Riddles About Keys

Ten riddles about keys at a time: real keys, keys that open nothing, puns and rhymes for a hunt.

Riddles About Keys

Show all 59
  1. What kind of key is the newest player on the team?
  2. I am the only key in your pocket that can make something roar. Turn me, and an engine wakes up. What am I?
  3. Why are lost keys always in the last place you look?
  4. A singer can lose me, and I was never in a pocket. Stay in me and the song sounds right. Drift off me, and everybody winces. What am I?
  5. What kind of key is pure nonsense?
  6. I am one key that opens every door in the building, though each door has a key of its own that opens no other. What am I?
  7. No tea in me today, as you will shortly see. / Take off my little lid, and out will slide the key.
  8. I am a key in the corner of a map. I open nothing, but I tell you that the blue line is a river and the little tent is a campground. What am I?
  9. What kind of key is brushed on chicken before it goes on the grill?
  10. I am a key that fits nothing yet. My edge is smooth, and I wait at the key counter until a machine cuts me to match another key. What am I?

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How it works

These riddles about keys come in four kinds: keys and the locks they fit, keys that open nothing, what-kind-of-key puns, and rhymes that send a hunter to the place where a key is hidden.

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Riddles about a key, and about keys that open nothing

Keys and locks is the real thing: a house key, a padlock, a deadbolt. Keys that open nothing has the piano, the keyboard, the map and the island. What kind of key is all puns.

Rhymes that lead to a hidden key

Where is the key is for an escape room at home or a treasure hunt. Each rhyme points to one hiding place: the freezer, the teapot, the mailbox, the dog's collar. Hide the key there first, then read the rhyme aloud.

  • A pun has to be heard. Read the answer slowly, don-key, and give the table a second to groan.

Questions and answers

What is a good riddle about a key?

I spend the day in a pocket and the night on a hook. I have one small job, and I do it twice a day: I let you out, and I let you back in. What am I? A key.

What has keys but cannot open a lock?

A piano and a computer keyboard are the usual answers, and a map has a key too. The set Keys that open nothing goes further: a telegraph key, a keystone, a Key lime and the low sandy islands called keys.

What kind of key cannot open a door?

A donkey, a jockey, a husky, hockey or karaoke: each one ends in the sound of key. The set What kind of key has more puns like these.

How do I write a riddle that leads to a hidden key?

Choose the hiding place first and describe it without naming it, then end the rhyme on the word key. The set Where is the key has rhymes for the freezer, a teapot, the mailbox, a mitten and more.

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All 59 riddles

Keys and locks 16

  • I am a circle of wire that goes around twice. To add a key, you pry up my end with a fingernail and slide the key all the way around. What am I? Answer: A key ring. A split ring is a double loop of wire.
  • I am a key as flat as a playing card, and I have no teeth at all. A hotel hands me over at the front desk. What am I? Answer: A key card. A key card opens a door with a stripe or a chip in place of teeth.
  • I am a key that fits nothing yet. My edge is smooth, and I wait at the key counter until a machine cuts me to match another key. What am I? Answer: A key blank. A copy of a key is cut from a blank.
  • I am a lock that belongs to no door. I carry my own metal loop, and I can guard a gate, a locker or a toolbox. What am I? Answer: A padlock. A padlock is a lock you can carry, with a loop called a shackle.
  • I am a lock that no key fits. A boat floats into me, my gates close, water pours in, and the boat rises to the next level of the canal. What am I? Answer: A canal lock. A canal lock raises and lowers boats between two levels of water.
  • I am a lock with no key and no keyhole. Turn my dial to the right numbers in the right order, and I open. What am I? Answer: A combination lock. A combination lock opens with a sequence of numbers.
  • I am a solid bar of metal that slides from the door into the frame. I have no spring to push me, so nothing moves me but the turn of a key or a knob. What am I? Answer: A deadbolt. A deadbolt has no spring and moves only when the lock is turned.
  • I am one key that opens every door in the building, though each door has a key of its own that opens no other. What am I? Answer: A master key. A master key opens a whole set of locks.
  • I am the only key in your pocket that can make something roar. Turn me, and an engine wakes up. What am I? Answer: A car key. Turning the key starts the engine.
  • I am the smallest key in the house. The only thing I guard is a book that someone writes in by hand and does not want read. What am I? Answer: A diary key. A diary with a lock comes with a tiny key.
  • I open a door without touching it. Press my button from a few yards away, and your car unlocks and answers with its lights or its horn. What am I? Answer: A key fob. A key fob is the small remote that locks and unlocks a car.
  • I spend the day in a pocket and the night on a hook. I have one small job, and I do it twice a day: I let you out, and I let you back in. What am I? Answer: A key. A house key locks the door behind you and opens it again.
  • Look along my edge and you see hills and valleys. Inside the lock, a row of little pins must each be lifted to exactly the right height, and only my hills can do it. What am I? Answer: A key. In a pin tumbler lock, the cuts of the right key lift every pin to the line where the lock can turn.
  • The more of us there are on one ring, the longer you stand at the door, trying us one at a time. What are we? Answer: A bunch of keys. Only one key on the ring fits the door.
  • One of us stays in the door, and one of us travels in a pocket. Apart, each of us is a lump of metal. Together, we decide who comes in. What are we? Answer: A lock and its key. Neither works without the other.
  • Why are lost keys always in the last place you look? Answer: Because once you find them, you stop looking. Nobody keeps searching after the keys turn up.

Keys that open nothing 19

  • A singer can lose me, and I was never in a pocket. Stay in me and the song sounds right. Drift off me, and everybody winces. What am I? Answer: The key of a song. To sing off-key is to sing above or below the right notes.
  • Fifty-two of us are white, and thirty-six of us are black. Press any one of us and no door opens, but a small hammer strikes a string. What are we? Answer: Piano keys. A modern piano has 52 white keys and 36 black keys, and each key works a hammer.
  • I am a big key that a city hands to an honored guest. I fit no lock anywhere in town. What am I? Answer: The key to the city. The key to the city is a symbolic honor, not a working key.
  • I am a key in the corner of a map. I open nothing, but I tell you that the blue line is a river and the little tent is a campground. What am I? Answer: A map key. A map key, or legend, explains the symbols on a map.
  • I am a key kept at the back of the teacher's book. I unlock every question on the test, and students are not supposed to see me. What am I? Answer: An answer key. An answer key lists the right answers.
  • I am a key that does nothing alone. Hold me down, and every letter you type grows up into a capital. Which key am I? Answer: The Shift key. Shift is held down to type capital letters.
  • I am a key that opens nothing and sends everything. Tap me short and long, and a message in dots and dashes travels down the wire. What am I? Answer: A telegraph key. A telegraph key is the switch an operator taps to send Morse code.
  • I am a key with six sides and no teeth, bent in the shape of the letter L. I turn screws that have a six-sided hole in the head. What am I? Answer: A hex key. A hex key is a six-sided steel rod bent into an L.
  • I am a key you can squeeze. I am a small, tart lime named for a chain of islands in Florida, and I am best known in a pie. What am I? Answer: A Key lime. The Key lime is named for the Florida Keys and gives its name to Key lime pie.
  • I am a key you can stand on: a small, low island of sand on top of a coral reef. My name comes from the Spanish word cayo. What am I? Answer: A key, or cay. A cay, also spelled key, is a low sandy island on a coral reef.
  • I am a lock with no key, and I live among keys. Press me once, AND EVERYTHING YOU TYPE COMES OUT LIKE THIS. What am I? Answer: Caps Lock. Caps Lock makes every letter a capital until it is pressed again.
  • I am a place where ships tie up. I am spelled with a Q, and I sound exactly like the thing that opens a door. What word am I? Answer: Quay. Quay is said like key, and until the 1690s it was spelled that way too.
  • I am the key that eats your words. Each time you press me, the letter just behind the cursor is gone. Which key am I? Answer: The Backspace key. Backspace deletes the character before the cursor.
  • I am the longest key on the keyboard, and what I type is nothing: the gap between one word and the next. Which key am I? Answer: The space bar. The space bar is the wide key along the bottom row.
  • I am the stone at the very top of an arch. I am set last, and once I am in place, the other stones lock together and hold. What am I? Answer: A keystone. The keystone is the last piece placed, and it locks the arch.
  • I open nothing. Turn me in the back of a clock or a clockwork toy, and a spring inside is wound tight enough to make it run. What am I? Answer: A wind-up key. Turning the key winds the mainspring, and the spring drives the works as it unwinds.
  • Put me in front of board, hole and stone, and you get three new words. What word am I? Answer: Key. Keyboard, keyhole and keystone.
  • Which key on a keyboard do you press when you want to walk in? Answer: The Enter key. Enter is a key, and it is what you do at a door.
  • Which key on a keyboard would you press to get out of a locked room? Answer: The Escape key. Escape, marked Esc, sits in the top left corner of most keyboards.

What kind of key 13

  • What kind of key do you find among the stars? Answer: The Milky Way. Say it slowly: the Mil-key Way.
  • What kind of key has long ears and will not budge when you pull it? Answer: A donkey. Say it slowly: don-key.
  • What kind of key is a bird in New Zealand and a fruit in the grocery store? Answer: A kiwi. Say it out loud: key-wee. In New Zealand the word kiwi alone means the bird.
  • What kind of key is a pair of tan pants? Answer: Khaki. Say it slowly: kha-key.
  • What kind of key is brushed on chicken before it goes on the grill? Answer: Teriyaki. Say it slowly: teriya-key.
  • What kind of key is played on ice with sticks? Answer: Hockey. Say it slowly: hoc-key.
  • What kind of key is pure nonsense? Answer: Malarkey. Malarkey means nonsense, and it ends in key.
  • What kind of key is the newest player on the team? Answer: A rookie. Say it slowly: roo-key.
  • What kind of key needs a drop of oil? Answer: A squeaky one. Say it slowly: squea-key.
  • What kind of key pulls a sled across the snow? Answer: A husky. Say it slowly: hus-key.
  • What kind of key rides a racehorse? Answer: A jockey. Say it slowly: joc-key.
  • What kind of key sings along while the words cross a screen? Answer: Karaoke. Say it slowly: karao-key.
  • Which key is the smallest one on your hand? Answer: Your pinky. Say it slowly: pin-key.

Where is the key 11

  • A house with two rooms, one big, one small. / Four fingers share the big one, crowded all. / The small one has a single guest: / today the key is in that nest. Answer: In the thumb of a mitten. A mitten has one room for four fingers and one for the thumb.
  • A hundred buttons live in a jar, / red ones, blue ones, near and far. / One thing in there was never sewn. / Pour them out: the key is shown. Answer: In the button jar. For a key hidden in a jar of buttons.
  • The carrier stops here six days a week / and never once comes in. / Today the thing inside is the thing you seek, / in a box of painted tin. Answer: In the mailbox. For a key hidden in the mailbox.
  • I have leaves, and I never grew. / I wear a jacket with no sleeves. / Open me where the ribbon lies: / the key is there, between my leaves. Answer: Inside a book, at the bookmark. A book has leaves and a jacket, and the ribbon is its bookmark.
  • I stay shut indoors, for luck, they say. / Open me a little anyway. / Out will fall, as you will see, / not one drop of rain, but a key. Answer: Inside the folded umbrella. For a key dropped into a closed umbrella.
  • No tea in me today, as you will shortly see. / Take off my little lid, and out will slide the key. Answer: In the teapot. For a key hidden in a teapot.
  • One stone beside the path is lighter than the rest. / Pick it up and turn it over: you have passed the test. Answer: In a hollow rock made for hiding a key. A fake rock for a spare key is hollow underneath.
  • This key goes on two walks a day and naps beside the door. / It jingles with a name tag on a friend whose legs are four. Answer: On the dog's collar. For a key clipped to the dog's collar.
  • This key is cold, as cold as can be. / It sleeps with the ice cubes. Go and see. Answer: In the freezer, with the ice cube tray. For a key hidden in the freezer.
  • Twelve little beds in a cardboard row, / eleven with eggs and one with a key. Go. Answer: In the egg carton. For a key hidden in the egg carton in the refrigerator.
  • Where the hammer sleeps beside the wrench, / in a metal box on the garage bench, / lift the tray and you will see / a thing that is no tool: the key. Answer: In the toolbox. For a key hidden under the tray of a toolbox.