Philippines
What the source says
Referenced, awaiting primary-source reviewOriginal version used from June 12, 1898. Blue [is] peace, truth, and justice; red patriotism and valor; the white triangle liberty, equality and fraternity. The eight-rayed sun [is] unity, freedom, people's democracy, and sovereignty, [its] rays representing eight provinces [in] the 1896 Revolution; the three stars [are] Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao. To indicate a state of war, the red field is flown upwards.
Referenced, not verified: a secondary work states this, and the document that constitutes the flag has not been read for this entry. What the marks mean.
Colors and meaning
Symbolism and history(r1)
A white hoist triangle, for liberty, equality and fraternity, bearing a sun and three stars for Luzon, Visayas and Mindanao, sits beside horizontal blue and red bands; to indicate a state of war, the flag is flown with the red field up.
Most similar flags
The 6 closest of the 194 other national flags, ranked by a similarity index computed from the flag images themselves. The number is that index, 0–100 — not a claim that the two flags are “X% identical”.
- Dominican Republic88
near-identical colour proportions.
- United Kingdom82
the same colours in similar amounts.
- Norway79
the same colours in similar amounts.
- Seychelles74
the same colours in similar amounts.
- Iceland72
the same colours in similar amounts.
- Eritrea71
the same colours in similar amounts.
Computed at build time: each flag is rasterised to 64x48, and the score is 0.55 × colour overlap + 0.45 × structure. A different weighting would rank these differently. How the index works.
References — not verification
(r1) Referenced to Flag of the Philippines (Wikipedia (English)) on 2026-07-17. States the adoption year, which colors the flag has, what the colors mean and the symbolism and history on this page. The passage it states them in is quoted at the top of this entry.
Further reading: Flag of the Philippines on Wikipedia