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PlainSpell

quiz

/kwɪz/noun, verb

quiz is spelled Q-U-I-Z: 4 letters and one syllable. It appears 6.6 times per million words in written English, the 9,313th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, quiz means “An odd, puzzling or absurd person or thing” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of quiz is quizzes.

How many letters and syllables are in quiz?

Letters4: Q-U-I-Z
Syllables1 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing6.6 times per million words; the 9,313th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How common is quiz?

Quiz appears 6.6 times per million words in written English, the 9,313th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you pronounce quiz?

  • /kwɪz/
  • [kʰw̥ɪz]

Quiz has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-quiz.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of quiz

  • quizzes plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • quizzing participle, present
  • quizzed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What does quiz mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    datedAn odd, puzzling or absurd person or thing.

  2. 2

    datedOne who questions or interrogates; a prying person.

  3. 3

    A competition in the answering of questions.

    We came second in the pub quiz.

  4. 4

    A school examination of less importance, or of greater brevity, than others given in the same course.

verb

  1. 1

    archaicTo hoax; to chaff or mock with pretended seriousness of discourse; to make sport of, as by obscure questions.

  2. 2

    archaicTo peer at; to eye suspiciously or mockingly.

  3. 3

    To question (someone) closely, to interrogate.

    He quizzed the suspect for around half an hour.

  4. 4

    To instruct (someone) by means of a quiz.

  5. 5

    obsoleterareTo play with a quiz.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Quiz in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchquiz (competition in the answering of questions)
GermanRatespiel, Fragespiel, Quiz (competition in the answering of questions), ausfragen (interrogate)
Portuguesequiz (competition in the answering of questions)
Spanishprueba, cuestionario, examen, test (competition in the answering of questions), pruebita (a school examination of less importance), engañar (hoax)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does quiz come from?

Attested since the 1780s, of unknown origin.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

What to look up after quiz