Is this the same as the sixteen-type test everyone posts?

No, and deliberately not. Those assign you to one of sixteen categories. This measures five continuous traits and reports where you landed on each, with the reliability of each scale attached. Different model, different output, and no borrowed branding.

Why are the questions in English even on other language versions?

Because a translated item is not the item that was validated. Translation shifts meaning, and the reliability figures shown here were measured on the English wording. Non-English pages show a reference translation underneath, but scoring uses the original.

Only twenty questions — can that be accurate?

It is a short form, and it says so. The published reliabilities range from 0.65 to 0.77, which is respectable for twenty items and well short of a clinical instrument. Treat it as a sketch you could redo in three minutes, not a diagnosis.

Do you keep my answers?

No. There is no account, no upload, no autosave. Everything is computed in the page and disappears when you close the tab.

Why show reliability at all? Nobody else does.

Because it changes how you should read the result. The openness scale here is the noisiest of the five; if your number there surprises you, that is the first thing worth knowing. Hiding it would make the page look more authoritative and be less useful.

All tools

§ Tools · Big Five, 20 items

Five dimensions. No four-letter type.

Most personality tests hand you a label because a label is shareable. This one hands you five numbers, the wording of every question it asked, and how reliable each scale actually is. It takes about three minutes.

Rate how accurately each statement describes you — as you generally are, not as you wish you were.

1Am the life of the party.
2Sympathize with others' feelings.
3Get chores done right away.
4Have frequent mood swings.
5Have a vivid imagination.
6Talk to a lot of different people at parties.
7Feel others' emotions.
8Like order.
9Get upset easily.
10Have difficulty understanding abstract ideas.
11Don't talk a lot.
12Am not really interested in others.
13Often forget to put things back in their proper place.
14Am relaxed most of the time.
15Am not interested in abstract ideas.
16Keep in the background.
17Am not interested in other people's problems.
18Make a mess of things.
19Seldom feel blue.
20Do not have a good imagination.

Your five numbers

0 of 20 answered

A dimension only gets a score once all four of its items are answered — a partial average would look like a score without being one.

Extraversion—reliability α 0.77
Agreeableness—reliability α 0.70
Conscientiousness—reliability α 0.69
Emotional volatility—reliability α 0.68
Openness to ideas—reliability α 0.65

α is internal consistency, reported by the scale’s authors. A dimension at 0.65 and one at 0.77 should not be read with equal confidence — the lower one is noisier, which is why we show it instead of hiding it.

These are not percentiles. We have no norming sample, so we cannot honestly tell you that you are “more extraverted than 73% of people”. All the number says is where you landed on a 1–5 scale.

Why there is no four-letter type here

Because the evidence does not support one. These five traits are continuous — cutting them into categories turns 2.9 and 3.1 into “two kinds of people”, and hands you a label that feels like an explanation. The numbers are less shareable and more true.

Where these questions come from

All twenty statements are the Mini-IPIP items, reproduced word for word from the International Personality Item Pool — a public-domain research resource whose items are explicitly free to use, including commercially. We did not write them, and we did not reword them: rewording an item makes it a different item, and the reliability figures above would no longer apply to it.

Donnellan, M. B., Oswald, F. L., Baird, B. M., & Lucas, R. E. (2006). The Mini-IPIP scales: Tiny-yet-effective measures of the Big Five factors of personality. Psychological Assessment, 18(2), 192–203. Items via ipip.ori.org.

Questions people ask

Is this the same as the sixteen-type test everyone posts?: No, and deliberately not. Those assign you to one of sixteen categories. This measures five continuous traits and reports where you landed on each, with the reliability of each scale attached. Different model, different output, and no borrowed branding.
Why are the questions in English even on other language versions?: Because a translated item is not the item that was validated. Translation shifts meaning, and the reliability figures shown here were measured on the English wording. Non-English pages show a reference translation underneath, but scoring uses the original.
Only twenty questions — can that be accurate?: It is a short form, and it says so. The published reliabilities range from 0.65 to 0.77, which is respectable for twenty items and well short of a clinical instrument. Treat it as a sketch you could redo in three minutes, not a diagnosis.
Do you keep my answers?: No. There is no account, no upload, no autosave. Everything is computed in the page and disappears when you close the tab.
Why show reliability at all? Nobody else does.: Because it changes how you should read the result. The openness scale here is the noisiest of the five; if your number there surprises you, that is the first thing worth knowing. Hiding it would make the page look more authoritative and be less useful.