Canyon?
The Colorado
The Colorado River cut the Grand Canyon over millions of years; the canyon is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide and over a mile deep.
Q 19Which of the three Niagara waterfalls straddles the Canada-US border?
Horseshoe Falls
Horseshoe Falls, the largest of the three, straddles the border between Ontario and New York; the American and Bridal Veil falls lie entirely in the United States.
Q 20Sri Lanka was known by what name before 1972?
Ceylon
Ceylon: the island gained independence from Britain in 1948 and became the Republic of Sri Lanka in 1972; its tea industry kept the Ceylon name as a brand.
Q 24Which Southeast Asian country was never colonised by a European power?
Thailand
Thailand, then Siam, gave up territory and trade rights through unequal treaties but stayed independent as a buffer between British Burma and French Indochina.
Q 25Which Indian city was officially called Bombay until 1995?
Mumbai
Mumbai: the city's seven islands passed to England in 1661 as part of Catherine of Braganza's dowry on marrying Charles II, and the state renamed Bombay as Mumbai in 1995.
Q 26Which Chinese city was long spelled Peking in the West?
Beijing
Beijing: the Peking spelling came from older romanisation systems; the pinyin form Beijing became standard abroad from the 1980s, and the city's sites include the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven.
Q 27Vietnam's largest city, formerly Saigon, was renamed in 1976 after whom?
Ho Chi Minh
Ho Chi Minh: Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City in 1976 after the reunification of Vietnam, honouring the late revolutionary leader; the river through the city kept the Saigon name.
Q 28Which Russian city was called Petrograd, then Leningrad, before getting its original name back?
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg was Petrograd from 1914, Leningrad from Lenin's death in 1924, and regained its original name by referendum in 1991; it endured the 872-day siege of 1941–44.
Q 29On what date was the Soviet Union formally dissolved?
26 December 1991
26 December 1991: the Soviet of the Republics voted the USSR out of existence the day after Gorbachev resigned as president; glasnost and perestroika had loosened the system, and nationalism did the rest.
Q 30Czechoslovakia peacefully split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in which year?
1993
1993: the federal parliament voted to dissolve Czechoslovakia in late 1992, and the Czech Republic and Slovakia came into being on 1 January 1993, in what is called the Velvet Divorce.