What are good riddles for adults?

Good riddles for adults have one clear answer, need no special knowledge and take under a minute to solve. Two that work with any group: "What gets wetter the more it dries?" (a towel) and "The more of them you take, the more you leave behind. What are they?" (footsteps).

What are some fun riddles for work?

Riddles for work should be clean and about things everyone shares. Try: "I have keys but no locks and a space but no room. You can enter, but you cannot come in. What am I?" (a keyboard), or "A meeting can run for hours, but someone always takes me. What am I?" (the minutes).

What are some hard riddles for adults?

Three that take a team a few minutes: measuring 45 minutes with two ropes that each burn for an hour, finding one heavy coin among nine with two weighings, and getting four people across a bridge in 17 minutes. The hard section gives the reasoning for each answer.

How do you play a riddle game with a team?

Split into teams of three to five and play three rounds: quick-fire easy riddles for 1 point each, written answers to classic riddles for 2 points each, then two hard riddles for 5 points each. It takes 15 minutes, and the team with the most points wins.

How do you run a riddle of the day at work?

Post one riddle in the team channel each morning, ask people to answer in the thread and reveal the answer at the end of the day. The riddle of the day card on this page changes every day and shows everyone the same riddle.

Are these riddles safe for work?

Yes. Every riddle on this page is clean and fits a mixed group of coworkers, clients or family. The funny ones are puns, not jokes at anybody's expense.

What is a good riddle to open a meeting?

Use a short one that most people can get in 30 seconds, such as "Which month has 28 days?" (all of them) or "Where does today come before yesterday?" (in a dictionary). Read it twice and let everyone answer in the chat at the same moment.

120 riddles for adults, with answers

Easy, funny, hard and made for work, each checked for one clear answer. Start with the riddle of the day, or scroll to the full list.

KraftyLab TeamUpdated Oct 202614 min read

Riddle of the day

These riddles for adults run from easy warm-ups to hard riddles that need a pen, with funny riddles, math and logic riddles and a set of workplace riddles in between. Every answer sits behind a tap, so you can read the list to a group without spoiling anything. After the list come three ways to use riddles at work and a 15-minute riddle game with scoring. Want a longer challenge? Play our free online escape room.

120 riddles for adults with answers

8 groups of 15. The classics are retold in our own words and the work riddles are new. Tap “Show answer” under any riddle.

Jump to: Easy Classic Hard Funny Math and logic What am I?Work Short

Easy riddles for adults (15)

Warm-ups that most people get in under 20 seconds. Start here with a group that has not played before.

1. What gets wetter the more it dries?
Show answer
A towel.
2. What has to be broken before you can use it?
Show answer
An egg.
3. What has a neck and a cap but no head?
Show answer
A bottle.
4. What is full of holes but still holds water?
Show answer
A sponge.
5. What can you catch but never throw?
Show answer
A cold.
6. Which building has the most stories?
Show answer
A library.
7. What has a thumb and four fingers but is not alive?
Show answer
A glove.
8. What goes up when the rain comes down?
Show answer
An umbrella.
9. What has one eye, cannot see and always pulls a thread behind it?
Show answer
A needle.
10. What has a head and a tail but no body?
Show answer
A coin.
11. What is full of words but never says one?
Show answer
A book.
12. What kind of tree can you carry in your hand?
Show answer
A palm.
13. What has many eyes, cannot see and grows underground?
Show answer
A potato.
14. What kind of band never plays music?
Show answer
A rubber band.
15. What has a tongue but cannot talk, and gets tied up every morning?
Show answer
A shoe.

Classic brain teasers (15)

The ones that have been stumping people for generations, told in our own words.

16. I have cities but no houses, forests but no trees and water but no fish. What am I?
Show answer
A map.
17. The more of them you take, the more you leave behind. What are they?
Show answer
Footsteps.
18. What travels all around the world but never leaves its corner?
Show answer
A stamp.
19. What belongs to you, but other people use it more than you do?
Show answer
Your name.
20. What gets bigger the more you take away from it?
Show answer
A hole.
21. Flip one switch and I fill the whole room, yet I take up no space. What am I?
Show answer
Light.
22. What is so fragile that saying its name breaks it?
Show answer
Silence.
23. You can make me and you can break me, but it is better for everyone if you keep me. What am I?
Show answer
A promise.
24. What runs but never walks, has a mouth but never talks and has a bed but never sleeps?
Show answer
A river.
25. I am lighter than a feather, yet nobody can hold me for more than a few minutes. What am I?
Show answer
Your breath.
26. What begins with T, ends with T and has T in it?
Show answer
A teapot. It starts and ends with the letter T, and it has tea in it.
27. If you have me, you want to share me. Once you share me, you no longer have me. What am I?
Show answer
A secret.
28. What is always in front of you but can never be seen?
Show answer
The future.
29. The more of me there is, the less you see. Switch on a lamp and I am gone. What am I?
Show answer
Darkness.
30. What do sailors throw out when they need it and haul back in when they don't?
Show answer
An anchor.

Hard riddles for adults (15)

Give a team two full minutes for each of these, and a pen for the first six. Every answer comes with the reasoning.

31. A man points at a portrait and says: "I have no brothers or sisters, but that man's father is my father's son." Who is in the portrait?
Show answer
His son. With no brothers or sisters, "my father's son" can only be the speaker. So the speaker is the father of the man in the portrait.
32. Outside a closed room are three switches. One of them works the old-fashioned bulb inside. You may flip the switches as much as you like, but you can open the door only once. How do you find the right switch?
Show answer
Use the heat of the bulb. Turn the first switch on for a few minutes, then off. Turn the second on and walk in. Bulb on: it is the second switch. Off but warm: the first. Off and cold: the third.
33. You have two ropes and a lighter. Each rope takes exactly 60 minutes to burn, but neither burns at a steady speed. How do you measure 45 minutes?
Show answer
Burn one rope from both ends. Light the first rope at both ends and the second at one end. The first is gone after 30 minutes. Right then, light the other end of the second rope: what is left of it burns in 15 minutes. 30 + 15 = 45.
34. Nine coins look the same, but one is slightly heavier. You have a balance scale and may use it only twice. How do you find the heavy coin?
Show answer
Weigh three against three. If one side drops, the heavy coin is among those three. If they balance, it is among the three left out. Now weigh one of those three against another: the heavier one is it, and if they balance it is the third.
35. Two doors: one leads out, one leads back to the start. Two guards: one always lies, one always tells the truth, and you do not know which is which. You may ask one guard one question. What do you ask?
Show answer
"Which door would the other guard say leads out?" Then take the other door. The truthful guard reports the liar's wrong answer. The liar lies about the truthful guard's right answer. Both point at the wrong door.
36. Four coworkers must cross a narrow footbridge at night with one flashlight. No more than two can cross at a time, and the flashlight has to be carried on every crossing. Alone they take 1, 2, 5 and 10 minutes, and a pair walks at the slower pace. What is the fastest all four can get across?
Show answer
17 minutes. The 1 and the 2 cross (2 minutes). The 1 walks back (1). The 5 and the 10 cross (10). The 2 walks back (2). The 1 and the 2 cross again (2). 2 + 1 + 10 + 2 + 2 = 17.
37. What occurs once in a minute, twice in a moment and never in a thousand years?
Show answer
The letter M. There is one M in minute, two in moment and none in "a thousand years".
38. I am a word of six letters. Take one letter away and twelve remain. What word am I?
Show answer
Dozens. Remove the S and you have a dozen, which is twelve.
39. I turn once, and what is out cannot get in. I turn again, and what is in cannot get out. What am I?
Show answer
A key. Lock the door from the inside and nobody gets in. Lock it from the outside and nobody gets out.
40. What is it that, when you are given one, you have either two or none?
Show answer
A choice. A choice needs at least two options. If there is only one, you have no choice at all.
41. Which five-letter word, written in capital letters, reads the same when you turn the page upside down?
Show answer
SWIMS. Upside down, S and I stay the same, W turns into M and M turns into W.
42. There are two in a corner, one in a room, none in a house and one in a shelter. What is it?
Show answer
The letter R. Count the Rs: corner has two, room and shelter have one each, and house has none.
43. At night they come without being called. By day they are lost without being stolen. What are they?
Show answer
The stars. They show up at dusk on their own, and at sunrise they fade from view.
44. Until I am measured, I am not known. Yet how you miss me once I have flown. What am I?
Show answer
Time. You only know how much of it has passed once you measure it, and you notice it most when it is gone.
45. I am dug out of a mine and shut inside a wooden case that I never leave, yet almost everyone uses me. What am I?
Show answer
Pencil lead. It is graphite, which is mined, then sealed inside a wooden pencil for good.

Like these? An escape room is a chain of them. Our escape room puzzle ideas show how to turn riddles, codes and locks into a 45-minute game.

Funny riddles for adults (15)

The answer is a pun or a trick, and the right reaction is a groan. All of them are clean.

46. What two things can you never eat for breakfast?
Show answer
Lunch and dinner.
47. How do you spell COW in thirteen letters?
Show answer
SEE O DOUBLE YOU.
48. What has four wheels and flies?
Show answer
A garbage truck.
49. What is the longest word in the dictionary?
Show answer
Smiles. There is a mile between the first letter and the last.
50. What do you call a bear with no teeth?
Show answer
A gummy bear.
51. Which letter of the alphabet holds the most water?
Show answer
C. Say it out loud: sea.
52. A horse is tied to a 10-foot rope, and the hay is 25 feet away. The horse eats the hay anyway. How?
Show answer
The other end of the rope is not tied to anything.
53. What do you call a boomerang that never comes back?
Show answer
A stick.
54. Why did the student eat her homework?
Show answer
The teacher said it was a piece of cake.
55. What has plenty of bark but no bite?
Show answer
A tree.
56. What kind of shoes does a spy wear?
Show answer
Sneakers.
57. What did the zero say to the eight?
Show answer
"Nice belt."
58. What do you call cheese that is not yours?
Show answer
Nacho cheese.
59. Why did the bicycle lie down halfway through the ride?
Show answer
It was two-tired.
60. What goes tick-tock, woof-woof?
Show answer
A watchdog.

Math and logic riddles (15)

No calculator needed, only careful reading. The first answer that comes to mind is usually the wrong one.

61. A notebook and a pen cost $1.10 together. The notebook costs $1.00 more than the pen. How much is the pen?
Show answer
5 cents. The pen is $0.05 and the notebook is $1.05. If the pen were 10 cents, the notebook would be $1.10 and the total $1.20.
62. Five printers take five minutes to print five posters. How long do 100 printers take to print 100 posters?
Show answer
Five minutes. Each printer needs five minutes for one poster, however many printers are running.
63. A patch of lily pads doubles in size every day. It covers the whole pond on day 30. On which day did it cover half the pond?
Show answer
Day 29. It doubles every day, so the day before it was full it was half full.
64. A snail is at the bottom of a 10-foot wall. Every day it climbs 3 feet, and every night it slides back 2. On which day does it reach the top?
Show answer
Day 8. It gains one foot a day, so it starts day 8 at 7 feet and climbs the last 3.
65. A drawer holds 10 black socks and 10 blue socks. In the dark, how many socks must you take out to be sure of a matching pair?
Show answer
Three. With only two colors, the third sock has to match one of the first two.
66. A clock takes 5 seconds to strike 6 o'clock. How long does it take to strike 12 o'clock?
Show answer
11 seconds. Six strikes have five gaps between them, so each gap is one second. Twelve strikes have eleven gaps.
67. How can you add eight 8s and get exactly 1,000?
Show answer
888 + 88 + 8 + 8 + 8.
68. A couple has seven daughters, and each daughter has one brother. How many children do they have?
Show answer
Eight. The seven daughters share the same brother.
69. A hallway has 100 closed lockers. The first person opens every locker. The second closes every 2nd one. The third changes every 3rd one, and so on until the 100th person changes locker 100. How many lockers are open at the end?
Show answer
Ten. A locker ends up open only if it is touched an odd number of times, which happens only for the square numbers: 1, 4, 9, 16, 25, 36, 49, 64, 81 and 100.
70. I am an odd number. Take away one letter and I become even. What number am I?
Show answer
Seven. Take away the S and you are left with "even".
71. A farmer has 17 sheep. All but 9 wander off. How many does she have left?
Show answer
Nine.
72. What letter comes next: O, T, T, F, F, S, S?
Show answer
E. They are the first letters of one, two, three, four, five, six and seven. Eight is next.
73. Two fathers and two sons order three sandwiches, and each of them eats a whole one. How?
Show answer
There are only three people: a grandfather, his son and his grandson.
74. Multiply together every number on a phone keypad. What do you get?
Show answer
Zero. One of the keys is 0, and anything times zero is zero.
75. A brick weighs one kilogram plus half a brick. How much does the brick weigh?
Show answer
Two kilograms. If half a brick is one kilogram, the whole brick is two.

"What am I?" riddles (15)

Read these out slowly, one clue at a time, and let people guess after each clue.

76. I answer without a mouth, and I only speak after you do. Shout across a canyon and you will meet me. What am I?
Show answer
An echo.
77. I am tall when I am new and short when I am old, and I glow the whole time in between. What am I?
Show answer
A candle.
78. I am not alive, but I grow. I have no lungs, but I need air. I have no mouth, but water finishes me. What am I?
Show answer
Fire.
79. I copy every move you make and never make a sound. I am longest at sunrise and sunset and gone in the dark. What am I?
Show answer
Your shadow.
80. I fly without wings and cry without eyes. What am I?
Show answer
A cloud.
81. I am always on my way, but I never arrive. What am I?
Show answer
Tomorrow.
82. Drop me and I am sure to crack. Smile at me and I smile back. What am I?
Show answer
A mirror.
83. Peel off my skin and I won't cry, but you might. What am I?
Show answer
An onion.
84. I can be cracked, I can be made, I can be told and I can be played. What am I?
Show answer
A joke.
85. I am made of water, but drop me in water and I slowly disappear. What am I?
Show answer
An ice cube.
86. I hold your place while you are away, and I never lose it, even when you shut me in. What am I?
Show answer
A bookmark.
87. I was never alive, but I die a little every day inside your phone. Plug me in and I am back. What am I?
Show answer
A battery.
88. I have a needle but I never sew, and I point the same way wherever you go. What am I?
Show answer
A compass.
89. I have 88 keys and cannot open a single door. What am I?
Show answer
A piano.
90. I have a face and two hands, but no arms and no legs. What am I?
Show answer
A clock.

Riddles for work and the office (15)

Workplace riddles about the things every team shares: meetings, inboxes and a printer with a mind of its own.

91. I am booked for thirty minutes and I last for sixty. Everyone gets invited to me, and half of me could have been an email. What am I?
Show answer
A meeting.
92. I have keys but no locks and a space but no room. You can enter, but you cannot come in. What am I?
Show answer
A keyboard.
93. On a video call, you switch me off when you should be talking and leave me on when you should not. What am I?
Show answer
Your microphone.
94. I am full of cells but I am not alive. I have rows but no boat. Give me a formula and I do the sums myself. What am I?
Show answer
A spreadsheet.
95. I never move, yet all week people say I am getting closer. Miss me and your manager will notice. What am I?
Show answer
A deadline.
96. I am named after an animal, I have a wheel but no car, and I click all day without saying a word. What am I?
Show answer
A computer mouse.
97. I am small, square and usually yellow. I hold one thought and cling to your monitor until you peel me off. What am I?
Show answer
A sticky note.
98. Everyone wants me at zero. Clear me out tonight and I will have something new for you by morning. What am I?
Show answer
Your inbox.
99. I have twelve pages and hundreds of little squares, and people check me before they say yes to anything. What am I?
Show answer
A calendar.
100. Nobody can see me, but the whole office knows the second I am gone. I have a name and a password. What am I?
Show answer
The Wi-Fi.
101. I eat paper and drink ink, and I jam whenever you are in a hurry. What am I?
Show answer
The printer.
102. A meeting can run for hours, but someone always takes me. What am I?
Show answer
The minutes.
103. You invent me yourself, you are told never to write me down, and you forget me right after a vacation. What am I?
Show answer
Your password.
104. I answer every email within a second, and all I ever say is that nobody is here. What am I?
Show answer
An out-of-office reply.
105. My job title is one word with three pairs of double letters in a row. What do I do for a living?
Show answer
I am a bookkeeper. Bookkeeper has a double O, a double K and a double E, one after the other.

Short riddles for meetings (15)

Icebreaker riddles you can say in one breath. Each takes less than a minute, answer included.

106. Which month has 28 days?
Show answer
All of them.
107. Where does today come before yesterday?
Show answer
In a dictionary.
108. Which word is spelled wrong in every dictionary?
Show answer
Wrong.
109. Which five-letter word gets shorter when you add two letters to it?
Show answer
Short.
110. What is at the end of a rainbow?
Show answer
The letter W.
111. What starts with E, ends with E and has only one letter in it?
Show answer
An envelope.
112. Which is heavier: a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers?
Show answer
Neither. Each weighs a ton.
113. How many letters are there in "the alphabet"?
Show answer
Eleven. Three in "the" and eight in "alphabet".
114. You are in a race and you pass the runner in second place. What place are you in now?
Show answer
Second place.
115. What do people love to give and hate to take?
Show answer
Advice.
116. Mary's father has five daughters: Nana, Nene, Nini, Nono and who?
Show answer
Mary.
117. Before anyone had measured Mount Everest, what was the highest mountain on Earth?
Show answer
Mount Everest. It was the highest all along. Nobody had measured it yet.
118. A rooster lays an egg on the very top of a barn roof. Which way does the egg roll?
Show answer
It does not roll anywhere. Roosters do not lay eggs.
119. You walk into a dark cabin holding one match. Inside are a candle, an oil lamp and a fireplace. Which do you light first?
Show answer
The match.
120. An electric train heads north at 60 miles an hour. Which way does its smoke blow?
Show answer
No way at all. Electric trains do not make smoke.

Need a question with a fact for an answer instead? See our trivia questions.

How to use riddles at work

A riddle gives a team one small thing to solve together before the real work starts. It costs nothing, needs no setup and works for five people or five hundred. Here are 3 formats.

A two-minute meeting opener

2 minutes · any group size · in person or on a call

Pick one short riddle. Put it on the first slide, or read it out twice. The short riddles for meetings are made for this.
Give 30 seconds of quiet. On a video call, ask everyone to type an answer in the chat but not to send it yet.
Say "send". The answers land all at once, so nobody copies the first one and the quiet people are in from the start.
Reveal it and move on. Give the answer, name one or two people who got it and start the agenda.

A riddle of the day in Slack or Teams

1 minute a day · whole team · works across time zones

Post one riddle each morning. Same channel, same time. The Copy button on the card at the top of this page gives you today's riddle, ready to paste.
Keep answers in the thread. Ask people to reply under the post, so the channel itself stays free of spoilers.
Reveal at the end of the day. Post the answer and name the first person who got it.
Rotate the poster. A different teammate picks the riddle each week. Save the hard ones for Friday.

A riddle relay

10 minutes · teams of 3 to 5 · in person or in breakout rooms

Deal six riddles to each team. Every team gets the same six, one to a card, stacked face down.
Start the clock. Each team turns over its first card and solves it together.
Send a runner. One person brings the answer to the host. Right: turn over the next card. Wrong: back to the team for another try.
Change runners every card. Everyone takes a turn, so no one person carries the team.
First team through the stack wins. On a video call, paste the riddles into each breakout room one at a time and have the runner message the host.

For more openers of the same length, see our team meeting games. If your team prefers a question to a puzzle, there is a question of the day too.

A 15-minute riddle game for teams

Three rounds that get harder, with a ready-made set of riddles from the list above. One team can score up to 25 points.

Set up

Split into teams of three to five. Two teams is enough, and six is the most one host can follow.
Each team needs paper and a pen. The host needs this page and a way to keep score.
Phones stay face down. Looking up an answer costs the team that riddle.

Round 1: quick fire
3 minutes · 5 riddles · 1 point each
Read each riddle once. The first team with a hand up answers. If they are wrong, the next team may steal it.
Use riddles 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.
Round 2: write it down
4 minutes · 5 riddles · 2 points each
Read each riddle twice. Every team writes one answer within 30 seconds and holds it up. Every correct team scores, so a fast table cannot shut the others out.
Use riddles 16, 17, 18, 19 and 20.
Round 3: the huddle
4 minutes · 2 riddles · 5 points each
Two hard riddles, two minutes each. Teams talk it through and hand in one written answer with their reasoning.
Use riddles 31 and 34.

The clock

Teams and rules: 2 min
Round 1: quick fire: 3 min
Round 2: write it down: 4 min
Round 3: the huddle: 4 min
Scores and tiebreaker: 2 min
Total: 15 min

Tied at the end? Read riddle 113 out loud. The first hand up with the right answer takes the game. To play again next month, swap in any five riddles from the same groups.

How to pick good riddles for a group

The best riddles for adults are fair: hard to see at first and obvious the second you hear the answer. These 6 habits keep a riddle round fun for the whole room.

Choose riddles with one answer. If two answers fit, the room argues and the riddle falls flat. Every riddle on this page was checked for that.
Skip anything that needs special knowledge. A good riddle uses things everybody knows: a towel, a map, a meeting that ran long.
Read it twice, then wait. Count to ten in your head before you take the first answer. Silence means people are thinking.
Accept close answers. "A watch" for "a clock" is a win. The point is the moment it clicks, not the exact word.
Have the reasoning ready. A hard answer without the why feels like a trick. With the why, it feels fair.
Mix the types. Wordplay suits some people and logic suits others. Use both and more of the room gets a win.