Guess the Country by Outline — Rules & What Counts
This quiz shows one country shape at a time. There is no map around the shape, no neighbours and no coastline of the continent. You name the country from its outline alone.
The shape is the only clue. A player who knows the world map by heart recognizes the big countries at once. The small landlocked countries and the island groups are the hard part.
How to play
Each round shows one country outline. Type the name of the country. A list of matching countries opens above the answer bar as you type, and you can pick from it.
The list holds only countries that are still in the run. A correct name commits as soon as you type it in full.
You have three lives. A wrong answer costs one life. The run ends when all three lives are gone.
A wrong name commits only when it is the last country in the list, or when you click the country or press Enter on it. So you only spend a life on a country you chose.
There is no skip button. The only way past a shape is to name a country.
A correct answer turns the shape green. A wrong answer turns the shape red and shows the name of the country.
One point per correct country. The run has a round for every country in the pool. The timer counts up from zero.
What counts in this quiz
The pool holds every sovereign country in the world quiz except the micronations, about 170 countries. The order is random in each run.
Each shape uses the same map data at the same detail: the Natural Earth 10 m country outlines. Islands that belong to the country are part of the shape when they lie close to the mainland.
Accepted spellings match the world map quiz. Common short forms count, for example "Holland", "DR Congo" and "Bosnia".
The shape of a country crosses the whole card. A long thin country such as Chile fills the height of the card, and a wide country such as Russia fills the width.
What's not included — and why
Micronations and very small island states are excluded, for example Vatican City, Monaco, Singapore, Malta and the Maldives. Their outline is a dot at any size.
Overseas territories far from the mainland are not part of a shape: French Guiana is not part of France, the Canary Islands are not part of Spain, and Svalbard is not part of Norway. Hawaii and Alaska are part of the United States.
Territories and dependencies are excluded. Only sovereign countries appear, matching the world map quiz.
Good to know
Some countries are almost a rectangle. Egypt and the mainland of Equatorial Guinea have long straight borders that were drawn with a ruler in colonial times.
Italy is the easiest shape in the quiz for most players. Countries in the Sahel, such as Niger, Chad and Mali, look alike and are the shapes most players mix up.
Chile is over 4,000 km long and only about 180 km wide on average. Its outline is the thinnest in the quiz.