How to host a trivia night at a bar
The night that works has a board people can see, a buzzer that is fair, and a score nobody has to argue about. Here is how a host runs one with a laptop, a television and the phones already in the room. It is written around Trinko because that is what we know; most of it is true of any night.
What you need
- A television or projector that can show a web page: a smart TV browser, a Chromecast, an Apple TV, or an HDMI cable to a laptop. Put it on the TV walks through all four.
- A laptop for you. The console runs in a browser and most of the routine is on the keyboard.
- One phone per team. Nothing to install and no accounts: a team scans the QR on the TV, types a name, and is in.
- A board: categories, squares, questions, answers. Write your own, import the spreadsheet you already have, or buy one ready to run.
The week before: the board
A Jeopardy-style board is categories across the top and values down the side. Six categories and ten rows is a full bar night; six by five is an hour and a half. The rule of thumb is two and a half minutes a square, a little more for the all-play squares, plus the Final.
| Shape | Squares | Runs |
|---|---|---|
| 4 × 5 | 20 | about an hour |
| 6 × 5 | 30 | about an hour and a half |
| 6 × 6 | 36 | about an hour and forty minutes |
| 6 × 8 | 48 | a little over two hours |
| 6 × 10 | 60 | about two hours and forty minutes |
Hide a few surprises behind squares. An all-play boost is a square every team answers at once, typed on their phones against a clock, so a table that has not buzzed in an hour still scores. A wheel square sends the team in control to spin for points, Double or Bankrupt. Two or three of each across a board is plenty. Keep the values climbing down each column, and put the question you are proudest of at the bottom of a category where it is worth something.
Write the answer the way you will accept it. "The Beatles" and "Beatles" should both be right; so should "Paris" and "paris". Trinko forgives case, punctuation and a leading article, and lets you list alternates. Whatever you use, decide before the night, not at the table.
The hour before: the room
- Open the TV page on the screen, then click or tap it once. Browsers keep a page silent until someone touches it; the console shows a green tick when the television has sound.
- Open the console on your laptop and check a phone joins. Read the code off the TV to yourself and type it on your own phone. If it lands, everyone else will.
- Put the join code where people can see it: the TV shows it and a QR the whole night. That is the roll call. You will see teams arrive on the console as they sign up, so there is no walking the tables.
- Decide what earns bonus points tonight: a round bought for the table, a birthday, a first-timer brought along. The console asks before it lets you start, and every award goes up on the TV so nobody quietly awards themselves anything.
Running it
The rhythm of a square is the same every time. The team in control picks. You read the question out loud, then open the buzzer. Every phone turns aqua at the same moment; the first to hit it is named on the TV with second and third behind them. That team answers out loud and you rule: right earns the square and the pick, wrong hands it to the second buzz. After two misses the square opens to the rest of the room for half its value, typed, and the fastest right answer picks next. The whole exchange is thirty seconds when it is going well.
A few things keep it fair. The buzzer is decided on the server with each phone's clock corrected, so bar wifi does not pick the winner. Buzzing early locks a phone out for a few seconds. A wrong answer can cost the square's points if you switch that on, and everything a wrong answer costs goes into a pot on the TV that the next right answer of any kind collects. Read the room: a pot that has grown for ten minutes changes how people play the next square.
On an all-play boost, say "phones out" and let the clock run. Thirty seconds is the default; you can close it early or let it hold while a table finishes. Mark the answers on the card the console gives you, one tap per team, and reveal. On a wheel square, the team goes up and spins, on the TV or a real wheel if you have one, and answers alone. Land on Bankrupt and the score goes to zero the moment it lands. That is the moment the room makes a noise.
The Final
Before the wagers open, the TV lists every team's total, ranked. Read them out. Then each team wagers up to their score on their own phone, locks it, sees the question, and types an answer. You mark the answers, the wagers settle, and the standings go up. Nothing is paid until you have marked it, so a typo never costs a table the night.
Scoring without paper
Every point is a row in a ledger the room can see: a buzz, a boost, a wheel, a bonus, a wager. If you rule wrong, undo it; if a table has a case, fix the score by hand and the reason is on the TV. At the end the standings carry the night's numbers, with a copy button for the venue. The paper sheets, the pencils, the roll call and the twenty minutes of grading at the end were what made the old way slow. They are the parts a phone does.
What the bar wants
The bar pays for the night, so hand the manager something: how many teams, how many people, how many came back from last week, and which tables earned the bonus points. The standings screen has it and the copy button puts it in a message. A night that grows week to week is the argument for the next one.
Questions people ask
How many questions do I need for a two-hour trivia night?
About fifty squares and a Final. A six-by-eight Jeopardy-style board is a little over two hours; six by ten is closer to two hours forty. Each square is about two and a half minutes with the buzzer, a bit more for an all-play.
Do players need to download an app?
No. Teams scan the QR on the TV or type the code at trinkotrivia.com, give a team name, and play in the browser. No account either.
How do you stop teams looking up the answers?
A buzzer answer is out loud and the first team to buzz is on the spot. An all-play answer is typed against a thirty-second clock and locked in. The Final is a wager locked before the question appears. There is no window to search in.
What does it cost to run a trivia night with Trinko?
Running a night is free today. Ready-made boards in the shop are free for a kitchen table or $14.99 for a full bar night, and a board is yours to run as many nights as you like.
What if the bar wifi is bad?
Phones on their own data work as well as wifi. The buzzer is ordered on the server with each phone's clock corrected, and a phone that drops rejoins with its team PIN without losing the score.
Can I use the trivia questions I already have?
Yes. Import a spreadsheet, or the HTML export from a JeopardyLabs board, and the squares land on the board in order.