Sherlock (BBC series) Trivia
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140 free Sherlock (BBC Series) trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Sherlock trivia quiz covers the BBC series created by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, which ran for four three-part series and a Victorian special between 2010 and 2017 (for questions on Arthur Conan Doyle's original stories, see our Sherlock Holmes quiz). It follows Benedict Cumberbatch's modern-day consulting detective and Martin Freeman's Afghanistan veteran John Watson from their first flatshare at 221B Baker Street to the fall from Barts, the return, John's wedding, the shooting of Magnussen and the secret sister locked away at Sherrinford. The easy questions are ones any viewer knows: who plays Moriarty, what Sherlock calls himself instead of a psychopath, where the special is set and what Irene Adler's phone password turned out to be. From there it works through every episode: the pink lady and the cabbie's pills, the Black Lotus cipher, the pips of The Great Game, the Baskerville hound and its acronym, Richard Brook, the thirteen scenarios on the roof, the Mayfly Man, Mary's A.G.R.A. stick, Culverton Smith the 'cereal killer', Redbeard and the girl on the plane. There are behind-the-scenes questions too: the unaired 60-minute pilot, why Baker Street was filmed on North Gower Street, Matt Smith's audition for Watson, Cumberbatch's real parents playing his fictional ones, the Emmys and the Royal Mail stamps. Every answer was checked against the encyclopaedia entries for the series, its episodes and its cast before publishing, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. Fans of British crime drama may also like our Doctor Who and Broadchurch quizzes.
30 of 140 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01In A Study in Pink, what does Sherlock get wrong when he deduces John's life from his phone?
Harry is John's sister
Harry is John's sister: Sherlock reads the engraved phone as a gift from a hard-drinking brother, and is furious to learn that Harry is short for Harriet.
Q 02What army rank does John pull to get past a corporal in The Hounds of Baskerville?
Captain
Captain: John flashes his old ID as 'Captain John Watson, Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers', and the corporal on duty snaps to attention and salutes.
Q 03Which CBS series, launched in 2012, followed Sherlock in moving Holmes to the present day?
Elementary
Elementary put Jonny Lee Miller's Holmes in modern-day New York beside Lucy Liu's Joan Watson; Sherlock's producers warned publicly that it had better not resemble their show.
Q 04What favour did Sherlock once do for Mrs Hudson, earning a special deal on the rent?
Ensured her husband's execution
Ensured her husband's execution: he was on death row in Florida, and when John assumes Sherlock saved him, Sherlock replies, 'Oh no. I ensured it.'
Q 05On which channel did Sherlock originally air in the UK?
BBC One
BBC One: a Russian-dubbed copy of the 2017 finale leaked online a day before its premiere on the channel, and the show's makers begged fans not to share it.
Q 06Sherlock is set in London, but in which city was most of it filmed?
Cardiff
Cardiff: the production shared Upper Boat Studios with Doctor Who, and filming there was cheaper than in London, so Welsh streets stood in for much of the capital.
Q 07Which real London road stands in for Baker Street in Sherlock's exterior shots of 221B?
North Gower Street
North Gower Street: number 187 plays 221B because the real Baker Street has heavy traffic and far too many things labelled 'Sherlock Holmes' to hide.
Q 08Which US network co-produced Sherlock and gave it its American premiere?
PBS
PBS: its Masterpiece strand, made by Boston station WGBH, co-produced the series, which is why Sherlock's American Emmys are credited to PBS and not the BBC.
Q 09From which war has John Watson returned when he meets Sherlock?
Afghanistan
Afghanistan: Conan Doyle's Watson was wounded there in 1880, so the backstory needed no updating, and Sherlock reads it off John's tan and bearing seconds after they meet.
Q 10Which song, Moriarty's ringtone, interrupts his standoff with Sherlock at the start of series two?
Stayin' Alive
Stayin' Alive: the Bee Gees hit rings out at the tensest moment, and the call it announces makes Moriarty dismiss his snipers and stroll away.
Q 11What is Molly Hooper's job?
Pathologist
Pathologist: Molly works in the hospital morgue, where Sherlock horsewhips a corpse in his very first scene to see what bruises form after death.
Q 12Who plays Mrs Hudson, the landlady?
Una Stubbs
Una Stubbs: her Mrs Hudson keeps reminding her tenants, 'I'm your landlady, dear, not your housekeeper', and then brings up the tea anyway.
Q 13In The Great Game, what has a bored Sherlock spray-painted on the wall of 221B and then shot at?
A smiley face
A smiley face, sprayed in yellow paint left over from the previous case; Conan Doyle's Holmes did his indoor target practice by picking out a patriotic 'V.R.' in bullet holes.
Q 21Who plays Sherlock and Mycroft's parents from series three onwards?
Cumberbatch's real mum and dad
Cumberbatch's real mum and dad, the actors Wanda Ventham and Timothy Carlton, play a couple so cheerfully ordinary that Sherlock sighs, 'It's a cross I have to bear.'
Q 22Who plays Irene Adler in A Scandal in Belgravia?
Lara Pulver
Lara Pulver, previously seen in the BBC spy drama Spooks, played Irene Adler in the January 2012 series-two opener, which drew more than 100 complaints to the BBC.
Q 23Who plays Henry Knight in The Hounds of Baskerville?
Russell Tovey
Q 14Who plays DI Greg Lestrade?
Rupert Graves
Rupert Graves: his Lestrade's first name goes unspoken until The Hounds of Baskerville, where Sherlock is surprised to learn it, and he is still calling him Graham episodes later.
Q 15What is a blood-soaked Sherlock carrying when he comes home by Tube at the start of The Hounds of Baskerville?
A harpoon
A harpoon: 'None of the cabs would take me,' he complains; the scene nods to Conan Doyle's 'Black Peter', in which Holmes spends a morning stabbing a dead pig to test a murder method.
Q 16Which 2007 film made Moffat and Vertue want to cast Cumberbatch as Sherlock?
Atonement
Atonement: Cumberbatch played the predatory Paul Marshall, and after seeing it the producers had him read the script and cast him before they auditioned a single Watson.
Q 17How does Sherlock describe himself instead of a psychopath?
A high-functioning sociopath
A high-functioning sociopath: 'Do your research,' he tells Anderson, though psychologist Maria Konnikova has argued the label is simply wrong for a man who so plainly cares about his friends.
Q 18What replaces Holmes's pipe in the modern series?
Nicotine patches
Nicotine patches: Sherlock calls the first episode's puzzle 'a three-patch problem', updating Conan Doyle's 'three-pipe problem' because he cannot smoke indoors in modern London.
Q 19Which future Doctor Who star auditioned unsuccessfully for Watson, judged too 'barmy'?
Matt Smith
Matt Smith was the first actor seen for Watson and was turned down as too 'barmy', more a Holmes than a Watson; Moffat soon cast him as the Eleventh Doctor instead.
Q 20Who plays Mary Morstan?
Amanda Abbington
Amanda Abbington was then the real-life partner of the actor playing John, so the Watsons' screen marriage was played by an actual couple.
Russell Tovey plays Henry Knight, whose childhood terror of a gigantic hound proves catching: after a night on the moor a badly shaken Sherlock admits he saw the creature too.
Q 24Sherlock was first announced in 2008 as what kind of production?
A single 60-minute drama
A single 60-minute drama was the plan announced at the 2008 Edinburgh TV festival; the BBC then shelved the finished pilot and paid to have the story shot all over again.
Q 25How was TV presenter Connie Prince really killed in The Great Game?
An overdose of Botox
An overdose of Botox: her houseboy Raoul stepped up the dose in her regular injections, while John had confidently accused her brother and the cat.
Q 26Which visual device did director Paul McGuigan introduce in the first episode of Sherlock?
Text floating on screen
Text floating on screen: McGuigan is credited with the idea, which spared viewers cutaways to a hand holding a phone and let Sherlock's deductions hover beside each clue.
Q 27What is the name of the sandwich shop beneath the flat used as Sherlock's home?
Speedy's
Speedy's, the real sandwich bar next to the front door used as 221B; its owner reported a sharp rise in customers, many of them fans, after the series aired.
Q 28Which brand made the long wool coat that became Sherlock's trademark?
Belstaff
Belstaff: the coat had gone out of production, and demand from viewers was such that the brand was making it again before the first series had finished airing.
Q 29Who composed the music for Sherlock?
David Arnold and Michael Price
David Arnold and Michael Price wrote the score; the violin Sherlock plays on screen was recorded by Eos Chater, who stood where the actor could see her and copy her bowing.
Q 30Which film franchise had one of Sherlock's two composers already scored five times?
James Bond
James Bond: he scored five 007 films from Tomorrow Never Dies to Quantum of Solace, after his album of Bond theme covers impressed the series' veteran composer John Barry.