How the chronotype test works
Press Find my chronotype and answer 12 questions, one per screen. Each question has its own answer options, such as time ranges ("6:00–7:30") or descriptions ("Fully awake", "A bit foggy"). Tap an option or press its number key; Back returns to the previous question.
The questions cover your natural wake-up and sleepy times on a free day, how easy mornings are, how alert and hungry you are after waking, when you would schedule a demanding task or a hard workout, how tired you are at 23:00, what happens after a late night, when you feel at your best, how you see yourself, and how much later you sleep on free days. Answer for your natural rhythm, as if no alarm, job or child set your hours. Chronotype is not one of the Big Five traits; for those, take the Big Five personality test.
Reading your result
Each answer gives points, with more points for the morning-leaning option. The total (maximum 41) is converted to a morningness score from 0 to 100, and the result card places you in one of five bands:
| Score | Type |
|---|---|
| 0–20 | Definite evening type |
| 21–40 | Moderate evening type |
| 41–59 | Intermediate type |
| 60–79 | Moderate morning type |
| 80–100 | Definite morning type |
These questions and cut-offs were written for this site; the scale is original and has not been normed. It follows the same ideas as the published questionnaires below, but its score is not interchangeable with theirs.
The card also shows an approximate mid-sleep on free days: the halfway point between the bedtime and wake-up ranges you chose in questions 1 and 2. For example, sleeping from about 23:45 to 8:15 gives a mid-sleep of about 04:00. Because the answers are ranges, the estimate is rounded to the nearest quarter hour.
The two classic chronotype questionnaires
The Morningness–Eveningness Questionnaire (MEQ) by Jim Horne and Olov Östberg (1976) is the best-known measure. It asks 19 questions about preferred times for waking, sleeping, mental work and exercise, and how you feel at different times of day. Its total score sorts people into five types, from definite morning to definite evening. Our test borrows this structure of five bands but uses its own questions; we do not reproduce MEQ items.
The Munich ChronoType Questionnaire (MCTQ) by Till Roenneberg, Anna Wirz-Justice and Martha Merrow (2003) takes a different approach. Instead of asking about preferences, it asks for actual sleep times on work days and free days. Chronotype is then expressed as a clock time: the mid-point of sleep on free days, corrected for sleep debt built up during the week. Our mid-sleep figure is a simplified version of this idea without the correction.
The MCTQ team also described social jetlag (Wittmann and colleagues, 2006): the gap between your biological clock and your social clock, visible as the difference between sleep timing on work days and free days. Question 12 asks about this gap. Sleeping in by more than an hour or two every weekend is a sign that your schedule runs earlier than your body would choose.
Lion, bear, wolf or dolphin?
You may have seen chronotypes described as animals. The labels come from the sleep specialist Michael Breus, who introduced four types in his 2016 book The Power of When: the lion rises early, the bear follows the sun and is, in Breus's description, the largest group, the wolf comes alive in the evening, and the dolphin is a light, easily disturbed sleeper. It is a popular, easy-to-remember language, not a scientific scale.
If you want to translate your result, the match is only approximate: the morning types are closest to the lion, the intermediate type to the bear and the evening types to the wolf. The dolphin does not sit on a morning–evening scale at all, because Breus describes it mainly by light sleep and insomnia rather than by timing. Our test measures timing only, so it never gives a dolphin result.
What shapes your chronotype
Chronotype is partly inherited and changes with age. Large MCTQ datasets show that people become later types during adolescence, reach their latest point around the end of their teens or about age 20, and then gradually become earlier again (Roenneberg and colleagues, 2004). Light is the main daily signal that sets the body clock: morning daylight shifts it earlier, and bright light in the evening shifts it later. That is why the tips on your result card focus on light and regular wake times.
Tips by type
- Evening types: get outdoor light soon after waking, dim lights in the evening, avoid sleeping in more than an hour on free days, and place demanding work later when you can.
- Intermediate types: keep regular sleep and wake times; you can usually adapt in both directions.
- Morning types: protect your morning hours for focused work, and get some afternoon light if your clock drifts too early.
Limits
This is a self-report questionnaire for curiosity and planning, not a sleep assessment. It cannot detect sleep disorders. If you are sleepy during the day despite enough time in bed, snore loudly, or cannot fall asleep for weeks, talk to a doctor or a sleep specialist. If you are curious how your rhythm affects alertness, try the reaction time test or the attention span test at different times of day; the result card links to the first one. To plan your nights around your rhythm, the sleep calculator shows bedtimes and wake-up times that fit whole sleep cycles.
More tests about sleep and daily rhythm are on the sleep and lifestyle tests page.
Sources
- Horne, J. A., & Östberg, O. (1976). A self-assessment questionnaire to determine morningness-eveningness in human circadian rhythms. International Journal of Chronobiology, 4(2), 97–110.
- Roenneberg, T., Wirz-Justice, A., & Merrow, M. (2003). Life between clocks: Daily temporal patterns of human chronotypes. Journal of Biological Rhythms, 18(1), 80–90.
- Roenneberg, T., Kuehnle, T., Pramstaller, P. P., Ricken, J., Havel, M., Guth, A., & Merrow, M. (2004). A marker for the end of adolescence. Current Biology, 14(24), R1038–R1039.
- Wittmann, M., Dinich, J., Merrow, M., & Roenneberg, T. (2006). Social jetlag: Misalignment of biological and social time. Chronobiology International, 23(1–2), 497–509.
- Breus, M. J. (2016). The Power of When. Little, Brown and Company.
Frequently asked questions
What is a chronotype?
Your chronotype is your body clock's natural timing: when you tend to get sleepy, wake up and feel most alert. It ranges from definite morning types to definite evening types, with most people somewhere in between.
How many chronotypes are there?
Questionnaires usually use five bands: definite morning, moderate morning, intermediate, moderate evening and definite evening. The popular animal labels (lion, bear, wolf, dolphin) are not research categories.
Is this the Horne-Östberg MEQ?
No. Our 12 questions are original and cover similar ideas, but they are not MEQ items and the score is not interchangeable with MEQ scores. The scale has not been normed.
What does mid-sleep on free days mean?
It is the halfway point of your sleep when no alarm sets your schedule. The Munich ChronoType Questionnaire uses it as a clock-time measure of chronotype. We estimate it roughly from the ranges you choose in questions 1 and 2.
Can I change my chronotype?
Your underlying tendency is partly genetic, but light exposure and regular wake times can shift your rhythm by a modest amount. Morning daylight moves it earlier and bright evening light moves it later.
Why are teenagers often night owls?
Large studies by Roenneberg and colleagues show chronotype gets later during adolescence, reaches its latest point around age 20, and then slowly becomes earlier again.
What is social jetlag?
The mismatch between your body clock and your social schedule, seen as the difference in sleep timing between work days and free days. Sleeping in for hours every weekend is a typical sign.