Countries of the World Quiz
Can you guess every country? The globe highlights them one by one, with no repeats, until you have seen them all.
How the countries challenge works
This is the marathon version of GuessGlobe. The globe highlights one country at a time, and you pick its name from four options. There are no capital questions and no repeats. The run ends when you have seen every country big enough to show at globe scale: 166 of the 195.
The other 29 are microstates and small island nations, such as Monaco, Singapore and Tuvalu, that would be a single pixel at this scale. To practise those, play Name the Countries, which marks them as dots, or the Flag Quiz.
On Easy you get 30 seconds per country and random wrong options. On Hard you get 20 seconds, and the wrong options are neighbouring countries with similar names, so you have to know exactly where each border runs. A full run takes about 20 to 30 minutes, and both difficulties have their own leaderboard.
How many countries are there?
GuessGlobe counts 195 countries: the 193 member states of the United Nations plus the two UN observer states, Vatican City and Palestine. Some lists say 196 or 197 by adding Taiwan or Kosovo, which are recognised by some countries but not UN members.
Tips for a full run
Warm up with the continent quizzes first, because Africa and Asia hold more than half of all countries. On Hard, watch for the classic pairs: Niger and Nigeria, Sudan and South Sudan, Guinea and Guinea-Bissau, Slovakia and Slovenia, and the Republic of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. When the globe zooms in, look at the neighbours first. They often tell you the answer before you read the options.
Countries by continent
| Continent | Countries | On the globe |
|---|---|---|
| Africa | 54 | 49 |
| Asia | 48 | 45 |
| Europe | 44 | 38 |
| N. America | 23 | 16 |
| S. America | 12 | 12 |
| Oceania | 14 | 6 |
| Σ | 195 | 166 |
Frequently asked questions
How many countries are there in the world?
195: the 193 UN member states plus the two observer states, Vatican City and Palestine.
Why does the challenge have 166 countries, not 195?
29 microstates and small island nations are too small to highlight on a globe. They are all included in Name the Countries and the Flag Quiz.
How long does a full run take?
Most players finish in 20 to 30 minutes. The run has to be completed in one sitting: closing the game ends it.
Read how many countries there are, continent by continent, or learn how to memorise the world map.