World Capitals by Continent: A Study Guide
World capitals by continent with the ones that catch people out: Canberra not Sydney, Ottawa, Brasília, Ankara, Bern, Abuja and ways to remember them.
The hardest capitals to remember are the ones that are not the biggest city. Everyone knows Paris and Tokyo; the quiz points come from Canberra, Ottawa, Brasília, Ankara and Abuja. This guide organises the capitals by continent, flags the traps, and gives you ways to remember them before you try the World Capitals Quiz or the continent quizzes for Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas and Oceania.
The traps first
These are the capitals most often answered wrongly, because a larger or more famous city steals the answer:
| Country | Capital | The city people guess |
|---|---|---|
| Australia | Canberra | Sydney or Melbourne |
| Canada | Ottawa | Toronto |
| Brazil | Brasília | Rio de Janeiro or São Paulo |
| Turkey | Ankara | Istanbul |
| Switzerland | Bern | Zurich or Geneva |
| Nigeria | Abuja | Lagos |
| Tanzania | Dodoma | Dar es Salaam |
| Morocco | Rabat | Casablanca |
| Pakistan | Islamabad | Karachi |
| Vietnam | Hanoi | Ho Chi Minh City |
| New Zealand | Wellington | Auckland |
| Myanmar | Naypyidaw | Yangon |
| Kazakhstan | Astana | Almaty |
| Belize | Belmopan | Belize City |
| United States | Washington, D.C. | New York |
Learn this table and you have most of the hard points in any capitals quiz.
Europe
Most European capitals are also the largest city, so the continent is friendly. The ones to check: Switzerland (Bern), the Netherlands (Amsterdam is the capital, though the government sits in The Hague), Liechtenstein (Vaduz), San Marino (San Marino), Andorra (Andorra la Vella), Montenegro (Podgorica), North Macedonia (Skopje), Moldova (Chișinău), Belarus (Minsk), Slovenia (Ljubljana) and Slovakia (Bratislava). The last two are confused with each other as often as their flags are: Ljubljana has the L of Slovenia and Bratislava is on the Danube next to Vienna.
A memory hook for the Baltic states: north to south the countries run Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and the capitals Tallinn, Riga, Vilnius. Learn them as one chant in that order and the pairing comes with it.
Asia
Asia has the most capitals that are not the biggest city. Besides Ankara, Islamabad, Hanoi, Naypyidaw and Astana from the traps table: India's capital is New Delhi (not Mumbai), China's is Beijing (not Shanghai), the Philippines' is Manila (which is at least the best known), Sri Lanka's is Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte (Colombo is the commercial centre), Bhutan's is Thimphu, Laos's is Vientiane, Cambodia's Phnom Penh, Mongolia's Ulaanbaatar, Nepal's Kathmandu, Bangladesh's Dhaka, Uzbekistan's Tashkent, Kyrgyzstan's Bishkek, Tajikistan's Dushanbe, Turkmenistan's Ashgabat, Afghanistan's Kabul, Iran's Tehran, Iraq's Baghdad, Saudi Arabia's Riyadh, Jordan's Amman, Lebanon's Beirut, Syria's Damascus, Oman's Muscat, Yemen's Sanaa, Qatar's Doha, Bahrain's Manama and Kuwait's Kuwait City.
The Gulf states are easiest learned as a set: Riyadh, Doha, Manama, Kuwait City, Muscat, Abu Dhabi (the United Arab Emirates' capital is Abu Dhabi, not Dubai, another trap worth adding to your list).
Africa
Africa's capitals reward learning in regions.
- North: Egypt (Cairo), Libya (Tripoli), Tunisia (Tunis), Algeria (Algiers), Morocco (Rabat), Sudan (Khartoum).
- West: Nigeria (Abuja), Ghana (Accra), Senegal (Dakar), Mali (Bamako), Burkina Faso (Ouagadougou), Niger (Niamey), Côte d'Ivoire (Yamoussoukro, with Abidjan the largest city), Guinea (Conakry), Sierra Leone (Freetown), Liberia (Monrovia), Togo (Lomé), Benin (Porto-Novo, with Cotonou the seat of government).
- East: Kenya (Nairobi), Ethiopia (Addis Ababa), Tanzania (Dodoma), Uganda (Kampala), Rwanda (Kigali), Somalia (Mogadishu), Eritrea (Asmara), Djibouti (Djibouti).
- Central: Democratic Republic of the Congo (Kinshasa), Republic of the Congo (Brazzaville, across the river from Kinshasa), Cameroon (Yaoundé, not Douala), Chad (N'Djamena), Central African Republic (Bangui), Gabon (Libreville), Angola (Luanda).
- South: South Africa has three capitals (Pretoria for government, Cape Town for parliament, Bloemfontein for the courts), Zimbabwe (Harare), Zambia (Lusaka), Mozambique (Maputo), Botswana (Gaborone), Namibia (Windhoek), Malawi (Lilongwe), Madagascar (Antananarivo).
Kinshasa and Brazzaville are the closest pair of capitals in the world, facing each other across the Congo River; remembering that pair fixes both.
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The Americas
North and Central America: Canada (Ottawa), the United States (Washington, D.C.), Mexico (Mexico City), Guatemala (Guatemala City), Belize (Belmopan), Honduras (Tegucigalpa), El Salvador (San Salvador), Nicaragua (Managua), Costa Rica (San José), Panama (Panama City), Cuba (Havana), Jamaica (Kingston), Haiti (Port-au-Prince), the Dominican Republic (Santo Domingo).
South America: Brazil (Brasília), Argentina (Buenos Aires), Chile (Santiago), Peru (Lima), Colombia (Bogotá), Venezuela (Caracas), Ecuador (Quito, not Guayaquil), Bolivia (Sucre is the constitutional capital and La Paz the seat of government; quizzes usually accept the one they ask for by name), Paraguay (Asunción), Uruguay (Montevideo), Guyana (Georgetown), Suriname (Paramaribo).
Remembering Brasília
Brasília was built in the 1950s as a planned capital in the country's interior, precisely so that the capital would not be Rio. Knowing why a capital is where it is makes it stick: Canberra was a compromise between Sydney and Melbourne; Ottawa was chosen as a defensible town between English and French Canada; Abuja and Dodoma were both chosen to be central and neutral; Astana and Naypyidaw were deliberate moves of government. "Planned capital, not the big city" is a pattern, and once you see it you will guess right more often.
Oceania
Australia (Canberra), New Zealand (Wellington), Papua New Guinea (Port Moresby), Fiji (Suva), Samoa (Apia), Tonga (Nuku'alofa), Vanuatu (Port Vila), Solomon Islands (Honiara), Kiribati (Tarawa), Micronesia (Palikir), Palau (Ngerulmud), Marshall Islands (Majuro), Nauru (no official capital; Yaren is the seat of government), Tuvalu (Funafuti).
How to study for the quizzes
- Learn the traps table cold. It is where the points are.
- Learn one region at a time, in geographic order (north to south, or along a coastline), so the names come with a mental map.
- Say the country and capital together out loud: "Burkina Faso, Ouagadougou". The rhythm helps.
- Play the continent quiz for the region you studied; the explanations after each answer fill the gaps.
- Come back to the World Capitals Quiz, which mixes everything, once each continent feels familiar.
Glossary
- Capital: the city where a country's government sits, which is not always its largest city.
- Seat of government: the city where the executive works, when it differs from the official capital (The Hague, La Paz, Cotonou).
- Planned capital: a city built or chosen to be the capital (Brasília, Canberra, Abuja, Astana).
Play it now
- World Capitals QuizMatch countries and capital cities from every continent.
- Capitals of Europe QuizName the capitals and big cities of European countries.
- Capitals of Asia QuizName the capitals and big cities of Asian countries.
- Capitals of Africa QuizName the capitals and big cities of African countries.
- Americas and Oceania Capitals QuizCapitals and cities from Canada to Chile and across the Pacific.
Every game is free in your browser, with nothing to download; the daily puzzles change at midnight and the archive keeps the last 60 days. See all the quizzes.
Questions and answers
What is the capital of Australia?
Canberra. It was chosen as a compromise between Sydney and Melbourne and built as a planned capital in the early twentieth century.
Which countries have more than one capital?
South Africa (Pretoria, Cape Town and Bloemfontein) is the best-known case. Bolivia has a constitutional capital, Sucre, and a seat of government, La Paz. The Netherlands’ capital is Amsterdam while the government sits in The Hague.
Which capitals are the most often confused with a bigger city?
Canberra (not Sydney), Ottawa (not Toronto), Brasília (not Rio), Ankara (not Istanbul), Bern (not Zurich), Abuja (not Lagos), Dodoma (not Dar es Salaam), Islamabad (not Karachi) and Abu Dhabi (not Dubai).
How many questions are in each capitals quiz?
Ten a day, in each of the World Capitals Quiz and the continent quizzes, with a short explanation after every answer.
Written by the DailyGameClub team from the rules as DailyGameClub plays them. Updated October 15, 2026. New to a word? See the glossary. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.