Marytale
Funny Riddles for Kids with Answers
35 riddles
A funny riddle and a clever riddle are not the same thing. A clever one makes a child think; a funny one makes them think, then groan, then immediately go and try it on somebody else. The groan is the point.
All 35 are clean, and many are classics that children have passed on for generations, picked and reworded by us. Most of them turn on a word that means two things, which is why they start working at about six and are still being retold at ten.
What has to be broken before you can use it?
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An egg
What gets wetter the more it dries?
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A towel
What has a neck but no head?
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A bottle
What has hands but cannot clap?
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A clock
What has a face but never washes it?
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A clock again
What has teeth but cannot bite?
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A comb
What has an eye but cannot see?
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A needle
What has legs but cannot walk?
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A table
What has a bed but never sleeps?
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A river
What has a head and a foot and four legs, but never goes for a walk?
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A bed
What has keys but opens no doors?
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A piano
What has ears but cannot hear?
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A field of corn
What has one horn and gives milk?
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A milk truck
What goes up and never comes down?
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Your age
What can travel around the world while staying in a corner?
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A stamp
What gets bigger the more you take away?
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A hole
What is full of holes and still holds water?
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A sponge
What building has the most stories?
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The library
What is at the end of everything?
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The letter G
What begins with T, ends with T, and has T inside it?
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A teapot
What is so fragile that saying its name breaks it?
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Silence
What can you catch but never throw?
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A cold
What can you hold without touching it?
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Your breath
What runs all around a garden and never moves?
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The fence
What has a thumb and four fingers but is not alive?
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A glove
What is easy to get into and hard to get out of?
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Trouble
What is black when clean and white when dirty?
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A blackboard
What kind of band never plays music?
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A rubber band
What kind of room has no walls?
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A mushroom
What kind of coat goes on wet?
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A coat of paint
What goes up when the rain comes down?
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An umbrella
What comes down but never goes up?
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Rain
What is heavier: a pound of feathers or a pound of bricks?
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The same. But the bricks hurt more
What do you throw out to use and take in when you are done?
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An anchor
What is always coming but never arrives?
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Tomorrow
How to ask them
Funny riddles are the ones worth asking at a table with more than two people, because half the fun is watching somebody else fail. Ask, then count to ten in your head before you give anything away — adults almost always rescue a child too early, and the ten seconds of silence is where the thinking happens. If nobody gets it, do not just say the answer: give the one word that unlocks it and ask again. A riddle solved after a hint still counts as solved, and a riddle whose answer you simply announced does not count at all. And when your child starts making their own, expect the first ones to have the answer sitting in the first line. Say so gently and let them try again — noticing that is the whole skill.
After the riddles, a story: illustrated bedtime stories on Marytale
Jokes
Many of these 35 riddles are traditional English riddles that belong to everyone; Marytale chose the clean ones and reworded them for children aged 6 to 10, and wrote the rest. Chosen and written by Marytale.