None of the evidence here is ours.
Everything above this section is either someone else's research or someone else's forum. We have no study of our own showing that klapp's design actually lowers anxiety in a room.
Research · published 18 September 2026 · corrected 18 and 19 September 2026
The fastest thumb should not win.
Here is the evidence we built that on.
klapp gives no points for answering quickly. This page lays out why: a literature review, a vendor's own support forum, a vendor's own research, and what klapp does with all three. None of the evidence here is ours.
Studies reviewed
93
Wang & Tahir (2020), on Kahoot in classrooms.
Reported on anxiety
14
Of the 93 studies in the review.
Found anxiety lower
10
Of those 14 — two with a statistically significant result.
Named time pressure
4
Articles listing stressful time pressure as a challenge.
What a review of 93 studies found
Counted from the review, not from us
Wang & Tahir (2020), 93 studies of Kahoot in classrooms
| What the review reports | Articles |
|---|---|
| Studies in the review | 93 |
| Reported on anxiety | 14 |
| — found Kahoot reduced it | 10 |
| — of those, statistically significant | 2 |
| — reported it could produce agitation | 1 |
| Named stressful time pressure | 4 |
| Named fear of losing | 2 |
| Named unreliable and slow internet | most |
Wang & Tahir (2020) reviewed 93 published studies of Kahoot in classrooms. Their main conclusion is positive: Kahoot can have a positive effect on learning performance, classroom dynamics, students' and teachers' attitudes, and students' anxiety, though some studies found little or no effect.
Teachers reported that scoring by how quickly students answer can reduce reflection and lead some to guess. The authors write that the problem is not points as such, but points awarded for speed. They weigh giving points for correct answers only, and note that it would take some uncertainty out of the game.
So the review does not show that Kahoot makes rooms anxious. On balance it reports the opposite. What it does support is narrower: points for speed are a named source of time pressure and guessing for some students, and the authors themselves discuss removing them. That narrower point is the one klapp built on. It is a review of one product, not a law about all quizzes.
What the review reports as findings
- a positive effect on learning performance
- a positive effect on classroom dynamics
- a positive effect on students' and teachers' attitudes
- a positive effect on students' anxiety — 10 of the 14 articles that measured it
- and some studies that found little or no effect at all
What the review lists as challenges
- unreliable and slow internet — the one mentioned by most articles
- stressful time pressure when answering (4 articles)
- not enough time to answer
- being afraid of losing (2 articles)
- teachers: scoring by speed reduces reflection and leads some to guess
Disclosure about this source
The review's first author, Alf Inge Wang, is a professor at NTNU and one of the co-founders of Kahoot!, according to NTNU's own impact case on Kahoot! We say so up front so readers can weigh the source, not to suggest the review is wrong.
Corrected 19 September 2026
This section first said that time pressure and “competition anxiety” were among the most frequently reported problems, called the review the largest synthesis of its kind and the closest thing to independent evidence, and left out its overall findings. That was not a fair reading. The review's main conclusion is positive, including on anxiety; the challenge mentioned by most articles was internet connections; “competition anxiety” was our phrase, where the paper says fear of losing; we had not checked the “largest” claim; and we had not disclosed that the first author co-founded Kahoot!.
In the vendor's own words
We read Kahoot's own support community on 18 September 2026. A teacher opened a request to disable the timer: “seeing the timer on the screen creates anxiety.” Another teacher added that “some students need more time and are pressurised by the timer.” Kahoot's own reply confirms the timer cannot be turned off: “Kahoot! does not offer a feature to completely disable the timer during live games,” and “the countdown timer is always visible on the screen, and there is no option to hide it at this time.”
Read the thread on support.kahoot.com — two years old at the time we read it, and still open.
Corrected 19 September 2026
The staff reply above is no longer the whole picture, and we should have checked Kahoot's help pages before quoting it. Kahoot's own help centre describes an Accuracy mode with no speed bonuses, where each correct answer gets one point, and an Unlimited time setting that lets players in a live Accuracy game take as long as they need. In Classic mode, points still fall as the timer runs down. For assigned kahoots the timer can be turned off. Accuracy mode on support.kahoot.com and Kahoot's accessibility page, both read 19 September 2026.
The other side, stated fairly
What Kahoot publishes
Kahoot also publishes research of its own arguing the opposite: that playing its games reduces academic stress. Its blog cites a 2024 study of 176 university students showing lower stress and anxiety with Kahoot than with traditional teaching, and a 2025 meta-analysis of 43 studies finding a moderate effect on reducing anxiety. On anxiety overall, the review above points the same way. Read it on kahoot.com.
How we weigh it
That claim is real, and we are not dismissing it — but it is the vendor's own selection of research on its own blog, published to make its own product look good. It sits next to, not instead of, the complaints on its own support forum above. Both can be true at once: the game format can lower stress for many players while the visible timer still creates it for some.
What klapp does instead
No speed points. We removed them as a decision (V6, 10 September 2026) once we mapped what a countdown plus a speed score actually does: a slow reader is punished, a screen-reader user cannot compete, and network latency quietly becomes part of the score.
The countdown itself is still there. The host can hide it on the phones and on the big screen, but hiding it does not stop it: the answer window closes at the same time either way, and the host can give the room 10 more seconds while answers are open. Where it stays visible, it builds tension without deciding anything: everyone answers inside the same window, and when the answer was locked in does not change the points. The window is kept on our server, so a slow connection can still mean an answer arrives after it has closed. What a slow connection can no longer cost is points for speed.
Updated 19 September 2026
The host can now switch the clock off. With wait for everyone on, there is no countdown on any screen, and answers close when every connected player has answered, or when the host closes them. It is for the rooms a clock works against: the slow reader, the screen-reader user, the phone on a weak connection. Points are the same either way, because speed never scored.
Corrected 18 September 2026
This section first said the host could switch the countdown off entirely, and that a slow connection cost nothing because each phone kept its own time. Both were wrong. Hiding the clock hides it; the window still closes. And the window is timed on our server, not on each phone.
What we have not measured
It is an inference, not a result.
Removing the mechanism the literature names is a reasonable thing to do. It is not the same as having measured what removing it did.
One product, one literature.
The review covers Kahoot in classrooms. A party quiz among friends is a different room, and the findings were not collected there.
What would actually show it.
Watching or surveying an actual room before and after a round, comparing how people describe the countdown when it cannot affect their score against how the Kahoot thread above describes it when it can. We have not run that yet, and we are saying so rather than implying we have.
See the mechanics this decision sits inside on klapp quiz, or read the other page where we measured something ourselves: why colour never carries meaning. Playing needs only /join and a six-digit code.