About Animal ID Quiz

A quiz that shows you real wildlife photos and asks you to name the species, using observations shared by the iNaturalist community.

About iNaturalist

iNaturalist is a nonprofit community science project and social network for people who record and share what they see in nature. Its goal is to connect people to nature and to advance biodiversity science and conservation.

Anyone can post a photo of a wild plant or animal with where and when they saw it. Other members then help identify it. When the community agrees on a species, the observation becomes research grade, and iNaturalist shares it with scientists through the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), where it is used in research on where species live and how that is changing.

How Animal ID Quiz uses iNaturalist

• Observations. The quiz is built from iNaturalist's research-grade observations of wild animals, from a Darwin Core export of October 19, 2026. We keep observations identified to species, with a photo and a location accurate to within 10 km, and a sample of up to 25 per species in each 1-degree square of the map.
• Places. Place names and outlines (countries, states, counties, parks and more) come from iNaturalist, so a quiz for "California" only shows species seen there.
• Wrong answers. The other choices are species from the same family that have also been seen in that place, so the quiz tests what you could really mix up in the field.
• Photos. Photos are shown straight from iNaturalist's open data on Amazon Web Services; we don't copy them. Each one is credited to its photographer under the Creative Commons license they chose, and links back to the observation on iNaturalist.
• What the photos show. iNaturalist records evidence that an animal was there, so not every photo shows a living animal. Some show signs it left behind, such as nests, tracks and footprints, feathers, shed skins, burrows, droppings or bones.
• Living animals only. This option, on by default, skips photos that iNaturalist members have marked as a dead animal, or as showing only signs of it. Not every photo is marked, so a few may still get through.
• Names. English bird names follow the Clements checklist of the birds of the world; other English names come from iNaturalist.

Please note: some photos show dead animals, such as roadkill, birds that hit windows, or prey. They are real records of where species live, and we can't screen them all out.

Animal ID Quiz is an independent project and is not affiliated with or endorsed by iNaturalist. If you'd like to help, the best way is to post your own observations and help identify others' on iNaturalist.

What's in the quiz

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How to play

Animal ID Quiz shows you real wildlife photos from iNaturalist and asks you to name the species. Here's everything you can do.

1. Set up a quiz

• Animal group. Tap one of the eight groups: birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians, fish, insects, arachnids (spiders and kin) or mollusks (snails, slugs and kin).
• Place. Start typing a country, state, county, city or park, then pick it from the list (typing alone isn't enough). You'll only see species that have been seen there, and the wrong answers are species seen there too.
• Narrow it down (optional). Type a family, a genus or a word from the names, such as "warblers", "hawks" or "Turdus", and pick from the list. You can add up to five; tap one to remove it. Leave it empty to be asked about the whole group.
• Living animals only. On by default. It skips photos marked as dead animals, and photos that only show signs such as tracks, nests or feathers.
• Questions. Choose 5, 10 or 20, then tap Start quiz.

Your last group, place and settings are remembered on this device, so the next quiz starts where you left off.

2. Look closely at the photo

• Zoom. Pinch, or double-tap where you want to look, on a phone or tablet. On a computer, double-click, scroll the mouse wheel, or use the + and − buttons. Zooming in loads a sharper version of the photo.
• Move around. Drag the photo while zoomed in. The fit button (four corners) shows the whole photo again.
• Brightness, contrast and saturation. The half-filled circle button opens sliders that help with dark or washed-out photos. Your settings stay for the next photos; Reset puts them back.
• More photos. Many observations have more than one photo. When they do, arrows appear on the sides of the photo with a count such as "1 / 3" in the corner. Tap the arrows or swipe left and right to see the others; they often show a different angle or another field mark.
• Where it was seen. The line below the photo says where the observation was made, such as a park, county, state and country. The photographer and license are credited in the corner of the photo.

3. Answer

• Tap the species you think it is. Each choice shows the English name (when there is one) with the scientific name below it.
• The right answer turns green. If you picked something else, your answer turns red, and the line below tells you what it was.
• After you answer, each name links to that species' page on iNaturalist, and See this observation on iNaturalist opens the original record with all its photos.
• Tap Next for the next photo. After the last one you'll see your score.

Keyboard shortcuts (computers)

• A B C D (or 1–4) pick an answer.
• ← and → show the observation's other photos.
• Enter goes to the next question.
• + and − zoom in and out, and 0 fits the photo.

4. Your score

• The results page lists every photo with the right answer and what you said. Tap a name to open that observation on iNaturalist.
• Play again starts a new quiz with the same settings and new photos. Change group or place takes you back to set-up.
• A quiz is saved as you go: if you close the page or lose your connection, open the same link again to pick up where you were.

Accounts (optional)

• You can play without an account. Sign in to keep your scores and see them under My scores: quizzes played, average score and every past quiz.
• Create an account with your email and a password (at least 8 characters, with a lowercase letter and a number), then enter the code we email you.
• Remember me keeps you signed in on this device. Leave it off on a shared computer. Show displays the password as you type it.
• Forgot your password? Choose Forgot your password? on the sign-in page and we'll email you a code to set a new one.
• Sign out is in the top bar.

Tips

• Start with a small place and a familiar group, then widen out.
• Use Narrow it down to practise a tricky family, such as gulls or sparrows.
• Look for field marks: bill shape, wing bars, patterns, and the habitat in the background.

Something not working, or a photo that looks misidentified? Contact us. To learn where the photos come from, see About.

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Privacy and cookies

Animal ID Quiz keeps the minimum it needs to run and to understand how it's used.

Cookies and browser storage

• idquiz_visitor: a random ID that tells us you're the same visitor when you come back, so we can count unique visitors and limit contact messages. It lasts one year.
• Quiz settings (stored in your browser, not sent anywhere): the animal group, place and question count you picked last, so the next quiz starts there.
• Sign-in (only if you sign in): your sign-in tokens, kept in your browser. With "Remember me" they last until you sign out (at most 30 days) and your email is filled in next time; without it, until you close the browser.

There are no advertising or third-party tracking cookies.

What we record

For each visit we store the day, your visitor ID, your IP address and the site that linked here. For each quiz we store the group, place and filters you chose, the answers you gave and your visitor ID. We use this to count visitors and quizzes and to improve the quiz.

Accounts

If you create an account, your email address and password are handled by Amazon Cognito; we never see your password. Your quizzes are linked to your account so you can see your scores. Signing in is optional.

Photos

Photos are loaded straight from iNaturalist's photo servers, which see your IP address like any website you visit. Each photo is credited to its observer under its Creative Commons license.

Contact form

If you write to us through the contact form, we keep your name, email address, message, visitor ID and IP address, and email the message to the site's editors. Your email address is used only to reply to you. You can send up to 3 messages a day.

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