Presidents by State
Match US presidents to their state of birth.
Presidents by State pairs a president with the state he was born in, which is a different memory job from remembering the order of the presidencies. Fifteen names per round, four states offered each time, roughly two minutes end to end.
How to play
Press Start and a president's name appears in the navy card with four state buttons below. Click the state. A correct pick turns green and scores a point. A wrong pick turns red, the correct state turns green, and you lose one of three lives. The three wrong options are drawn at random from the other 49 states, so a rough sense of region is often enough to eliminate two of them. Fifteen names are dealt from a deck of 44 cards, one per president, there is no timer, and stars land at 90, 60 and 30 percent. Best score and daily streak are kept in your browser.
Two states carry a third of the deck
Virginia holds 8 cards and Ohio 7, so a blind guess is far from even money. For presidents who served before the Civil War, Virginia is the strongest fallback, and it accounts for four of the first five presidents. From Grant (1869) to Harding (1921), Ohio is the fallback: it produced seven of the eleven presidents of that run.
Birth state, not home state
The question is always the state of birth, and many presidents are remembered for another one. The classic traps:
- Lincoln, born in Kentucky, career in Illinois.
- Grant, born in Ohio, home in Illinois.
- Obama, born in Hawaii, career in Illinois.
- Benjamin Harrison, born in Ohio, career in Indiana.
- Zachary Taylor, born in Virginia, home in Louisiana.
- Polk and Andrew Johnson, both born in North Carolina, both careers in Tennessee.
- Eisenhower, born in Denison, Texas, raised in Abilene, Kansas.
- Gerald Ford, born in Omaha, Nebraska, raised in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
- George W. Bush, born in New Haven, Connecticut, raised in Texas.
Andrew Jackson is not in the deck: he was born in the Waxhaws, on the border between the two Carolinas, and North and South Carolina both still claim him. Grover Cleveland and Donald Trump each served two non-consecutive terms and each get a single card.
Presidents per state in this deck
| State | Cards | Presidents |
|---|---|---|
| Virginia | 8 | Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, William Henry Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Wilson |
| Ohio | 7 | Grant, Hayes, Garfield, Benjamin Harrison, McKinley, Taft, Harding |
| New York | 5 | Van Buren, Fillmore, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Trump |
| Massachusetts | 4 | John Adams, John Quincy Adams, Kennedy, George H. W. Bush |
| North Carolina | 2 | Polk, Andrew Johnson |
| Pennsylvania | 2 | Buchanan, Biden |
| Texas | 2 | Dwight D. Eisenhower, Lyndon B. Johnson |
| Vermont | 2 | Chester A. Arthur, Coolidge |
| One card each | 12 | Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey |
Keep going
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Presidents born in each stateFrequently asked questions
How do you play Presidents by State?
Match US presidents to their state of birth. Scores tracked locally; streak preserved across days.
Is this game free?
Yes, 100% free, no signup, no ads. Just play.
Does it work on mobile?
Yes, fully responsive on phones, tablets and desktop.
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