How it works
Each row of emoji stands for one US state: its nickname, an official state symbol or a landmark. Pick the state from four choices, and a note says what every emoji meant. All fifty states have a row.
Read the full guide
How a row works
A row might read ๐ ๐ฅ ๐ง ๐ข. Those are the Peach State, its state crop (the peanut), the Vidalia sweet onion and the gopher tortoise, so the answer is Georgia.
One region at a time
The rows fall into the four regions of the U.S. Census Bureau: Northeast (9 states), Midwest (12), South (16) and West (13). The three wrong choices always come from the same region as the answer.
Where the clues come from
Most clues are official state symbols: a bird, a tree, a fruit, a sport. The rest are nicknames, national parks and landmarks. No row uses a sports team or a living person.
- Read the whole row before the choices. One emoji can fit several states, but three or four clues together fit one.
- Two emoji side by side can spell a name. A bird and a hammer make the yellowhammer, the state bird of Alabama.
- Your phone draws the emoji, so a row may look a little different on another screen.
Questions and answers
How do you guess the state by emoji?
Look for the nickname first. A sunflower is the Sunflower State, Kansas, and a badger is the Badger State, Wisconsin. Then check the other emoji against your guess: a state animal, a state food, a landmark.
Can one emoji stand for more than one state?
Yes. The bison is the state animal of Kansas and Oklahoma and the state mammal of Wyoming, and the apple is the state fruit of New York and Washington. Two states that share a clue are never choices for the same row.
Does the quiz show state flags or outlines?
No. A flag emoji or an outline would give the answer away, and the blank map has its own quiz here. Two rows do name something drawn on a state flag: the crescent of South Carolina and the sun symbol of New Mexico.
Where were the state symbols checked?
Each symbol was found in two Wikipedia records, most often the list of that state's symbols and the list for the kind of symbol, such as state birds. Parks were checked on National Park Service pages. The date is printed under the quiz.