thumbnail

Capital Cities with the Least Precipitation

Can you guess the world capitals that have the lowest average annual precipitation?
Source: Wikipedia
Quiz by georgekotz
Rate:
Last updated: January 7, 2018
You have not attempted this quiz yet.
First submittedJune 6, 2017
Times taken18,914
Average score57.1%
Rating4.73
4:00
Enter answer here
0
 / 21 guessed
The quiz is paused. You have remaining.
Scoring
You scored / = %
This beats or equals % of test takers also scored 100%
The average score is
Your high score is
Your fastest time is
Keep scrolling down for answers and more stats ...
cm/yr
capital
0.64
Lima
2.47
Cairo
5.71
Abu Dhabi
7.08
Manama
7.52
Doha
9.40
Nouakchott
10.0
Muscat
cm/yr
capital
10.2
Riyadh
11.6
Kuwait City
12.1
Khartoum
12.3
Baghdad
13.1
Damascus
16.4
Djibouti
20.1
Ashgabat
cm/yr
capital
21.0
Baku
21.0
Praia
23.3
Tehran
24.5
Amman
26.5
Sana'a
26.7
Ulaanbaatar
28.2
Santiago
+21
Level 82
Oct 19, 2017
Kinda expected more Saharan countries on there, interesting quiz
+6
Level 69
Oct 20, 2017
Can't believe the 2 outside Africa and Asia
+4
Level 88
Aug 10, 2019
The 2 near the driest desert on Earth.
+7
Level 71
Mar 2, 2021
Lima sits in a desert. The irony is that it isn't sunny at all despite the low precipitation. It tends to be foggy and cloudy...strange climate.
+5
Level 75
Mar 2, 2021
Grey and cool almost all the time - just what you had in mind for a coastal tropical spot.
+6
Level 77
Jul 29, 2022
I just spent some time on Google Maps and holy moly you guys are 100% right. Every single location that i dropped down in it was foggy and cloudy. It constantly looks like it's going to rain and yet it's the driest capital city on the planet. How bizarre.
+9
Level 90
Oct 20, 2017
I was completely shocked by the driest capital city. I only got it by guessing random cities. If I had done it methodically I would have guessed at least 100 cities before that one. After looking it up it seems to be a unique climate. It's extremely cloudy during the winter months with nearly complete cloud coverage all season but no rain.
+1
Level 77
Jan 6, 2018
I guessed it simply because I thought it was in the middle of the Andes, and the one with the most on this list for kind of the same reason.
+6
Level 73
Jan 6, 2018
I've been there while it was raining fairly hard - I didn't have any idea how rare an occasion that really was!!
+4
Level 75
Jan 6, 2018
It's very weird. Near the equator, on the coast, and you need a sweater. Garua, I think the phenomenon is called (maybe only called that in Peru?). It lends a grey grimness to Lima most of the time.
+4
Level 57
Jan 8, 2018
Garua is drizzle. Yeah, Lima is very humid and the climate is weird (can be cloudy and foggy in a part of the city but sunny and burning hot only 4 km away in another part of the city), but it rarely rains for real. Mostly drizzles. I live in Lima so I'm sure.
+3
Level 72
Oct 20, 2017
A tad more leeway on the spelling would be nice. I wasn't a million miles off with one but no go.
+5
Level 88
Aug 10, 2019
Especially since Riyadh spelled correctly on JetPunk always leaves a hanging H to muck up the next answer so I always just type Riyad. That didn't work and I swore I hadn't typed it.
+6
Level 66
Oct 20, 2017
I was surprised about Baku and Praia and about there being not that many Saharan countries.
+2
Level 82
Oct 20, 2017
Having been to Baku, I'm not suprised at all. It's pretty much in a desert.
+2
Level 66
Oct 20, 2017
Lima? Is this accounting for El Nino because that can cause massive rains in Peru.
+7
Level 82
Oct 20, 2017
Apparently elsewhere in Peru.
+7
Level 76
Oct 20, 2017
Exactly, El Nino mostly affects northern Peru in terms of rainfall. Lima generally remains under the influence of the cold Humboldt ocean current, which causes the city to have a very dry and, amazingly, as idontkn1 mentions above, a very cloudy climate at the same time!
+3
Level 57
Jan 8, 2018
Lima is actually very humid. It just doesn't rain here.
+3
Level 87
Oct 27, 2017
Who are the near-misses? I don't ever remembering rain in Ndjamena, Chad. Mogadishu, Somalia?
+8
Level 76
Oct 27, 2017
The nearest misses are Yerevan (29.6 cm), Kabul (31.2 cm) and Astana (32.0 cm). N'Djamena and Mogadishu get 51 cm (almost as much as Copenhagen!) and 42.9 cm of rain every year respectively, which falls mostly within a period of 2-3 months in each city. The reason they (and other capitals of Sub-Saharan Africa) seem to get less rain than they actually do is the high evaporation rate due to the extremely high temperatures!
+1
Level 81
Mar 30, 2023
Mogadishu surprises me!

But perhaps even more surprising is the absence of Windhoek.

+3
Level 30
Jan 6, 2018
Wow Praia really? Unexpected.
+1
Level 59
Jan 6, 2018
In my humble opinion capital cities spelling should have the same precision as country names.

Where is Riyad?!

+8
Level 71
Jan 7, 2018
If you have reached 60 on jetpunk and you don't know where Riyad is, then you must have inside connections. I could understand you demanding the spelling of Saudi Arabia's capital as مدينة الرياض

but to get your knickers in a twist over something so irrelevant is silly.

+1
Level 48
Jan 6, 2018
“Word capitals”?
+1
Level 76
Jan 6, 2018
Oops! Thanks for noticing it! Resubmitted!
+2
Level 75
Jan 6, 2018
I would have gotten one more if I'd remembered that Dubai is not the capital of UAE. I'm not worthy.
+7
Level 82
Jun 26, 2018
Lots of people seem shocked by Lima and Santiago, but given that lying between them is the driest desert on Earth, they don't particularly shock me. Praia's the one that surprises me - I get that you can have a very dry climate near the coast if there are mountains or desert in the windward direction, but in Praia's case the sea is close in every direction and it sits deep in the tropics. I suppose dry winds carry over from the Sahara and don't pick up much moisture as they blow over the sea.
+1
Level 71
Feb 18, 2019
According to WP's article on Gaborone, it has an average precipitation of 18.97 cm.
+2
Level 76
Feb 18, 2019
The Wikipedia page on Gaborone offers two widely different sets of precipitation data, the one, as you said, totalling 18.97 cm and the other a little less than 50 cm. Given the annual temperature and rainfall distribution, the former would mean that Gaborone should be in a complete desert, which is not the case, so I would trust the latter.
+1
Level 50
Feb 8, 2020
UGHhhhhh did so wel but forgot praia
+1
Level 56
Mar 2, 2021
I was surprised that Ulanbataar made the cut. The last time I was there it rained more than I have ever seen before. Streets were completley underwater and our hotel basement was flooded.
+1
Level 67
Mar 2, 2021
Dang, I guessed all of the wrong South American cities.
+3
Level 71
Mar 2, 2021
Avoid those near the world's largest rainforest
+1
Level 49
Mar 2, 2021
I must say Lima was a great surprise to me..had no idea it's drier than Cairo
+1
Level 79
Mar 3, 2021
I KEEP missing Praia on this quiz!
+1
Level 51
Oct 29, 2021
I started guessing every middle eastern capital then did all the stans, then did the andes mountains and then start guessing africa crazily
+1
Level 49
Mar 25, 2022
I eventually figured that Lima could be in there, but i had 0 clue it was the driest.
+1
Level 53
Apr 21, 2022
I spelled Ashgabat wrong smh 😑
+1
Level 31
Apr 22, 2022
This is way too caap.
+1
Level 59
Nov 12, 2022
what
+1
Level 68
Feb 12, 2024
20/21, I’m surprised that Praia is one of the driest capital cities.