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Categorise is a quiz question type where participants sort a shared list of items into predefined categories on their phones, with results updating live on the presenter screen.

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How It Works

When you present a Categorise slide, participants see a list of shuffled items on their devices and drag each one into the category they think it belongs in. The more items they get right — and the faster they answer — the more points they earn. On your presenter screen, the category columns populate with items in real time as responses come in.

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Setting Up a Categorise Slide

1

Add the slide

In the editor, click New slide and select Categorise from the Quiz section of the slide type picker.
2

Write your question

Click into the Your question field and type the challenge you want participants to tackle. Be specific about what they’re sorting.
3

Add items to sort

In the Category & options section, enter all the items participants will sort into the shared “Enter options, separated by commas” field. AhaSlides splits them automatically into draggable items on the participant screen.
4

Name your categories

Fill in a name for each category block. You can add up to 8 categories by clicking + Add Category. You can also type category-specific items into the “Enter options, separated by commas” field inside each category to pre-assign them as correct answers.
5

Adjust settings and save

Configure scoring and timing — see Settings below — then save your slide.

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Settings

Set the Max and Min points for the question. All correct answers receive the maximum unless Faster answers get more points is enabled.
Toggle this on to reward speed. For example, with 45 seconds on the clock and a max of 1,000 points, answering with 30 seconds remaining earns more than answering in the final seconds.
Toggle this on to award points for each correctly sorted item, even if the participant doesn’t get them all right.
Set how many seconds participants have to answer. The default is 45 seconds.
Toggle this on to show a leaderboard slide automatically after the Categorise slide.

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Video Tutorial

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Try It Yourself

Explore a ready-made Categorise slide live — no account needed.

Use this template

Open this Categorise example in AhaSlides and make it your own.

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Common Use Cases

Classroom and Education

Sort vocabulary words by grammatical category, classify organisms into kingdoms, or group historical events by era — live results show teachers where the class needs revisiting.

Corporate Training and Onboarding

Have new hires sort company values into “strategic priority” or “cultural pillar” buckets, or classify customer complaints by support tier.

Team Workshops and Retrospectives

Sort a backlog of improvement ideas into “quick win”, “big bet”, and “park for later” buckets, or group blockers by root cause.

Icebreakers and Events

Sort fun facts, team trivia, or product features into themed categories to warm up a conference session or all-hands.

Market Research

Ask participants to sort product attributes into “must-have”, “nice-to-have”, and “not needed” columns, or group use cases by department.
For scoring mechanics, the leaderboard, and other quiz-wide settings, see Quiz.