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AP World History — Practice Questions flashcards

6 of 60 questions free to study here · 9 topics · the whole deck is built into Willys

Multiple-choice practice questions, one best answer each, on all nine AP World History: Modern units, from Song China and the Mongols to revolutions, imperialism, world wars and globalization.

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Practice deck · part of AP World History: Modern · written against: College Board AP World History: Modern Course and Exam Description (nine units, c. 1200–present). Updated 2026-10-10.

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6 questions from the deck as they are. Flip, rate yourself, filter by topic; your progress stays in this browser.

The 6 sample questions as a list
  1. A historian notes that under the Song dynasty, most high officials won their posts by passing written examinations on the Confucian classics rather than by inheriting aristocratic rank.

    The development described most directly helped Song emperors to do which of the following?

    A) Replace tributary relations with formal alliances
    B) Rule the provinces through hereditary military lords
    C) Reduce the role of Confucian ideas in government
    D) Build a centralized bureaucracy loyal to the throne
    D) Build a centralized bureaucracy loyal to the throne

    Exams on the Confucian classics produced a scholar-official bureaucracy whose members owed office to merit and the emperor rather than to birth. The exams spread Confucian ideas through government instead of reducing them.
    Global Tapestry › East Asia
  2. Why are the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal empires often grouped together?

    A) Each used firearms and cannon to win and hold large agrarian lands
    B) Each drew most of its revenue from the transatlantic trade
    C) Each made Twelver Shi'ism the official religion of its state
    D) Each built a maritime empire of fortified trading posts in Asian seas
    A) Each used firearms and cannon to win and hold large agrarian lands

    They are called gunpowder empires because firearms and cannon let them overpower rivals and build centralized states funded by taxing farmers. Only the Safavids made Twelver Shi'ism official; the Ottoman and Mughal rulers were Sunni.
    Land-Based Empires › Expansion
  3. Portuguese mariners of the 1400s relied on the lateen sail and the astrolabe.

    These technologies are best understood as examples of which of the following?

    A) Navigational tools carried to Europe from the Americas
    B) Techniques copied from Zheng He's ships after 1433
    C) Europeans adopting Indian Ocean and Islamic innovations
    D) Inventions first developed in Portuguese royal shipyards
    C) Europeans adopting Indian Ocean and Islamic innovations

    European voyages depended on borrowed technologies: the lateen sail and astrolabe came through the Indian Ocean and Islamic worlds. Europeans adapted them for long Atlantic voyages rather than inventing them.
    Transoceanic Interconnections › Exploration and Technology
  4. Rudyard Kipling's 1899 poem, which opens "Take up the White Man's burden," urged the United States to rule the Philippines as a duty owed to its people.

    The poem's message is best understood as an example of which of the following?

    A) A civilizing mission used to justify imperial rule
    B) A defense of free trade against mercantilism
    C) A nationalist call for self-rule in British India
    D) A Marxist critique of capitalist exploitation
    A) A civilizing mission used to justify imperial rule

    The poem presents empire as a duty to 'civilize' colonized peoples, the civilizing mission that, with Social Darwinism, was used to justify imperialism.
    Consequences of Industrialization › Imperialism
  5. Which of the following best describes a long-term cause of World War I?

    A) Rigid alliances, militarism and nationalism in the Balkans
    B) The collapse of world trade during the Great Depression
    C) Disputes over League of Nations mandates in the Middle East
    D) Japan's seizure of Manchuria from China
    A) Rigid alliances, militarism and nationalism in the Balkans

    Militarism, alliances, imperial rivalry and nationalism built tension for decades; the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in June 1914 was the spark. The other options all came after the war.
    Global Conflict › World War I and Interwar
  6. Which of the following best describes China's economic policy under Deng Xiaoping after 1978?

    A) A ban on foreign investment to protect state industries
    B) A shift to multiparty democracy along with free markets
    C) Market reforms and foreign investment under Communist Party rule
    D) Forced collectivization into huge communes and backyard furnaces
    C) Market reforms and foreign investment under Communist Party rule

    Deng let farmers sell surplus crops and opened Special Economic Zones to foreign investment, producing rapid growth while the Communist Party kept political control. Communes and backyard furnaces belong to Mao's Great Leap Forward.
    Globalization › Economy Culture and Institutions

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About these cards

Review status: Second-reader reviewed, with corrections applied.

Checked against:

  • Topic outline follows the College Board AP World History: Modern Course and Exam Description (effective Fall 2026), Units 1–9; no text copied.
  • Facts follow this folder's two study decks, which were checked against the references below.
  • OpenStax World History, Volume 1 and OpenStax World History, Volume 2, consulted as references; no text copied.
  • Quoted stimuli are brief excerpts from public-domain texts (the Declaration of Independence, 1776; Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, 1776; Marx and Engels, The Communist Manifesto, 1888 English translation; Rudyard Kipling, 1899); other source stimuli are described or paraphrased and marked as such.

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