Massachusetts counties quiz

The 14 counties in the quiz

They’re the 14 counties of Massachusetts, as counted by the US Census Bureau. The state capital, Boston, is in Suffolk County.

How to play

In Point mode we name a county and you tap it on the map; in Type mode one lights up and you type its name (accents don’t matter); and in Time trial you get 6 seconds per question. If you miss, we show you where it was, which way it lies and a hint drawn from the data: its size rank and its neighbors.

Each game has 10, 20 or all the questions, and at the end you can practice just the ones you missed. Your best score for each mode is saved in this browser only: neither we nor anyone else can see it, and there’s no sign-up.

The hardest ones

The smallest counties are the hardest, since they barely show on the map: Nantucket (46 sq mi), Suffolk (58 sq mi), and Dukes (103 sq mi). Zoom in with the buttons or two fingers to tap them.

Tips to learn them

• Start with the three largest: Worcester, Berkshire, and Middlesex cover 42% of the area of Massachusetts.
• The 4 counties bordering New Hampshire trace that border on the map: Essex, Franklin, Middlesex, and Worcester.
• 6 of the 14 have no coastline: Berkshire, Franklin, Hampden, Hampshire, Middlesex, and Worcester.
• Dukes and Nantucket have no land border with any other county on the map: look for them at sea.
• Middlesex is the most populous (1,669,979 people in 2025) and, together with Worcester and Essex, is home to 47% of Massachusetts’s people.

Playing in class

If you teach in Massachusetts, start with your school’s county and its neighbors and add a few each day. Otherwise, it’s a good way to get to know the state before studying it.

With the Challenge your class link, everyone gets the same questions in the same order, with no accounts or passwords, and each student sees their own score, time and streak. To practice on paper, there’s a printable worksheet of the same map with an answer key.

List of all 14 counties

1. Barnstable pop. 233,539
2. Berkshire pop. 128,224
3. Bristol pop. 593,640
4. Dukes pop. 21,219
5. Essex pop. 826,653
6. Franklin pop. 70,698
7. Hampden pop. 464,338
8. Hampshire pop. 164,065
9. Middlesex pop. 1,669,979
10. Nantucket pop. 14,758
11. Norfolk pop. 739,749
12. Plymouth pop. 546,829
13. Suffolk pop. 791,891
14. Worcester pop. 888,502