Official Mensa® Challenge – May 2026

Five clever challenges to test your logic, language and number skills

Ready to give your brain a spring workout? This month’s Mensa puzzle brings together five quick-but-clever challenges, from triangle logic and word definitions to an anagram sentence, a hidden quote and a five-digit number mystery. Take your time, look for patterns and see how many you can solve before checking the answer key.

Think you have what it takes? Try all five challenges first, then scroll down to check your answers.

1. Following the logic in first three triangles, fill in the missing number in the fourth triangle.

2. Five words starting with JUN are defined in the list below. Can you fill in all five?

1) The second of the same name ___________

2) A type of boat ___________

3) An overgrown tropical area ___________

4) A promotional trip ___________

5) A point in time ___________

3. What two words, formed from different arrangement of the same seven letters, can be used to complete the sentence below?

Every actress ______ to see her ______ sung by reviewers in the newspaper.

4. A simple substitution code has been used to conceal a “quote.” Work out the code to decipher the original words.

     Jack and Jill:
     VD    QDZKKX    RGNTKC    GZUD    OQZBSHBDC    LNTMSZHM
     BKHLAHMF    ADENQD    VD    RSZQSDC  NTS.

5. Find the five-digit number in which the second and fourth digits are the same, the third digit is the sum of the first and second, the fifth digit is the sum of the third and fourth and the third digit is one more than the first and one less than the fifth. The sum off all the digits is 14.

May Mensa Puzzle Answer Key

No peeking until you’ve tried them all. Here are the answers to this month’s Mensa puzzle.

1. 48 (Add the three exterior numbers and double the sum.) 

2. JUNIOR, JUNK, JUNGLE, JUNKET, JUNCTURE 

3. aspires, praises 

4. We really should have practiced mountain climbing before we started out. (Code: A = Z; B = A , C = B, etc.) 

5. 31,415