Geography quiz
State border chain: cross the United States
You are given a start and a destination on the map. Type a state that borders the one you stand in, then the next, until you arrive. Three journeys make a play.
- Format
- Chain
- Items
- 3 journeys
- Limit
- None
- Level
- Easy
- Checked
- 2026.10.03
- In play
- 48 states
- A play
- 3 journeys
- Each journey
- 3 to 5 borders at the shortest
- Scoring
- 5 for a shortest route with no help
- Clock
- None to beat
- Type a state linked to the one you are in and press Enter. Any route to the destination counts.
- A name that is not linked, or is already on your route, is refused and costs nothing. Undo takes back a step.
- A hint outlines a next step on the map. Hints and showing every outline count as help.
- Pause whenever you like (Esc). The board hides while the clock is stopped.
Type a state that borders the one you are in and press Enter. Keep going until you reach the destination.
Drawing the map
About this quiz
The 48 states that share a land border with another state are in play; Alaska and Hawaii touch no other state. Two states are neighbours when their outlines share a stretch of boundary, so the four states at the Four Corners are not all neighbours of each other.
- Any route that reaches the destination counts. A state you have already crossed cannot be entered twice; undo a step to go back.
- A shortest route with no help scores 5. Each extra border costs a point, down to 2. Arriving with help scores 1, and a revealed route scores 0.
- A hint draws the outline of a next step on a shortest route; a second hint in the same place names it. The map can also show every outline. Both count as help.
- A journey never starts or ends in a state with only one neighbour (such as Maine), so the first and last steps are always a real choice.
- When a journey ends, every equally short route is listed and can be shown one at a time.
- The first three journeys of each day are the same for everyone. Play again for fresh ones.
- States that meet only at a point or only across water (Arizona and Colorado, Michigan and Illinois) are not neighbours here.
Sources
- [1]US Census Bureau. Cartographic Boundary Files.
- [2]US Census Bureau. County adjacency file.
- [3]US Census Bureau. ANSI codes for states.
Note on the data. State borders are computed by scripts/build-state-borders.mjs from the Census Bureau's cartographic boundary file: two states are neighbours when they share a boundary line, and a shared point is not a border. The five pairs that the Census Bureau's county adjacency file joins only at a point or across water (Arizona and Colorado, New Mexico and Utah, Illinois and Michigan, Michigan and Minnesota, New York and Rhode Island) are declared unclear and are never links. The exclave check of scripts/build-border-exclaves.ts finds no state border that runs only through an exclave. The 50 states are those on the Census Bureau's state code list, leaving out the District of Columbia and the territories. The map is drawn from the Census Bureau's public domain cartographic boundary files, with Alaska and Hawaii moved and rescaled into the lower left corner.
Last checked October 3, 2026
More quizzes like this
| No. | Quiz | Section | Format | Items | Added |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | US states bigger than every neighbour: minefield Click the 8 US states that are larger in land area than every state they border. One wrong click ends the round. A forgiving mode is included. Geography / Map quiz / 8 on the map | Geography | Map quiz | 8 | 2026.10.03 |
| 02 | Border chain: cross the world country by country Get from one country to another across the world, one neighbour at a time. Type each country you cross. Any route counts; the shortest scores best. Geography / Chain / 3 journeys | Geography | Chain | 3 | 2026.10.03 |
| 03 | Border chain of Europe Get from one country to another across Europe, one neighbour at a time. Type each country you cross. Any route counts; the shortest scores best. Geography / Chain / 3 journeys | Geography | Chain | 3 | 2026.10.03 |