Hard Riddles with Answers
A spoon, a sundial or a single silent letter in disguise, and the answer one tap away.
- Time
- 15–30 min
- Players
- One or more people
- Best for
- Game nights, long dinners and quiet evenings with friends
- Deck
- 100 riddles in 5 categories
How to use these hard riddles
- Pick a category from the menu under the card, or keep “All categories”.
- Read the riddle on the top card aloud, twice if anyone asks, and give everyone time to think.
- Tap “Show answer”, then “Next riddle”, or swipe the card away, for another. Riddles do not repeat until you have seen the whole category.
- Tap the heart to save a riddle on this device, or tap “Make a 10-riddle list” to copy riddles with their answers.
When to play hard riddles
A hard riddle can hold a table for five minutes or more, so it suits an evening with no rush, where people are happy to sit, think and talk over wrong guesses. The answer waits under every card for the moment the room gives up.
Over tea after dinner
With the plates cleared, read a Very hard riddle like the spoon or the mountain and let the guesses go around the counter until someone cracks it.
A game night opener
Three Riddles in rhyme, like the scarecrow or the weather vane, warm the group up before the board games or cards come out.
A riddle a day in the group chat
Post one Hidden in plain sight or Wordplay card in the morning, collect guesses all day and share the answer in the evening.
Ways to play with hard riddles
One guess each, around the table
The reader shares a riddle and everyone else gets one guess, in turn, going around the table. If nobody has it after a full round, the reader repeats the riddle slowly and the group gets a second round before the reader taps “Show answer”. Whoever solves it reads the next card.
Hints that cost points
Play to ten points, with a point for each riddle solved. A stuck player can buy a hint for half a point: first the number of letters in the answer, then its first letter. Very hard riddles like the spoon or the mountain often need both.
Pass the phone for the word puzzles
Wordplay and letters has anagrams and strings like BSAINXLEATNTEARS that are easier to see than to hear. Hand the phone around so each player reads the card in silence and writes a guess on paper, then reveal all the guesses before the answer.
Tips for a good hard riddle round
- Start with Riddles in rhyme. The rhyme narrows the answer down, so the group gets a few wins before the Very hard cards come out.
- Keep a pen and paper on the table for Wordplay and letters. Anagrams like “the Morse code” are much easier to crack written down.
- Take every clue in a riddle literally first, then as a figure of speech. A key’s bow and a mountain’s foot are real names for real parts, and that is where most hard riddles hide the answer.
All 100 hard riddles by category
The complete list, grouped by category. The cards above draw from the same list, so you can read ahead here and play there.
Hard what am I?
Everyday things that describe themselves in slippery clues, like a key, a sail, an iceberg or a thimble.
- My bow shoots no arrows and my blade cuts nothing, but one turn of me opens a door. What am I?Answer: a key
- I have a plus end and a minus end, and I slowly run down while you play. What am I?Answer: a battery
- Spin me, shake me, turn me around, and I still point the same way. What am I?Answer: a compass needle
- I only work by undoing someone else’s work, and every mistake I fix makes me smaller. What am I?Answer: an eraser
- I touch the road every mile, but only a small patch of me at a time. What am I?Answer: a tire
- Most of me hides under the water, and the part you can see is only my tip. What am I?Answer: an iceberg
- I grow in layers inside a shell, then end up on a string around someone’s neck. What am I?Answer: a pearl
- I tell the time all day with no moving parts, but I’m no help at all at night. What am I?Answer: a sundial
Show all 20 in Hard what am I?Show fewer
- I can be skipped, climbed, tied and pulled, but I never move on my own. What am I?Answer: a rope
- Joined in the middle, we open and close, and whatever lies between us comes apart. What are we?Answer: scissors
- You chew me and chew me but don’t swallow me, and I can be blown into a bubble. What am I?Answer: bubble gum
- I’m small enough for a squirrel to bury, yet a whole oak tree is waiting inside me. What am I?Answer: an acorn
- I have a tongue but taste nothing, and I sing only when someone swings me. What am I?Answer: a bell
- I climb as the day warms and sink as it cools, without leaving my glass tube. What am I?Answer: a thermometer
- I’m a tiny hat, but not for a head: I sit on a fingertip while a needle works. What am I?Answer: a thimble
- I work only when I’m open, and I do my best work on the way down. What am I?Answer: a parachute
- I pull things toward me without touching them, but only things made of the right metal. What am I?Answer: a magnet
- I keep your place in a story for weeks, but I never read a word of it. What am I?Answer: a bookmark
- I catch something nobody can see and use it to pull a boat across the water. What am I?Answer: a sail
- My ends rest on two shores and traffic rides on my back, yet I never take a step. What am I?Answer: a bridge
Riddles in rhyme
Short two-line verses with the answer tucked inside, from a scarecrow to a dandelion to a hammock.
- No eyes have I, yet I guard your door; one turn of my partner, and I guard no more. What am I?Answer: a lock
- Round and bright, I drift on air; touch me once, and I’m not there. What am I?Answer: a soap bubble
- Pull me hard and I grow tight; I come undone with patience, not might. What am I?Answer: a knot
- I rise, I curl, I fall in foam, and the open sea is my only home. What am I?Answer: a wave
- First I’m gold, then white as snow; one puff of breath, and off I go. What am I?Answer: a dandelion
- Woven fine without a loom, I hang in corners of the room. What am I?Answer: a cobweb
- Six-sided rooms with waxy walls, and something sweet stored in the halls. What am I?Answer: a honeycomb
- Peel my skins off one by one, and you’ll be teary before you’re done. What am I?Answer: an onion
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- Strike my head and I flare up bright, but I give only a moment of light. What am I?Answer: a match
- I’m stuffed but never eat a bite; I hold your head up every night. What am I?Answer: a pillow
- Hold me to your ear to hear the sea, though there’s no ocean inside of me. What am I?Answer: a seashell
- Arms spread wide and stuffed with straw, I guard the corn from beak and claw. What am I?Answer: a scarecrow
- Perched on the roof, I swing and spin to point the way the wind blows in. What am I?Answer: a weather vane
- Two rows of white stones on a pink hill; they chomp and grind, then they stand still. What are they?Answer: teeth
- I crawl along on many feet, then sleep and wake with wings complete. What am I?Answer: a caterpillar
- Back and forth I sail up high, but my ropes won’t ever let me fly. What am I?Answer: a swing
- I’m fed with coins but cannot chew; shake me, and some come back to you. What am I?Answer: a piggy bank
- I’m a word of just letters three; add two, and fewer is what I’ll be. What am I?Answer: few
- Dig me deep and lower a pail, and I’ll send up water without fail. What am I?Answer: a well
- Strung between two trees, I sway, and cradle you through a lazy day. What am I?Answer: a hammock
Wordplay and letters
Anagrams, silent letters and spelling tricks, like the six-letter word that leaves twelve when one letter goes.
- Name a nine-letter word that stays a real word as you drop one letter at a time, down to one.Answer: startling
- What everyday word begins with “und” and also ends with “und”?Answer: underground
- Take one letter away from this six-letter word, and twelve remain. What is the word?Answer: dozens
- What seven-letter word gets longer when you take away its third letter?Answer: lounger
- Shuffle the letters of “eleven plus two” into another sum with the same total.Answer: twelve plus one
- The letters of “the Morse code” also spell a three-word hint about what it sends. What is it?Answer: here come dots
- Scramble “a decimal point” into a short sentence it might say about itself.Answer: I’m a dot in place
- Scramble “snooze alarms” into a sigh about the morning.Answer: alas, no more Zs
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- Cross out six letters from BSAINXLEATNTEARS to leave a common word.Answer: banana, minus “six letters”
- What common six-letter word has no A, E, I, O or U, and keeps the beat?Answer: rhythm
- Take the first letter off a word for heaviness, and you get a number. What is the word?Answer: weight, then eight
- What word means grand and dignified, and becomes a month when you give it a capital letter?Answer: august
- Which part of a dresser spells a prize when you read it backward?Answer: a drawer – reward
- Name the only two common English words that end in “shion.”Answer: fashion and cushion
- Which letter of the alphabet is in none of the fifty US state names?Answer: the letter Q
- I start eternity and every end, and I finish time and space. What am I?Answer: the letter E
- Add one letter to a dry, sandy place to get the sweet course after dinner. Which two words?Answer: desert and dessert
- Which word means both to split apart and to cling together?Answer: cleave
- Which letter is silent in both “listen” and “castle”?Answer: the letter T
- Which part of your face reads the same backward and sounds just like a letter?Answer: your eye
Hidden in plain sight
Things you see or use every day without noticing, from the dot on an i to the hum of the fridge.
- I’m in view whenever your eyes are open, yet your brain edits me out of the picture. What am I?Answer: your nose
- I press on every inch of you, day and night, and you never feel me. What am I?Answer: the air
- I’m the little groove between your nose and your upper lip. What am I called?Answer: the philtrum
- I’m the longest key on the keyboard, and I type nothing you can see. What am I?Answer: the space bar
- I’m the little tip on each end of a shoelace, and hardly anyone knows my name. What am I?Answer: an aglet
- We fill the daytime sky as much as the night sky, but the sun’s glare hides us. What are we?Answer: the stars
- How many F’s are in this sentence: “Five of the fresh figs fell off of the shelf”?Answer: nine – count both “of”s
- I help with every bite and every word, yet I stay hidden behind a fence of teeth. What am I?Answer: your tongue
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- I hold you down every second of your life, yet you’ve never seen me. What am I?Answer: gravity
- I drift through every room, and you only notice me when a sunbeam catches me. What am I?Answer: dust
- Every door in the house hangs on us, and nobody gives us a glance until we squeak. What are we?Answer: hinges
- I hang over everyone in this room, and almost nobody has looked at me today. What am I?Answer: the ceiling
- You do me all day without thinking, and each time, the world goes dark for an instant. What am I?Answer: a blink
- I hum in your kitchen day and night, and you only hear me when I stop. What am I?Answer: the refrigerator
- What was the tiny pocket inside the front pocket of jeans first made to hold?Answer: a pocket watch
- On most car dashboards, what does the tiny arrow beside the fuel gauge tell you?Answer: the gas cap’s side
- Which letter in the name of the second month do many people skip when they say it?Answer: the first R
- You listen with us all day, yet you’ve never seen us without a mirror. What are we?Answer: your ears
- I’m printed on nearly everything you buy: stripes no person reads, but a scanner does. What am I?Answer: a barcode
- Two letter keys on a keyboard have a tiny bump you can find without looking. Which two?Answer: F and J
Very hard
The toughest of the lot: a spoon, a mountain or plain nothing, buried under clues with double meanings.
- Feed me and I grow; give me a drink and I’m gone. What am I?Answer: fire
- Look into my bowl and you’re upside down; turn me over and you’re right side up. What am I?Answer: a spoon
- I’m inside every empty box, written on every blank page and left after the last cookie. What am I?Answer: nothing
- The more of me there is, the less you can see. What am I?Answer: darkness
- One breaks each morning and nothing falls; the other falls each evening and nothing breaks. What are they?Answer: day and night
- I’m dug from a mine and sealed in wood for life, yet almost everyone uses me. What am I?Answer: pencil lead
- My house has no door or window, so my first trip outside means breaking through the wall. What am I?Answer: a chick
- The more you use me, the sharper I get, yet nobody has ever sharpened me. What am I?Answer: your mind
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- People grow us and people buy us. We’re painted or left bare, filed round or square. What are we?Answer: fingernails
- I ride your nose, hold on by your ears, and the world looks clearer through me. What am I?Answer: glasses
- I appear when you sit down and vanish when you stand up, yet I never go anywhere. What am I?Answer: your lap
- I have a foot without toes, a face without eyes, and my head often in the clouds. What am I?Answer: a mountain
- I can reach the moon and back in an instant, without ever leaving your head. What am I?Answer: a thought
- I arrive when your eyes close, and I slip away soon after they open. What am I?Answer: a dream
- Made of the past and kept in your head, I can carry you back years in a second. What am I?Answer: a memory
- I can be asked, answered or dodged, and in writing I end with a hook over a dot. What am I?Answer: a question
- I cost nothing, start at the corners of your mouth, and usually come straight back when given. What am I?Answer: a smile
- Everyone is happy to give me away, but hardly anyone wants to take me. What am I?Answer: advice
- I have a hairy shell, three little eyes and water inside, and I grow high on a palm. What am I?Answer: a coconut
- I’m where the sky seems to meet the ground, and I back away with every step toward me. What am I?Answer: the horizon
Frequently asked questions
How many hard riddles are there?
There are 100 hard riddles, 20 in each of five categories: hard what am I riddles, riddles in rhyme, wordplay and letters, hidden in plain sight, and very hard. Every riddle comes with its answer, shown on the card when you tap “Show answer” and printed under it in the list on this page.
What makes these riddles hard?
Each one leaves out the obvious clue. The sail never names the wind, the bridge never names a river, and the very hard ones lean on words with two meanings, like the foot and face of a mountain. For gentler ones, try riddles with answers, which start with easy classics.
What is the difference between a hard riddle and a brain teaser?
A riddle describes something in disguise and asks you to name it: an object, a word or an idea. A brain teaser asks you to work something out, like a number, an order or the catch in an odd situation. For logic puzzles and quick math, see brain teasers.
What should we play after hard riddles?
Try funny riddles for a lighter round of jokes with a twist, or trivia questions, where each card has one right answer you either know or don’t.