This classic riddle asks: What kind of ship never sails?
The answer is: friendship.
The trick is hidden inside the word itself. “Friendship” contains the word “ship,” but it is not a vessel that travels across water.
The riddle works because it makes you search for a type of boat or ship, when the real answer is a word ending in “-ship.”
Friendship describes a relationship between people, so of course it never sails anywhere.
It is a simple language puzzle, but that simplicity is what makes it effective. The answer is right there in an everyday word, yet most people initially look in the wrong direction.


