Language & Words
Palindromes & Word Games Quiz
Racecar, kayak, and madam — the wonderful world of wordplay puzzles.
Racecar, kayak, and madam — the wonderful world of wordplay puzzles.
Georges Perec wrote an entire 300-page novel in French without using the letter 'e' — the most common letter in both French and English. This 50-question quiz dives into the delightful world of wordplay: from classic palindromes like "racecar" and "A man, a plan, a canal: Panama" to anagrams, pangrams, and the inventors behind beloved word games like Scrabble and the crossword puzzle.
From the Greek word palindromos meaning "running back again" to the invention of Scrabble in 1938, word games have fascinated language lovers for centuries. Whether you can spot a hidden anagram or know the difference between a semordnilap and a palindrome, this quiz covers the full spectrum of wordplay.
Each round presents 10 randomized multiple-choice questions drawn from a pool of 50, so every playthrough is different. You get instant feedback with explanations after each answer, plus a shareable score at the end.
You'll explore famous palindromes, record-breaking anagrams, the history of the crossword and Scrabble, lipograms and isograms, and the clever wordplay behind semordnilaps, ambigrams, and pangrams.
The longest single-word palindrome in common English is 'tattarrattat', coined by James Joyce in Ulysses to represent the sound of a knock at the door. Among real dictionary words, 'detartrated' (11 letters) is often cited. The Finnish word 'saippuakivikauppias' (soapstone vendor, 19 letters) holds the record for the longest palindromic word in any language.
A pangram is a sentence that uses every letter of the alphabet at least once. The most famous English pangram is 'The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog', which contains all 26 letters in just 35 characters. A perfect pangram uses each letter exactly once; an example is 'Mr Jock, TV quiz PhD, bags few lynx'.
The modern crossword puzzle was invented by Arthur Wynne, a journalist from Liverpool. It was first published on December 21, 1913, in the New York World newspaper as a 'word-cross' puzzle. The format became enormously popular and spread worldwide.
Last updated: March 2026