47 responses · Open since 2021
Could you beat it in a fight?
Fifteen animals, two questions. Which ones would you beat with your bare hands, and which ones would you beat with a knife.
Fill out the fight form →Each person ticked every animal they think they would beat, once bare handed and once holding a bowie knife. Percentages are the share of people who ticked that animal. The sheet is re-read hourly, so new responses fold in on their own.
The headlines
Unarmed
3
animals the median person thinks they beat bare handed
With a knife
5
animals the median person thinks they beat once armed
Biggest knife bump
+32
points for the medium sized dog, 53% to 85%
Ticked everything
0
people would fight every animal unarmed, lion and grizzly included
Nearly everyone takes the rat, goose and house cat. After that it falls off a cliff.
Grizzly bear, Gorilla, Elephant and Lion stay under 15% even with a knife. Still, 2 people would fight a crocodile, 1 person would fight a gorilla with nothing but their hands.
Animal by animal
Ranked by the unarmed vote. The pale bar is bare hands, the bright bar is with the knife.
Rat
Goose
House cat
Medium sized dog
Eagle
Large dog
Kangaroo
King cobra
Chimpanzee
Wolf
Grizzly bear
Crocodile
Gorilla
Elephant
Lion
Unarmed With a knife
Split by gender
Share of each group who think they would win. 19 men and 24 women answered. The 4 who picked something else or preferred not to say are in the overall numbers above but not in this split.
| Unarmed | Knife | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Men | Women | Men | Women | |
| Rat | 95% | 67% | 89% | 75% |
| Goose | 89% | 67% | 84% | 79% |
| House cat | 89% | 58% | 89% | 67% |
| Medium sized dog | 84% | 29% | 89% | 83% |
| Eagle | 42% | 25% | 68% | 38% |
| Large dog | 47% | 13% | 79% | 38% |
| Kangaroo | 26% | 21% | 53% | 29% |
| King cobra | 26% | 13% | 47% | 21% |
| Chimpanzee | 26% | 8% | 58% | 17% |
| Wolf | 21% | 4% | 53% | 17% |
| Grizzly bear | 0% | 13% | 0% | 8% |
| Crocodile | 11% | 0% | 37% | 13% |
| Gorilla | 5% | 0% | 16% | 8% |
| Elephant | 0% | 0% | 11% | 8% |
| Lion | 0% | 0% | 11% | 8% |
About the numbers. This is a poll about confidence, not a prediction. Nobody was harmed and no animal was consulted. Only the counts live in this site; the individual responses never left the sheet.