Higher-or-Lower Quiz · Last updated: September 2026
How fast is a garden snail, how fast is a hummingbird – and how fast is a Space Shuttle at launch? This category ranges from snail pace to spaceflight. Tip: double-digit km/h values are typical for animals, while aircraft and spacecraft play in a completely different league.
This category contains 48 entries. The highest value in our list belongs to lightning bolt (440,000), the lowest to Roman snail (0.048) – so the largest value is roughly 9,200,000 times the smallest. Values are given in: km/h.
| Rank | Item | km/h |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | lightning bolt | 440,000 |
| 2 | Earth (orbital speed) | 107,000 |
| 3 | Space Shuttle (launch) | 28,000 |
| 4 | Concorde | 2,180 |
| 5 | fighter jet (F-16) | 2,100 |
| 6 | speed of sound | 1,235 |
| 7 | airliner (cruise speed) | 900 |
| 8 | Learjet | 860 |
| 9 | Formula 1 car | 350 |
| 10 | motorcycle (racing) | 350 |
| Rank | Item | km/h |
|---|---|---|
| 39 | cat (sprint) | 48 |
| 40 | human (sprint world record) | 44 |
| 41 | elephant | 40 |
| 42 | wild boar | 40 |
| 43 | racing bike (flat) | 30 |
| 44 | human (walking pace) | 5 |
| 45 | Galápagos giant tortoise | 0.3 |
| 46 | sloth | 0.24 |
| 47 | garden snail | 0.05 |
| 48 | Roman snail | 0.048 |
All values are rounded approximations (as of 2024/25) meant for fun, not as a factual source.
Test your feel for these numbers in the game: pick the category and try to get 10 correct answers in 60 seconds.