The FREE Mental Math Champs challenge · ← back to mentalmathchamps.com

How many can your child
solve in 3 minutes?

20 mental-math questions, 3 minutes, no calculator, no scratch paper — and every single question has a secret 3-second shortcut. Most kids' first score surprises their parents — in both directions. Enter your email and the timer starts when you're ready.

Email me my child's results plus Mental Math Champs practice tips and offers. Unsubscribe anytime with one click. We never share or sell your email.

Free forever · no card · works on any screen (paper & pencil for the kid recommended!)

Mental Math Champs · Free Challenge 3:00

20 questions. 3 minutes. That's 9 seconds each.

This isn't a test of whether your child can do the maths — it's whether they can do it fast enough. At competition level, accuracy alone isn't the goal: it's accuracy at speed. Every one of these 20 has a shortcut. The kids who find them are using shortcuts — ways of seeing numbers that turn a 30-second problem into a 3-second one. See how far your child gets today, then we'll show you the tricks.

⭐ Rules: +1 for every correct answer — no negative marking, skip anything and come back if there's time. Type numbers only. The test auto-submits when the clock hits zero.

The results are in!

0attempted
0correct
0score
out of 20

Answer key

Green = correct, red = not yet. No pressure: every one of these has a shortcut.

2 secret tricks champs use

Every question on that test has a shortcut. Here are 2 of them. Together they solve 8 of the 20 questions in seconds: the 9-times questions (2, 7, 13, 18) and the ×11 questions (4, 10, 16, 20).

Trick 1: The 9-times finger trick

Your 10 fingers already know the whole 9 times table.

  1. Hold both hands up, palms facing you.
  2. Number your fingers 1 to 10, starting with your left pinky.
  3. To do 9 × a number, fold down that finger.
  4. Fingers on the left = the tens.
  5. Fingers on the right = the ones.
Try it: 9 × 4. Fold finger 4. Left: 3. Right: 6. Answer: 36
Try it: 9 × 7. Fold finger 7. Left: 6. Right: 3. Answer: 63

Quick check: the digits of every 9-times answer add up to 9 (3 + 6 = 9).

Trick 2: The ×11 trick (any 2-digit number × 11 in 2 seconds)

Split the two digits apart and put their sum in the middle.

  1. Write the first and last digit with a gap.
  2. Add the two digits together.
  3. Put that sum in the gap.
253

23 × 11: 2 + 3 = 5 goes in the middle → 253

Try it: 54 × 11. 5 _ 4 → 5 + 4 = 9 → 594
Level up: 87 × 11. 8 + 7 = 15. Keep the 5, carry the 1 → (8+1) 5 7 → 957

The other 12 questions have quick tricks too: adding 9 or 99 in a flash, ×5 and ×25 in one step, 1000 minus anything, squaring numbers that end in 5. Kids learn each one in minutes, and they're all inside Mental Math Champs.

Retry round: use your tricks

1 minute, 10 questions. Use the finger trick and the ×11 trick.

1:00

Now watch that number climb.

Mental Math Champs is the level-by-level system built to take this exact score from where it is today to competition pace: 50+ tricks with worked examples, 25 timed tests, and a 16-week plan — 20 minutes a day.

Get the full system → $29.99

One-time purchase · instant download · no subscription