You can run a quiz on TikTok Live by hand: read out a question, watch the chat and keep score yourself. It works for a handful of viewers, but once the chat gets busy a quiz tool that reads answers from the chat and scores them automatically lets you keep up, and gives viewers a live leaderboard.
A manual quiz needs nothing but you, your questions and the chat:
It's free, and it's a great way to try quizzes with a small audience before investing in anything.
The problems start as soon as more than a few people are playing:
A quiz tool connects to your TikTok Live chat, reads every answer and does the scoring for you. Here's how the two compare, using QuizGames Live as the example tool:
| By hand | With QuizGames Live | |
|---|---|---|
| Reading answers | You scan the chat and catch what you can | Every answer in the chat is read automatically |
| Scoring | Pen and paper, or a spreadsheet | Automatic, with points for speed and penalties if you want them |
| Typos and spellings | You decide each one on the spot | Close spellings still count |
| Leaderboard | Read out by you | Shown live on stream after each question |
| Monthly and all-time scores | Kept by hand, if at all | Kept automatically |
| Question types | Whatever you can show on camera | Multiple choice, pictures, music, word games and game shows |
| Writing questions | All by you | By you, or drafted by the AI Quiz Builder |
| Cost | Free | Paid plan, with a 7-day free trial |
Running a quiz by hand is perfectly fine if:
A tool starts to pay off once your quizzes become a regular part of your lives, your chat is too busy to read by hand, or you want a leaderboard that brings players back every week. QuizGames Live has a 7-day free trial, so you can try it on a real live before deciding.
Before QuizGames Live existed, Stuart ran the @quizgameslive quizzes by hand, and it was hard work. Every answer meant writing names down, then tallying them all up, while still trying to host the live.
There was also no way to keep track of the leaderboards over time. Stuart wanted to run a monthly champions quiz for the top 8 players, and doing that by hand just wasn't realistic.
That's a big part of why QuizGames Live was built. Now the scores are counted automatically and the monthly leaderboard keeps itself, so champions events can happen. Some months there's a champions quiz, run in all sorts of different ways, including the game shows.
Yes. Quiz tools like QuizGames Live connect to your TikTok Live chat, read viewers' answers as they type them, score them automatically and show a live leaderboard on your stream.
No. With QuizGames Live, viewers just type their answers in the TikTok Live chat. Nothing to install, no link to click and no sign-up.
QuizGames Live counts close spellings as correct, so a small typo doesn't cost a player the point.
Yes. You write your own questions, choose the rounds, and set your own timer, points and penalties, so every host's quiz can be different.
If you only quiz occasionally for a few viewers, running it by hand is fine. If quizzes are a regular part of your lives, a tool saves you the admin and gives viewers a leaderboard that brings them back. You can try QuizGames Live free for 7 days.
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