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60 free Yangtze trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Yangtze trivia quiz covers the Long River from its source on the Tibetan Plateau to the delta that produces a fifth of China's GDP. It starts with the basics (how long it is, where it rises and ends, what its Chinese name means and where the English name came from) and works through the Three Gorges, the world's largest power station and the million-plus people it displaced, the extinct baiji and paddlefish, the alligator and the giant salamander, and the ten-year fishing ban. The second half is history and cities: the fire ships at Red Cliffs, the deadliest floods in history, Mao's propaganda swims, the first bridges at Wuhan and Nanjing, Chongqing's years as wartime capital, the Yellow Crane Tower, Poyang and Dongting lakes, the Grand Canal and the South-North Water Transfer. About a third of the questions are easy; the rest are for geography teachers and anyone who has taken the Three Gorges cruise. Try our China and rivers of the world quizzes next. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the Yangtze, the Three Gorges Dam and the river's wildlife, cities and history, and each explanation adds one more detail.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Where does the Yangtze rank among the world's longest rivers?
Third
Only the Nile and the Amazon are longer; it is the longest river in China.
Q 02What does the Chinese name Chang Jiang literally mean?
Long River
The epithet 'long' was first formally applied during the Six Dynasties period; earlier it was simply 'the River'.
Q 03Where does the Yangtze rise?
The Tanggula Mountains of the Tibetan Plateau
Its source is at Jari Hill, and it flows about 6,236 km to the East China Sea.
Q 04Into which sea does the Yangtze empty?
The East China Sea
Its estuary carries almost 1,000 cubic kilometres of water a year.
Q 05Roughly what share of China's population lives in the Yangtze basin?
Nearly one-third
The basin covers a fifth of China's land area.
Q 06The English name 'Yangtze' comes from a local name for the lower river near which city?
Yangzhou
It probably derives from an ancient ferry crossing called Yangzi; Europeans in the delta applied the local name to the whole river.
Q 07What alternative English name for the Yangtze arose in the 18th century by analogy with the Yellow one?
The Blue River
Marco Polo had called it Quian, and early English maps showed it as Kian or Kiam.
Q 08What does Jinsha, the name of the upper Yangtze from Yibin to Qinghai, mean?
Gold Sands
The Tongtian ('Leading to Heaven') River is the stretch above it.
Q 09Which famous canyon does the Jinsha stretch of the Yangtze pass through in the far southwest?
Tiger Leaping Gorge
The upstream section through Yunnan is part of the UNESCO Three Parallel Rivers site.
Q 10What are the names of the Three Gorges, from west to east?
Qutang, Wu and Xiling
They stretch 193 miles from Baidicheng in Chongqing to Nanjin Pass at Yichang.
Q 11How long is the Three Gorges stretch of the river?
193 miles
Junks were once hauled upstream through it by 70 to 80 'trackers' harnessed to ropes.
Q 12What is the Three Gorges Dam's claim to fame?
World's largest power station by capacity
Its installed capacity is 22,500 MW and it generates around 95 TWh a year.
Q 13Which Chinese leader first envisioned a great dam across the Yangtze, in a 1919 book?
Sun Yat-sen
Construction finally began on 14 December 1994.
Q 21The Chinese paddlefish, declared extinct in a 2019 study, may have grown to what length?
Possibly 7 metres
It was among the largest freshwater fish on Earth and was last seen alive in 2003.
Q 22Which animal is China's only surviving freshwater cetacean?
The Yangtze finless porpoise
Its numbers rose to just over a thousand by 2017, and it was listed as critically endangered.
Q 23The Chinese alligator, historically called the 'muddy dragon', survives in the wild in which province?
Anhui
One of the smallest crocodilians, it grows to about 1.5-2 metres and brumates in burrows.
Q 14Near which city is the Three Gorges Dam?
Yichang
The Gezhouba Dam and the gorges themselves are all in the city's Yiling District.
Q 15Roughly how many people were displaced by the Three Gorges reservoir?
1.1 to 1.4 million
Planners expected 13 cities, 140 towns and 1,350 villages to be partly or fully flooded.
Q 16The steel used in the Three Gorges Dam would be enough to build how many Eiffel Towers?
63
It took 27.2 million cubic metres of concrete and 463,000 tonnes of steel.
Q 17In which year did the Three Gorges power plant become fully operational, with its 32nd turbine?
2012
The first generator started up in July 2003; the ship lift came last, in 2015.
Q 18How long is the Three Gorges Dam?
2,335 metres
The concrete wall stands 181 metres above its rock base.
Q 19Which was the only other dam on the Yangtze's main stem besides Three Gorges, as of 2007?
Gezhouba
Built in the early 1980s, it blocked the sturgeon's route to its spawning grounds.
Q 20Which Yangtze river dolphin was declared functionally extinct after a 2006 survey found none?
The baiji
Nicknamed the Goddess of the Yangtze, it may be the first dolphin species wiped out by humans.
Q 24How long can the Chinese giant salamander, one of the world's largest amphibians, grow?
1.8 metres
It is critically endangered, partly because it is eaten as a delicacy.
Q 25How long is the fishing moratorium China imposed on the Yangtze in January 2020?
Ten years
It covers 332 sites and, under the new law, all natural waterways, tributaries and lakes.
Q 26The Yangtze-Huai floods often ranked among the deadliest natural disasters ever struck in which year?
1931
Official figures said 2 million died; some Western estimates run to 4 million.
Q 27How many people were made homeless by the 1998 Yangtze floods?
15 million
About 3,700 died and economic losses were put at $24 billion.
Q 28The Battle of Red Cliffs on the Yangtze in 208-209 AD saw the defeat of which northern warlord?
Cao Cao
His ships, chained together against seasickness, were destroyed by fire ships.
Q 29Until 1957 there was no bridge across the Yangtze between Yibin and Shanghai. Which city got the first?
Wuhan
Soviet engineers helped design the double-deck road-rail bridge from Turtle Hill to Snake Hill.
Q 30The Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge, opened in 1968, was the first to cross which part of the river?
The lower reaches
Like the Wuhan bridge it is a double-decked road-rail truss bridge.