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50 free Krishna trivia questions with answers — history quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Krishna is one of the most loved figures in Hinduism: the eighth avatar of Vishnu, the mischievous butter thief of Gokul, the flute player who drew the gopis to the Yamuna, and the charioteer who spoke the Bhagavad Gita on the field of Kurukshetra. This quiz follows the whole story, from the prophecy that doomed his uncle Kamsa to the hunter's arrow at Bhalka. Along the way you will meet Devaki and Vasudeva, Nanda and Yashoda, Radha of Barsana, Sudama and his parched rice, the serpent Kaliya, the Syamantaka jewel, and the eight wives listed in the Bhagavata Purana. Later questions cover the festivals of Janmashtami and Dahi Handi, the regional forms of Krishna from Jagannath to Vithoba, Jayadeva's Gita Govinda, Mirabai, and how A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada founded ISKCON in New York in 1966. Easy questions suit anyone who has heard the stories; the expert tier asks about the Heliodorus pillar and what Megasthenes called him. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on Krishna, the Bhagavata Purana and the people and places around him, and each question carries the sentence that backs it up.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Krishna and Rama are both avatars of which Hindu god?
Vishnu
Most Vaishnava lists make Rama the seventh and Krishna the next of the ten Dashavatara; Krishnaite traditions go further and treat Krishna as the source of all avatars.
Q 02In which city was Krishna born, according to Hindu tradition?
Mathura
The birthplace is marked today by the Krishna Janmasthan Temple Complex, built over what tradition says was an underground prison.
Q 03Who were Krishna's birth parents?
Devaki and Vasudeva
The foster parents in Gokul are the ones who actually raised him after the swap on the night of his birth.
Q 04What relation was the tyrant Kamsa to Krishna?
His maternal uncle
Kamsa had imprisoned his own cousin Devaki and killed her earlier children after a prophecy foretold his death.
Q 05According to the prophecy Kamsa heard at Devaki's wedding, which of her children would kill him?
The eighth
Kamsa killed Devaki's earlier children one by one; the seventh, Balarama, was transferred to Rohini's womb and the eighth was smuggled out to Gokul.
Q 06Which river did Vasudeva carry the infant Krishna across on the night of his birth?
The Yamuna
A Kushan-era artwork thought to show this scene has Vasudeva carrying the baby in a basket over the water.
Q 07The Sanskrit word krishna, from which the god takes his name, means what?
Dark or black
That is why murtis of Krishna are so often painted black or blue; the same root gives Krishna Paksha, the waning 'darkening' half of the lunar month.
Q 08Krishna's childhood pranks earned him the nickname Makhan Chor, meaning what?
Butter thief
The Dahi Handi pyramids that smash hanging clay pots each Janmashtami re-enact exactly this habit.
Q 09Which hill did Krishna lift to shelter the people of Vrindavan from devastating rain?
Govardhan
The 8 km ridge in the Braj region is still circled by pilgrims on a parikrama path, and is itself worshipped as a natural form of Krishna.
Q 10Krishna is most often shown playing which instrument?
A bansuri flute
The peacock-feather crown and the flute are his two most recognisable attributes in art.
Q 11The gopis who danced with Krishna were what by occupation?
Milkmaids
The most celebrated of them was Radha; the gopis are said to number 108 in Vrindavan tradition.
Q 12Which demoness tried to kill the infant Krishna by breastfeeding him poisoned milk?
Putana
The name is often glossed as 'devoid of virtue', yet she is also counted as a foster-mother of Krishna because she nursed him.
Q 13The serpent Kaliya had settled in Vrindavan because a curse kept which enemy of all serpents away?
Garuda
Kaliya's original home was the island of Ramanaka; Krishna ended up dancing on his hoods and banishing him back there.
Q 21On what condition did Krishna agree to be Arjuna's charioteer in the Kurukshetra War?
That he would never raise a weapon
The Kauravas got Krishna's army instead, while Arjuna chose the unarmed Krishna himself.
Q 22How many chapters does the Bhagavad Gita contain?
18
Its 700 verses are only a small part of the Mahabharata but became Hinduism's most widely read scripture.
Q 23The Bhagavad Gita is traditionally attributed to which sage?
Veda Vyasa
Historians treat it as a composite work by several authors, probably composed in the second or first century BCE.
Q 14Yashoda, Krishna's foster mother, was married to which chieftain of Gokul?
Nanda
The Harivamsa makes Nanda a step-brother of Krishna's birth father, which is why the baby was entrusted to him.
Q 15Krishna's elder brother Balarama is usually described as an incarnation of which being?
Shesha
Balarama's weapon is a plough, and one 12th-century poem even lists him rather than Krishna among the ten avatars.
Q 16After killing Kamsa, whom did Krishna reinstate as king of the Yadavas?
Ugrasena
Ugrasena was Kamsa's own father, deposed by his ambitious son; Krishna refused the throne for himself.
Q 17Which coastal city in present-day Gujarat did Krishna found as his capital?
Dwarka
The name means 'city of gates'; the town's Dwarkadhish Temple is one of the four Char Dham pilgrimage sites.
Q 18Who is listed first among Krishna's eight principal wives in the Bhagavata Purana?
Rukmini
She was a princess of Vidarbha who eloped with Krishna to escape a marriage arranged by her brother Rukmi.
Q 19What humble gift did Krishna's poor childhood friend Sudama bring to his royal court?
Handfuls of parched rice
Krishna replaced Sudama's hut with palaces without ever mentioning his friend's poverty.
Q 20Where did Krishna and Sudama study together as boys?
Sandipani's ashram
The ashram is traditionally placed at Ujjain in present-day Madhya Pradesh.
Q 24What is the name of Krishna's conch, which he blew at Kurukshetra?
Panchajanya
The Mahabharata says the shell was taken from a slain daitya named Panchajana; Devadatta was the conch of the Pandava archer and Kaumodaki is Krishna's mace.
Q 25Krishna beheaded which abusive king with the Sudarshana Chakra at Yudhishthira's coronation?
Shishupala
Krishna had promised the king's mother to forgive a hundred insults; the hundred-and-first was fatal.
Q 26The Syamantaka jewel of the Krishna legends originally belonged to which god?
Surya
The ruby was said to yield eight bharas of gold a day, and Krishna was falsely accused of stealing it before he tracked it to the bear-king Jambavan.
Q 27How does Krishna die in the Mahabharata and Puranic accounts?
A hunter's arrow hits his foot
The hunter Jara mistook the resting Krishna for a deer; Krishna forgave him before dying.
Q 28Which pilgrimage site in Gujarat marks the place where Krishna is believed to have died?
Bhalka
The site lies near Veraval on the Saurashtra coast and is a stop on the government's Krishna pilgrimage circuit.
Q 29Krishna's birthday festival, Janmashtami, usually falls in which months of the Gregorian calendar?
August or September
It is fixed to day eight of the dark fortnight of Bhadrapada in the lunisolar calendar, and devotees fast until midnight, the hour of the birth.
Q 30The Dahi Handi human-pyramid celebration after Janmashtami is especially associated with which state?
Maharashtra
The pot of curd or butter hung high in the air stands in for the butter the child Krishna used to steal.