How to Run a Pub Quiz Night

I've been running pub quizzes for years, in real pubs, on real Tuesday nights, in front of real teams who will tell you straight away when a round doesn't work. This is the format I've settled on. It fills the room, it keeps the bar busy, and it gives the quiz master enough room to vary the scoring and have a bit of fun with it.

If you're starting a quiz night from scratch, or you've inherited one that's gone a bit flat, here's everything I'd tell you over a pint.

What you need before quiz night

You can run a quiz on almost nothing, but these are the bits I genuinely wouldn't turn up without.

1. Blank answer sheets. I tried pre-printed ones with the questions on and the teams hated them. Too small to write answers in, and nowhere to scribble notes and argue. Plain lined sheets, numbered down the side, work far better. Print more than you think you need.
2. A tear-off strip of paper for the shot round, attached to or handed out with the answer sheet.
3. Several print-outs of the picture round, based on how many teams you normally get. I always print off a good few more than needed. Some teams want a spare to work on, and someone always spills a drink on one.
4. Spotify on your phone or laptop for the music round.
5. Speakers. If you can hook up by Bluetooth to the pub's own system, that's best by a mile. If not, I use a couple of Tronsmart Bluetooth Groove speakers that dual-pair together, but there are plenty of others that'll do the job.
6. Pens. More than you think. You will not get them all back.
7. A microphone if the room is big or noisy. If the back tables can't hear you, they'll stop playing.

The format that works

Five rounds of ten questions, plus the one-question shot round. That is 51 questions and one half-time break, and it runs a shade under two hours, which is the sweet spot. Long enough to feel like a proper night out, short enough that nobody drifts off before the last round.

The five are three standard rounds, a music round and a picture round. This is the running order:

1. Normal question round
2. Normal question round
3. Shot round, then HALF TIME
4. Music round
5. Normal question round
6. Picture round

The logic is simple: start with straightforward rounds while people are still arriving and settling, put something daft before the break so they go to the bar in a good mood, and finish with the picture round because it's the one teams take longest over.

Running the standard rounds

Standard rounds are just 10 questions, one point each. Read each question twice: once for the team, once for the bloke who was at the bar. Don't rush; the gap between questions is where the banter happens, and the banter is the reason they came.

Mix the difficulty inside the round rather than making a whole round hard. A round where everyone scores two out of ten is demoralising. A round where the strong teams get nine and the casual teams get five is a good round.

Getting that balance right every single week is the fiddly part, and it is the main reason this site exists. Every question in our packs carries a difficulty rating, so each round already mixes easy, middling and hard before it reaches you. You are not sat there on a Tuesday afternoon trying to guess whether question seven is too obscure.

The shot round

This is the one people talk about on the way home.

Ask a single question with a numerical answer, something nobody could reasonably know but everyone can guess at. The teams have one minute from when you finish reading to write their answer and their team name on the tear-off strip and physically get it to you. Closest answer wins a shot each for the team.

In all the years I've been doing it, nobody has ever got it exactly right. That's the point. It's a guess, it's quick, it's loud, and it sends everybody to the bar for half time already laughing.

The music round

Half a point for the artist and half a point for the song title. That half-point split matters: it keeps scores tight and it means a team who knows the tune but not the name still gets something.

The QR code in the quiz pack is for you, not the teams. Scan it with your own phone and it opens the right playlist, ready to go. Keep that screen to yourself: it lists the songs and the answers, so it is the last thing you want a team reading over your shoulder. Play each clip twice, then ask for any repeats at the end before you move on.

It is audio only. Nothing goes up on a screen and there is nothing for the teams to look at, so the only thing that can give the answer away is the song itself. One warning from painful experience: plenty of tracks sing their own title in the opening line, so know where you are stopping each clip before the words hand it over. Some give you barely a couple of seconds. Have a run through at home first. It takes ten minutes and it saves you giving away a round.

The picture round

Always last. Hand the sheets out and leave the teams to it. This is the round they'll happily chew over while you get the scores straight.

I give somewhere between 10 and 30 minutes depending on how hard it is. Anagram picture rounds are far and away the hardest, so be generous with the time on those. Straight "name the celebrity" rounds go much quicker.

Because it's last and it's self-paced, the picture round also buys you the time you need to mark everything else. That's not an accident. It's the main reason it goes at the end.

Marking, trust and cheating

At the end, get the teams to swap answer sheets with another table. Always work on trust first. You'll soon know if any teams are at it, because phones under the table are not subtle, and in my experience the other teams will police it long before you have to.

If it does come up, keep it light. Remind everyone it's for fun and move on. Turning a quiz night into a courtroom is the fastest way to lose a room.

Prizes, including the booby prize

Whatever the pub can stand: a bar tab, a bottle, or the share of the entry fee you have set aside for it. But always, always have a booby prize for last place. Keep it low value and make it funny. It takes the sting out of finishing bottom and it's usually the biggest cheer of the night.

The jackpot round

This is the one that genuinely grows a quiz night, and it's the addition I'd push hardest.

It costs nothing extra to run and there is no second pot to collect. We simply split the entry fee: part of it goes straight back out as that night's prize, and the rest goes into the jackpot, where it builds week after week.

I keep a box with 50 balls in it, each with a number inside, and a sheet of 50 hard questions. The team that wins the quiz pulls a ball out of the box, and the number on it gives them their question. Get it right and they take the jackpot. Get it wrong and it rolls over to next week.

The biggest one I've had so far was £325. After a few roll-overs, word gets round and it pulls teams in on its own. It also gives the teams at the top a reason to keep pushing right to the final round, because winning the quiz is what buys you the shot at it.

Build a league so teams come back

A one-off quiz is a nice night. A league is a habit.

Keep your scores every week and upload them so teams can track their position over time. Once teams are in a league they come back. Nobody wants to drop down the table because they skipped a week. Offer a prize for the best overall points across the month or the year and you'll see the same faces every week.

Take a picture of the winners (and the losers) and put it on your socials. It's always nice to see happy faces from your local, and it's free advertising for next week.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Questions that are too hard. A quiz should make people feel clever, not thick. If you write your own, mix the difficulty inside every round. If you use ours, that job is already done.
• Rounds that drag. Ten questions is plenty. Fifteen is too many.
• Not testing the music. See above. Do the run-through.
• Letting anyone see your playlist. The music round QR code and the playlist behind it are effectively the answer sheet. Keep your screen turned away from the nearest table.
• Starting late. Start on time, every time, and people will turn up on time.
• No break. Half time is when the bar takes its money. The landlord will notice.
• Writing it yourself at 5pm. A rushed quiz shows. This is exactly why ready-made packs exist.

Frequently asked questions

How long should a pub quiz last?

Give it an hour and three quarters, give or take. Fifty-one questions does not sound like a lot on paper, but reading each one out twice, playing every music clip twice and letting the teams take a proper go at the picture round is what fills the night. Roughly: half an hour on the three standard rounds, twenty minutes on the music round, anywhere from ten to thirty on the picture round, five on the shot round, fifteen for half time, and ten at the end for marking and announcing. If you want a full two hours, be generous with the picture round and the break.

How many questions should a pub quiz have?

Fifty-one. Five rounds of ten questions (three standard rounds, a music round and a picture round), plus the one-question shot round. That is exactly what comes in one of our packs.

How much should I charge per team?

Somewhere between £1 and £2 a head is standard. Split what you take: part goes back out as that night's prize, and the rest builds the jackpot for the following week.

What's the ideal team size?

Four to six. Cap it at six or you get one table of twelve running away with it.

Do I need a licence to play music at a pub quiz?

The pub itself normally holds the licence covering recorded music on the premises. Check with the landlord before your first night rather than assuming.

The short version

Five rounds, one break, a daft shot round before half time, a picture round to finish, a rolling jackpot to bring them back, and a league to keep them honest. Get those bones right and the rest is just good questions.

And if you'd rather not spend your week writing 51 questions and building a picture round from scratch, that's exactly what we do. Every quiz pack comes with the question rounds, a picture round, a music round with the playlist QR code, and answer sheets ready to print.

Mitch and Harry