Learning flags: patterns, colours and look-alikes
Flags are one of the quickest ways to recognise a country, and they turn up everywhere: outside town halls, at sports events, on boats and in Far Fetched's Flags mode. There are around two hundred national flags, but most of them are built from a small number of patterns. Learn the patterns and the colour families first, and individual flags become far easier to remember.
This guide explains how flags are put together, which colour groups appear again and again, and how to tell apart the famous pairs that catch almost everyone out. It finishes with memory tricks and ways to practise.
The parts of a flag
A few simple words make flags much easier to describe and compare:
- The hoist is the edge nearest the flagpole. When a flag is drawn on its own, the hoist is on the left.
- The fly is the far edge, the one that flaps in the wind.
- The field is the main background colour.
- The canton is the top corner on the hoist side. On many flags it holds a small design of its own.
Flags also have proportions: their height compared with their width. Many national flags are 2:3, meaning two units tall for every three units wide. Germany's is 3:5, and Ireland's is 1:2, which makes it look noticeably long. A few break the usual shape altogether. The flags of Switzerland and Vatican City are square, and Nepal's is shaped like two stacked pennants, making it the only national flag that isn't a rectangle.
Proportions sound like a detail, but when two flags use exactly the same colours, the shape can be the only reliable difference.
Common layouts
Stripes: tricolours and bicolours
The most common design is a set of equal stripes. A tricolour has three. In a vertical tricolour the stripes run from top to bottom, as on the flags of France (blue, white, red), Italy (green, white, red) and Belgium (black, yellow, red). In a horizontal tricolour they lie on their sides, as on the flags of Germany (black, red, gold), Hungary (red, white, green) and Bulgaria (white, green, red).
Read vertical stripes from the hoist outwards and horizontal stripes from the top down. That habit sorts out pairs like Belgium and Germany, which share three colours but use them in a different order and direction.
A bicolour has just two stripes. Poland's is white over red and Ukraine's is blue over yellow. Some flags repeat a colour: Austria's is red, white, red.
Nordic crosses
Five Nordic countries share one layout: a cross whose upright is shifted towards the hoist, so the arm on the fly side is longer. Denmark's white cross on red is the oldest of them. Sweden has a yellow cross on blue and Finland a blue cross on white. Norway and Iceland put a thinner cross inside a wider one, and the Faroe Islands do the same with a red cross edged in blue on a white field.
Crescents and stars
A crescent with a star appears on many flags across North Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Turkey has a white crescent and star on red. Tunisia's flag is also red, but its crescent and star are red and sit inside a white circle in the middle. Pakistan puts a white crescent and star on dark green, with a white stripe at the hoist. Algeria splits its flag into green and white halves with a red crescent and star across the join. Azerbaijan has blue, red and green stripes with a white crescent and an eight-pointed star, and Singapore has red over white with a white crescent and five small stars.
Stripes with a canton
Some flags combine stripes with a design in the canton. The flag of the United States has 13 red and white stripes and 50 white stars on a blue canton. Malaysia uses the same idea with 14 red and white stripes and a yellow crescent and star on blue, and Liberia has 11 stripes and a single white star. Greece has nine blue and white stripes with a white cross in the canton, while Uruguay has nine white and blue stripes and a golden sun.
A different canton holds the Union Flag of the United Kingdom, often called the Union Jack. It appears on several Commonwealth flags, including those of Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Tuvalu.
Colour families
Countries often share colours because of shared history or shared ideas. Three families are especially useful to recognise, because once you know the family you only need to learn how its members differ.
Green, yellow and red
These are often called the Pan-African colours, and they are inspired by the flag of Ethiopia. Many African flags use them, including those of Ghana, Senegal, Mali, Guinea and Cameroon. The order and direction of the stripes, plus any star, separate them. The same three colours also appear outside Africa, for example in the horizontal stripes of Lithuania (yellow, green, red) and Bolivia (red, yellow, green).
Red, white, black and green
These four are known as the Pan-Arab colours. All four appear on the flags of Jordan, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Sudan, each with three horizontal stripes plus a shape at the hoist. That shape is the key: Jordan has a red triangle with a white star, the UAE a vertical red band, Kuwait a black shape that narrows towards the fly, and Sudan a green triangle. Egypt and Yemen use red, white and black stripes, and Egypt adds a golden eagle in the middle.
White, blue and red
Often called the Pan-Slavic colours, these appear on the flags of several countries where Slavic languages are spoken, including Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia and Czechia. Several are horizontal tricolours, so the order of the stripes and the coat of arms matter most.
Famous look-alikes and how to tell them apart
Chad and Romania
Both are vertical tricolours of blue, yellow and red, in that order, and both are 2:3. The clearest difference is the shade of blue: Chad's is deeper and darker, while Romania's is a little brighter. Side by side you can just about see it; on its own, almost nobody can be sure. Moldova and Andorra use the same three colours but add an emblem in the middle stripe, which makes them easier.
Indonesia and Monaco
Both are plain red over white. Indonesia's flag is 2:3, while Monaco's is 4:5, so Monaco's looks shorter and squarer. A handy hook: Monaco is a small country with a compact flag. Don't confuse either with Poland, which is the other way up, white over red. Singapore is also red over white, but its crescent and stars give it away.
Ireland and Côte d'Ivoire
Both are vertical stripes of green, white and orange, but in opposite orders. Ireland has green at the hoist; Côte d'Ivoire has orange at the hoist. Ireland's flag is also longer, at 1:2 against Côte d'Ivoire's 2:3. Picture a flagpole standing in green Irish grass: green next to the pole means Ireland. Italy has green at the hoist too, but its third stripe is red, not orange.
The Netherlands and Luxembourg
Both are horizontal stripes of red, white and blue. The Netherlands uses a dark blue; Luxembourg uses a light sky blue, and its flag is a little longer. A memory hook: "lux" is Latin for light, so Luxembourg has the light blue.
Senegal and Mali
Both are vertical tricolours of green, yellow and red in the same order. Senegal adds a green five-pointed star in the middle of the yellow stripe; Mali's flag is plain. Senegal and star both begin with "S". Guinea uses the same three colours in reverse: red, yellow, green.
Norway and Iceland
Both have a cross inside a cross in red, white and blue. Norway has a red field with a blue cross edged in white. Iceland swaps the colours, with a blue field and a red cross edged in white. Think of Iceland's blue as the cold sea all around the island.
Australia and New Zealand
Both are dark blue, with the Union Flag in the canton and stars from the Southern Cross constellation on the fly. Australia's stars are white: a large seven-pointed star under the Union Flag, called the Commonwealth Star, and a Southern Cross of four seven-pointed stars plus one small five-pointed star. New Zealand has just four stars, each red with a white border and five points. The quick check: white stars mean Australia, red stars mean New Zealand.
Slovenia, Slovakia and Russia
All three are white, blue and red horizontal tricolours. Russia's is plain. Slovakia's has a coat of arms towards the hoist: a white double cross on a red shield, standing on three blue hills. Slovenia's has a smaller shield in the upper hoist corner, showing a white three-peaked mountain with three yellow stars above it, and the flag is longer, at 1:2. Remember: Slovakia shows a cross, Slovenia shows a mountain.
Memory tricks that work
- Describe it in words. Say "vertical, green at the hoist, then white, then orange" rather than just looking. Putting a flag into words makes you notice the order and direction, which is exactly where look-alikes differ.
- Learn in families. Study all the Nordic crosses together, or all the red, white and blue horizontal flags together. Side by side, the one detail that matters stands out.
- Give each pair a hook. Lux means light; Senegal has the star; green by the pole is Ireland; white stars are Australia. Silly hooks are fine as long as they are yours.
- Draw them. Sketch flags from memory with a few coloured pencils, then check. Getting the order of three stripes right on paper is a good test of whether you really know a flag.
- Come back later. Return to the same family a day or two after you first study it and see which flags you can still name. The ones you forget are the ones to practise next.
Flags out on the road
Flags are useful beyond the Flags mode. In ordinary Far Fetched games you will sometimes see a national flag flying outside a public building, a school or a hotel, or painted on a wall or a fence. A flag can confirm a country you already suspected from the language or the road lines.
Be a little careful, though. Hotels and embassies sometimes fly flags from other countries, and the blue flag of the European Union, with its circle of twelve gold stars, appears in many member countries. Treat a flag as strong evidence when it matches your other clues, and as a reason to look again when it doesn't. The guide to the world's alphabets is a good partner here, because the writing on a sign often settles what a flag only hints at.
Practising with Flags mode
Far Fetched has a Flags mode in which you name countries from their flags. You can play it as a Global match against other players, as a Solo run against the clock, or as Survival, where you keep going until your lives run out. Flags games earn XP like any other game, but they don't add stamps to your Passport, which records the places you have recognised in Street View.
A good way to build up is to start with Survival, where there is time to think, and switch to Solo once you are naming most flags quickly. Keep a short list of the flags you miss and look up which family each belongs to. Most mistakes turn out to be inside a family, which tells you exactly what to compare. If you are new to the game as a whole, the beginner's guide explains the other modes.
Try it: Play three games of Flags in Survival. Each time you get one wrong, write down the flag you saw and the country you guessed. After three games you will have your own list of look-alikes to learn.
Teachers can use the same mode as a quick class warm-up; Geography games in the classroom has ideas for doing that with a whole group.