Antarctica quiz: Test your knowledge on Earth's frozen continent

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How much do you know about Antarctica? Take our science quiz to see if you'll freeze up or be as cool as a cucumber.

penguins walking onto land from the sea with mountains of ice in the background and blue sky
How much do you know about Antarctica? (Image credit: SteveAllenPhotoGetty Images)

Antarctica is Earth's frozen continent. Covering 5.5 million square miles (14.2 million square kilometers), it's bigger than Europe and Australia. It holds about 60% of Earth's total fresh water, with ice up to 3 miles (5 kilometers) thick in places.

But this wasn't always the case. During the Cretaceous period (145 million to 66 million years ago), when dinosaurs roamed Earth, Antarctica was ice-free and was covered in a subtropical rainforest, serving as a land bridge for these extinct giants to cross continents.

Now, just a tiny fraction of Antarctica is covered with vegetation — but that's starting to change, as warmer global temperatures melt the ice, turning the landscape green.

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Hannah Osborne
Hannah Osborne
Editor

Hannah Osborne is the planet Earth and animals editor at Live Science. Prior to Live Science, she worked for several years at Newsweek as the science editor. Before this she was science editor at International Business Times U.K. Hannah holds a master's in journalism from Goldsmith's, University of London.