Music
Pop Music Through the Decades Quiz
From The Beatles to today's biggest stars — the ultimate pop music challenge.
From The Beatles to today's biggest stars — the ultimate pop music challenge.
This pop music quiz covers seven decades of chart-topping hits, drawing from a pool of 50 questions that span from The Beatles and ABBA to Taylor Swift and Billie Eilish. Michael Jackson's Thriller remains the best-selling album of all time at over 70 million copies worldwide.
Each round randomly selects 10 questions from our collection of 50, giving you a fresh experience every time. All questions are multiple choice with four options, and you receive instant feedback with explanations after each answer. Challenge your friends by sharing your final score.
Questions cover iconic albums, record-breaking singles, boy bands, girl groups, solo superstars, and music industry milestones. You might learn that Spotify launched in Sweden in 2008 and changed how the world consumes music, or that "Video Killed the Radio Star" by The Buggles was the very first music video aired on MTV in 1981.
"White Christmas" by Bing Crosby, first recorded in 1942, is the best-selling physical single of all time with an estimated 50 million copies sold worldwide. In the digital era, Ed Sheeran's "Shape of You" (2017) holds the record as the best-selling digital single of the 21st century with over 41 million units sold.
The Beatles hold the record for the most #1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100 with 20 chart-toppers. Mariah Carey is the solo artist with the most #1 singles at 19, while Elvis Presley dominated the pre-Hot 100 era. In terms of total weeks spent at #1, Mariah Carey leads all artists with 91 cumulative weeks at the top.
The 1980s is often cited as pop music's golden decade, driven by MTV's launch in 1981 and megastars like Michael Jackson, Madonna, and Prince. Jackson's Thriller (1982) alone produced seven top-10 singles. However, every decade has its claim: the 1960s gave us The Beatles and Motown, the 1990s brought boy bands and Britpop, and the 2010s saw streaming reshape the charts entirely.
Last updated: March 2026