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British Citizenship Test

Can you answer these questions that might appear on the Life in the UK Test required to become a British citizen?
Quiz by Quizmaster
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Last updated: September 26, 2022
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First submittedSeptember 26, 2022
Times taken57,463
Average score60.0%
Rating4.53
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1. Which of the following was written by William Shakespeare?
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Great Expectations
Pride and Prejudice
Pygmalion
2. Which of the following territories is a Crown dependency but is NOT part of the UK?
The Channel Islands
Northern Ireland
Scotland
Tahiti
3. Where is Big Ben located?
Buckingham Palace
The Houses of Parliament
The Tower of London
Trafalgar Square
4. Who was given the title of Lord Protector?
Charles I
Charles II
Winston Churchill
Oliver Cromwell
5. What is the Cenotaph?
A flower
A Christian church
A theatre
A war memorial
6. True or False: The national anthem "God Save the King" can only be played in the presence of the King.
True
False
7. True or False: Scotland issues its own pound sterling banknotes.
True
False
8. True or False: Wales has its own established church.
True
False
9. Who was supported by clansmen from the Scottish highlands and raised an army in 1745?
Bonnie Prince Charlie
John Logie Baird
Kenneth MacAlpin
Robert Burns
10. Who is the patron Saint of Wales?
St. Andrew
St. David
St. George
St. Patrick
11. What's the longest time that can go by without a general election happening?
3 years
4 years
5 years
10 years
12. What sort of event is the Grand National?
Golf
Horse racing
Polo
Rugby
13. True or false: The Bill of Rights in 1689 gave women the right to vote.
Women would not gain the right to vote until 1918
True
False
14. Which flower is associated with Scotland?
Daffodil
Rose
Shamrock
Thistle
15. Which of the following is a responsibility of the Home Secretary?
The economy
Education
National defense
Policing
96 Comments
+12
Level 84
Sep 28, 2022
Guess I get to keep my British citizenship, for what it's worth (which is currently decreasing rather rapidly).

In Q3, it's The Houses of Parliament (not 'of the Parliament').

+1
Level 92
Sep 28, 2022
Agreed (on both points!) :-(
+6
Level 79
Sep 28, 2022
In fairness, Big Ben is strictly speaking in the Palace of the Westminster rather than the Houses of the Parliament.
+1
Level ∞
Sep 28, 2022
Fixed that, thanks.
+4
Level 92
Sep 28, 2022
Fairly straightforward if you are British but I'll be interested to see how the stats pan out when 'the world' has a go at it. How much of what each of us assumes everyone knows about our own countries do nationals of other countries actually know? Perspective is useful: 'Oh to see outselves as others see us'.
+4
Level 67
Sep 28, 2022
I only got 6 lol (I'm not British)
+1
Level 24
Feb 9, 2023
I got three right. Ugh!
+2
Level 80
Sep 28, 2022
I got 12, and I`m Austrian. 2 of the 12 were wild guesses.
+1
Level 78
Sep 28, 2022
10/15 - Central USA. Missed 2 that were 50/50 guesses.
+1
Level 85
Sep 28, 2022
Midwest US, missed 2.
+4
Level 84
Sep 28, 2022
12/15, I probably know too much about the perfidious Albion to not have my French citizenship revoked.
+1
Level 86
Sep 28, 2022
Missed only the Home Secretary (east coast US)
+13
Level 59
Feb 9, 2023
To be fair, most of us living here would not miss the Home Secretary if she departed.
+2
Level 73
Oct 3, 2022
I'm from Bulgaria and also got 12 / 15. For two questions (patron Saint of Wales and Home Secretary) I was hesitating between two options and chose the wrong one. For the third one (the Scot with his own army) I didn't have the faintest clue. Everything else was pretty straight forward for me.
+1
Level 24
Feb 9, 2023
I only got three questions right, but I am an American. 😬
+1
Level 66
Feb 10, 2023
15/15. I'm a yank, but I did spend 3 days in London in 2010. I'm not sure that helped me any, but I had fun. ;-)
+1
Level 56
Apr 7, 2023
American here and I got 8/15 with a the help of a couple lucky guesses
+1
Level 73
Jul 19, 2023
15/15 from the US.
+1
Level 48
Jun 25, 2024
U.S. here, missed three- Grand National, Church of Wales, and the Election years.
+1
Level 45
Oct 10, 2024
14/15 from Hungary. I missed the election one. Half of them were really easy. The other half not so much, and I had luck with two of them, the rest were educated guesses or some murky memories.
+1
Level 65
Oct 10, 2024
I got 100% and am American, but I just lived in the UK for over 2 years. Had to guess on the Grand National one.
+1
Level 68
Oct 10, 2024
11/15 as a Kiwi
+1
Level 57
Oct 13, 2024
14. I did not know that the Church of Wales did not exist as such. Had to guess for the Houses of Parliament election. And no, I am not British (thanks for that Dave, if I ever find you, I'll slap you, you bloody referendum-seeking, austerity-causing. stupid toff).
+5
Level 71
Sep 28, 2022
11/15 as an American. Frankly, I feel like the US citizenship test is easier and more practical. Like, why is it necessary for British citizens to know Scotland's national flower or what the Grand National is? The US citizenship is mostly government/politics, stuff that's useful for a prospective voter to know, and at any rate you only need 6/10 right to pass. No one I personally know have had any problems with it. I'll admit that I may be biased though. I'm wondering if anyone has statistics on pass/fail rates for these tests?
+3
Level 93
Sep 28, 2022
I got the same score and agree that the value of some of these questions toward being a good British citizen seem a bit arbitrary.
+14
Level 59
Sep 29, 2022
I'd have thought that knowing something about the culture of your adopted country is at least as important as its political system.
+2
Level 71
Feb 9, 2023
Does it? I think any immigrant to Britain can be a good citizen while not knowing who Bonnie Prince Charlie is. I mean, it's fine to ask cultural questions, but I don't get why they have to be so specific.

I checked the source website and it says the pass rate for this test is about 75%. In comparison, the pass rate for the US test is 90% (on the initial try; it goes up to 96% taking retrials into account). That's a pretty significant difference.

+2
Level 70
Feb 11, 2023
Same score here, also American. I wouldn't necessarily consider the U.S. citizenship easier though (husband took it a few years back) but it's definitely less arbitrary. One thing that struck me when looking over the questions for the U.S. citizenship test was that way too many of our countrymen wouldn't pass it, despite having grown up here.
+1
Level 70
Oct 10, 2024
I think they have to study a text book with chapters on British history, culture etc. The questions will choose different facts from these each time because you would have no idea before the test if it'll ask about the 1745 rising and the Grand National or, eg, the Spanish Armada and the FA Cup Final.
+1
Level 71
Oct 10, 2024
The US citizenship test is very easy. When I took it, there were 100 possible questions announced ahead of time, many of them quite obvious. It's just a matter of cramming for the exam to learn the 4-5 tricky ones. A perfect score is not required.

The main difference is that the US test has nothing on culture. The questions on history and geography are also much easier, such as 'mention one war fought by the US in the 20th c.'

+1
Level 84
Sep 28, 2022
I think 67% should be good enough to become a citizen, right?
+1
Level 24
Feb 9, 2023
Maybe not…
+1
Level 75
Sep 28, 2022
7/15 let's gooo, looks like Im staying in the States.
+3
Level 55
Oct 10, 2024
Yeah, maybe we don't want to be British citizens anyways...
+4
Level 78
Sep 29, 2022
Ah yes, citizenship tests. Because your quality as a citizen depends on your knowledge of historical and geographical trivia. Well here on Jetpunk it probably does, but in the real world, I wish they'd ask more questions like "Church and state are separated, do you agree?", "If your neighbour is gay, would you shake his hand?", "Would it be acceptable to you if our chief of goverment was a Jew" etc. People could still lie of course, but it'd still make more sense than the trivia quizzes these tests currently are.
+14
Level 70
Sep 29, 2022
That would be a test "how liberal you are", that has nothing to do with citizenship...
+10
Level 78
Sep 29, 2022
The second question is be a bit misphrased, I agree. A better one might be something like "Your neighbour is gay. Which of the following statements applies to him? 1. He is a citizien with the same rights as me, 2. He should be treated/reeducated, 3. He should be imprisoned, 4. He should be put to death". My point was, equal rights and separation of state and religion are constitutional rights in most democracies. The point of a citizenship test should be to test if people who want to live in the country endorse its basic constitutional values, as far as testing that is even possible. Unfortunately, many people who seek citizenship in European countries have views that endorse violence especially against women, jews and homosexuals. If we take our values seriously, we have to ask ourselves if giving such people citizenship makes sense. Sorry for getting political, but the double-think behind that really bothers me.
+3
Level 43
Oct 10, 2024
The German citizenship test includes those types of questions for exactly that reason.
+2
Level 64
Sep 30, 2022
Values of a society are far more important than knowledge of a countries history.
+15
Level 78
Sep 29, 2022
This reminds me of the citizenship test my wife took in my native Germany. One of the questions was "Which of the following is not part of Germany? 1. Brandenburg, 2. Hesse, 3. Bavaria, 4. Alsace-Lorraine". She passed the test with flying colours by giving the obvious right answer, Bavaria.
+4
Level 79
Sep 29, 2022
Lol
+3
Level 78
Jan 16, 2023
Btw a bit of shameless self-advertising but I turned that very test into a quiz:

https://www.jetpunk.com/user-quizzes/1457943/german-citizenship-test

+5
Level 81
Sep 29, 2022
British Citizen and only scored 13. Good job I qualify by birth. On the Church of Wales question you could argue it both ways. Although it is Anglican it definitely has its own identity and its own Archbishop. It is officially its own province of the Anglican Communion. There are many churches in the Anglican Communion e.g the Church of Pakistan.

If I can have that then I get full marks: one more for the Northern Ireland banknotes and one for this.

+4
Level 70
Sep 29, 2022
Totally agree about the Church in Wales. It is definitely a recognised entity which could easily fit the description in the question: churchinwales.org.uk

Otherwise my Britishness is solid!

+1
Level 76
Sep 30, 2022
...and not only one kinds of banknotes. Truly, I don't know whether there is a country so versatile with their bank notes as UK. Probably not.
+1
Level 72
Oct 10, 2024
Every country in the eurozone.
+2
Level 82
Oct 1, 2022
How is Tahiti counting as part of the UK?
+1
Level 81
Oct 2, 2022
We helped set it up but then the French took it
+11
Level 64
Oct 7, 2022
It isn't part of the UK. The question does not imply that any answer that isn't a crown dependency is part of the UK.
+5
Level 64
Feb 9, 2023
It doesn’t. It’s there to make sure you understood both parts of the question.

Two answers are part of the UK, but not Crown Dependencies. One answer is not a part of the UK and not a Crown Dependency. One answer is not a part of the UK and is a Crown Dependency. It’s this fourth one that is needed here.

+2
Level 75
Oct 12, 2022
There is a church of Wales
+1
Level 86
Jan 31, 2023
yes. the answer was wrong.
+2
Level 75
Feb 10, 2023
Yes, but the Church in Wales is not an established church.

Disestablishment took place in 1920 under the Welsh Church Act 1914.

+1
Level 57
Nov 7, 2022
13/15 as a Canadian
+3
Level 55
Nov 12, 2022
The Channel Islands are 2 Crown Dependencies (Jersey and Guernsey), not 1.
+1
Level 86
Jan 31, 2023
The Church in Wales is Wales's established church.
+4
Level ∞
Feb 9, 2023
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_in_Wales

Unlike the Church of England, the Church in Wales is not an established church.

+1
Level 24
Feb 9, 2023
Ugh, I only got three right, but I am American.
+2
Level 79
Feb 10, 2023
Yes, you mentioned that already. What sort of acknowledgment are you looking for?
+1
Level 82
Feb 9, 2023
First try I got 5 wrong--Naturalized American and citizen of ROK.
+2
Level 67
Feb 9, 2023
Great quiz and great to remember all the fantastic things that make Britain Great Britain. God save the King!
+1
Level 70
Feb 9, 2023
I'm pretty sure there is a Church of Wales...
+1
Level 72
Feb 9, 2023
Tricky with National Defence and Policing being relatively similar... Got that one wrong. Oh well!
+1
Level 45
Feb 9, 2023
14/15, just didn't get the wales one
+5
Level 63
Feb 9, 2023
How many do you need to pass?
+1
Level 47
Feb 9, 2023
Wales does have its own established. church, the Church in Wales
+3
Level ∞
Feb 9, 2023
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_in_Wales

Unlike the Church of England, the Church in Wales is not an established church.

+2
Level 70
Feb 9, 2023
Capitalize Dream in Question One.
+1
Level 18
Feb 9, 2023
Scotland does not issue banknotes. Only the Bank of England can do that. The Royal Bank of Scotland and Clydesdale Bank are ordinary clearing banks that print them under licence to make the Scots feel better.
+1
Level 64
Oct 10, 2024
The Bank of England themselves state that Scotland is authorised to issue banknotes...
+1
Level 86
Oct 10, 2024
"Scotland does not issue banknotes, England only lets them issue banknotes."

Did you even read that before posting?

+1
Level 67
Feb 11, 2023
Didn't read the Home Sec question and answered "National defence" - which is correct!

Obviously policing is a major part, but they also deal with "Matters of national security" which is a synonym of national defence, according to Wiki.

Look at how much Braverman talks about boats in the water and I think you'll agree that this needs changing. The focus is very much on the so-called "protection" of the country.

+2
Level 69
Aug 7, 2024
I'm glad she's gone!
+1
Level 63
Oct 19, 2023
Why do you need to know Shakespeare plays to be a British citizen.
+1
Level 42
Nov 1, 2023
I got 5 points who the hell knows this stuff
+1
Level 70
Jun 19, 2024
I should not have fallen for the trick on the anthem question; I kept wondering, how the heck could the musicians learn to play it without rehearsing--the monarch would probably not want to spend all that time sitting through all those hours in the band room!
+1
Level 81
Oct 10, 2024
Why do you think His Majesty always looks so pained? Not only must he sit through all practices but he needs to be ready at a moment's notice to go anywhere in the UK or any of the empire, sorry Commonwealth around the world where the National Anthem is to be played. This function can only be delegated if His Majesty is actually unconscious.

It also applies to recordings so it is a criminal offence (the only one that still carries the death penalty) to play the National Anthem without previous written permission by the King, the Prime Minister, the Chief Corgi, the Chancellor of the Dutchy of Lancaster, or Megan Markle.

+1
Level 44
Sep 11, 2024
Saint Dafydd
+1
Level 51
Oct 10, 2024
Please spell defence with a 'c' and not an 's' in the last question
+1
Level 56
Oct 10, 2024
67% and I'm British :P
+1
Level 50
Oct 10, 2024
LOL as an American, I got 3/15
+1
Level 34
Oct 10, 2024
as an american i got 47% not bad
+1
Level 50
Oct 10, 2024
14/15 as a born and raised Brit (English).

Don't know my Scottish history, clearly. I'll hand my passport in as I walk into the sea.

+1
Level 59
Oct 10, 2024
12/15 as a German...

3 were just guesses

2 were half knowledge (elimination and guessing between the rest)

+1
Level 56
Oct 10, 2024
could you make a Dutch citizenship test quiz?
+1
Level 63
Oct 10, 2024
10/15, retook for 14/15
+1
Level 48
Oct 10, 2024
Surprisingly easy if your British / English

15/15. I guess I can stay if I can’t find anywhere better.

+1
Level 42
Oct 10, 2024
2/15....
+1
Level 54
Oct 10, 2024
i got 14, guess i can keep my british nationality
+1
Level 66
Oct 10, 2024
Nice detail adding a pretty obscure racing driver (Kenneth McAlpine)
+1
Level 49
Oct 10, 2024
Are the Channel Islands technically part of the UK but not in Great Britain? That one threw me off
+1
Level 41
Oct 23, 2024
They're a crown territory, meaning that the UK technically owns them, but they aren't in it. They're somewhere in-between being ruled like Wales or Scotland and being as free as Canada or Australia. Kinda free but they have to follow most of our laws
+1
Level 49
Oct 11, 2024
Jeez, there must be a lot of British people on JetPunk. I always score low on the UK-oriented quizzes.

70% of people knew that Scotland issues its own banknotes? What??

+1
Level 41
Oct 23, 2024
10/10 and I'm British... Damn
+1
Level 58
Mar 20, 2025
As an American I got 11/15, though the Cenotaph and Bonnie Prince Charlie questions were guesses.
+1
Level 61
Apr 3, 2025
As an American 14/15 isn't half bad. Might come join the Brits across the pond.