Space Riddles With Answers
Updated · Best Riddles With Answers editorial team
Quick answer: This page has 42 space riddles with answers for young astronomers, classrooms and family quiz nights. The easy riddles cover rockets, stars and the Moon, the middle sets add black holes, eclipses and light-years, and the hard set mixes real space facts with number puzzles. Every fact has been checked, and the riddles are clean and family friendly.
Easy Space Riddles
I change shape from a thin curve to a full circle each month, but I make no light of my own. What am I?
The Moon
I am a tiny dot of light in the night sky, and there are billions of me. What am I?
A star
I wear a bulky suit and a helmet, and I float inside the space station. Who am I?
An astronaut
I blast off with fire and smoke, and I carry people and machines into space. What am I?
A rocket
I am a tube with lenses, and I help you see stars that are far away. What am I?
A telescope
I am a ball of ice and dust, and when I come near the sun, I grow a long glowing tail. What am I?
A comet
I streak across the night sky for a second, and people make wishes on me. I am really a speck of rock burning up. What am I?
A shooting star (a meteor)
I am our home galaxy, and my name sounds like a chocolate bar. What am I?
The Milky Way
I orbit the Earth with astronauts living inside me. What am I?
The space station
I circle the Earth without a driver, and I help with phone signals, maps and weather pictures. What am I?
A satellite
I am the star at the centre of our solar system, and every planet circles me. What am I?
The Sun
Join the dots of the stars and I make a picture of a bear, a hunter or a swan in the sky. What am I?
A constellation
Trickier Space Riddles
Not even light can escape me, because my pull is so strong. What am I?
A black hole
I keep your feet on the ground and the Moon circling the Earth, yet you cannot see or touch me. What am I?
Gravity
When the Moon slides between the Earth and the Sun, I turn day into twilight for a few minutes. What am I?
A solar eclipse
I sound like a measure of time, but I measure distance: how far light travels in one year. What am I?
A light-year
I am a lump of rock, and millions of my relatives orbit the Sun in a belt between Mars and Jupiter. What am I?
An asteroid
I was the first person to walk on the Moon, and I called it one small step. Who am I?
Neil Armstrong
I am the curved path a moon follows around a planet, or a planet around its star. What am I?
An orbit
I am bowl-shaped holes that cover the face of the Moon, made when rocks crashed into it. What am I?
Craters
I am a giant family of billions of stars, gas and dust held together by gravity. What am I?
A galaxy
In space you cannot hear me, because there is no air to carry me. What am I?
Sound
I count backwards from ten, and at zero a rocket leaves the ground. What am I?
A countdown
I am a room full of screens on the ground, where people talk to astronauts and watch every step of a mission. What am I?
Mission control
Hard Space Riddles
If the Sun suddenly vanished, about how long would it be before we saw the sky go dark on Earth?
About 8 minutes, the time its light takes to reach us
I spin exactly once each time I go around the Earth, so you only ever see one side of me. What am I?
The Moon
A space station circles the Earth once every 90 minutes. How many times does it orbit in one day?
16, because a day is 24 x 60 = 1,440 minutes and 1,440 / 90 = 16
A countdown starts by saying 20, then says one number every 2 seconds until it says 0. How many seconds pass between saying 20 and saying 0?
40 seconds. There are 20 gaps between the 21 numbers, and 20 x 2 = 40
An astronaut's scale reads 72 kg on Earth. The Moon's gravity is about a sixth as strong. What does the same scale read on the Moon?
12 kg, because 72 / 6 = 12 (her mass stays the same; only the pull changes)
When you look at me you see how I looked long ago, because my light took years to reach you. What am I?
A star
I am the Moon phase that is dark and almost invisible, and I must be in place for a solar eclipse. What am I?
The new moon
On the space station an astronaut lets go of a spanner, and it does not fall to the floor. Why not?
The station and the spanner are both in free fall around the Earth, so they fall together and it seems weightless
A probe flies at 48,000 kilometres an hour. The Moon is about 384,000 kilometres away. How many hours does it take?
8 hours, because 384,000 / 48,000 = 8
When I am in space I am a meteoroid, and when I burn in the sky I am a meteor. What am I called when I land on the ground?
A meteorite
Quick-Fire Space Riddles
A glowing cloud of gas and dust where stars are born. What am I?
A nebula
A giant star that ends its life in a huge explosion. What am I?
A supernova
A little wheeled robot that explores a planet's dusty surface. What am I?
A rover
White, pressurised and worn outside the station. What am I?
A space suit
The small cabin on top of a rocket where the crew sit. What am I?
A capsule
Floating outside the spacecraft on a safety line. What am I doing?
A spacewalk
The flat ground where a rocket stands before blast-off. What am I?
A launch pad
Dozens of shooting stars in a single night. What am I?
A meteor shower
How to Use These Space Riddles
Space riddles suit a night of stargazing, a science lesson or a car journey. Read an easy riddle, then let children point at the sky or a picture once they have the answer. The quick-fire set makes a fun warm-up before a lesson.
Use the hard set to start a conversation. After you reveal an answer, look up the fact behind it together, such as why the Moon always shows the same face, and add it to a class space notebook.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is a good space riddle for kids?
Try 'I change shape from a thin curve to a full circle each month, but I make no light of my own.' The answer is the Moon. Riddles about rockets, stars and astronauts are also easy for children.
How long does sunlight take to reach the Earth?
About eight minutes. The Sun is roughly 150 million kilometres away, and light travels about 300,000 kilometres every second, so the light we see now left the Sun a little over eight minutes ago.
Why do we only see one side of the Moon?
The Moon spins once on its axis in exactly the time it takes to orbit the Earth, so the same face always points towards us. The far side is lit by the Sun too, but we cannot see it.
Can I use these space riddles in the classroom?
Yes. The riddles are clean, accurate and sorted by difficulty, so you can pick the set that matches your class. The number puzzles work well in maths lessons and the facts link to science topics.
