Flags of the World

How to play

1. Press Start. You have 15 minutes, and the flags appear in a new order every game.
2. One flag is highlighted, and a larger copy sits next to the answer field. Type its country. It counts as soon as the name matches, with no need to press Enter, and the next flag you haven’t named lights up.
3. Only the highlighted flag counts. If you type another country’s name, you’re told it isn’t that one, and the field clears. Wrong answers cost nothing but time.
4. Stuck? Tap any flag you haven’t named to switch to it. On a keyboard, Tab or Enter on an empty field moves to the next flag and Shift+Tab to the previous one. Esc leaves the answer field, so Tab reaches the rest of the page.
5. Pause whenever you like. The flags are hidden while the clock is stopped.
6. When the time is up, every flag is labeled: the ones you named and, marked in red, the ones you missed. Tap any flag to see it larger with its name.
7. Then practice the flags you missed: they come back in a round of their own, with no clock and no score. End it whenever you like, and try the ones still missed again.

Which flags are in the quiz

The flags of all 197 countries in our countries quiz: the 193 member states of the United Nations, the two UN observer states, and two more that most country quizzes also include. Flags of territories and of the nations inside a larger country are not in it. Each flag is drawn to its official proportions, so some are longer, squarer or not rectangular at all.

Spelling and alternative names

Capitals, accents, spaces and punctuation don’t matter, “St” works for “Saint” and a leading “The” is optional, but the spelling itself has to be right. Well-known alternative names count too:

Look-alike flags

Some flags are almost the same, and the quiz counts only the right name for each one. These are the pairs and trios that catch most players, and what tells them apart. The flags are shown here with their names, so the list stays closed until you open it.

Show the look-alike flags

Chad and Romania

Both are vertical stripes of blue, yellow and red in the same proportions. The only difference is the blue: Chad’s is a darker indigo, Romania’s a brighter cobalt. Side by side you can see it; on its own, it’s the hardest flag in the quiz.

Indonesia and Monaco

Red over white, and nothing else. The shape is the clue: Indonesia’s flag is 2 by 3, Monaco’s a squarer 4 by 5. Poland’s flag is the same two colors the other way up, white over red.

Ireland and Côte d’Ivoire

Green, white and orange in vertical stripes, in opposite orders. Ireland’s green is next to the flagpole, Côte d’Ivoire’s orange is. Ireland’s flag is also longer, 1 by 2 against 2 by 3.

Australia and New Zealand

Both are dark blue with the Union Jack in the corner and the Southern Cross on the right. Australia’s stars are white, with a large seven-pointed star under the Union Jack. New Zealand has four red stars with white borders and nothing under the Union Jack.

The Netherlands and Luxembourg

Red, white and blue in horizontal stripes. Luxembourg’s blue is a light sky blue and its red a little brighter, and its flag is longer. The Dutch blue is darker.

Norway and Iceland

The same Nordic cross with the colors swapped. Norway is red with a blue cross edged in white; Iceland is blue with a red cross edged in white.

Mali, Guinea and Senegal

Three vertical stripes in green, yellow and red. Mali reads green, yellow, red from the flagpole; Guinea is the same colors reversed, red, yellow, green; Senegal follows Mali’s order and adds a green star in the middle.

Slovakia, Slovenia and Russia

White, blue and red in horizontal stripes. Russia’s flag is plain. Slovakia adds a shield with a white double cross on blue hills, toward the flagpole. Slovenia’s shield is smaller and higher, in the top corner, with a white mountain and three gold stars, and its flag is longer.

Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela

Yellow, blue and red in horizontal stripes. In Colombia’s and Ecuador’s flags the yellow takes the top half; Ecuador adds its coat of arms, with a condor, in the middle. Venezuela’s three stripes are equal, with an arc of eight white stars on the blue.

Accessibility

This quiz is about recognizing pictures, so it can’t be played with a screen reader: describing a flag in words would give most of the answers away, so each flag in the quiz is only labeled with its number. The controls, the answer field and the announcements work with a keyboard and a screen reader. For a quiz that works fully without sight, try Countries of the World, which you play by typing names from memory.

Questions

Why are the flags different shapes?

Each flag is drawn to the proportions its country sets. Most are 2 by 3 or 1 by 2, but Switzerland and Vatican City are square, Qatar is long and narrow, and Nepal’s is two stacked pennants rather than a rectangle. The shape is part of the flag, and sometimes it’s the only way to tell two apart.

Two flags look identical to me. Why does only one name count?

Because they are two different flags. Every flag in the quiz has exactly one country, and the look-alike list above shows what separates the closest ones.

Can I stop and come back later?

Yes. If you close or reload the page mid-game, the game is saved and waits, paused, with the same flags in the same order, until you come back. The clock doesn’t stop if you only switch tabs: use Pause for that.

Where do the flag images come from?

From an open collection of flags drawn to each country’s official specification, based on Wikimedia Commons, which, like that collection, treats national flags as public domain.

Where are my scores kept?

Only in this browser. Nothing is sent anywhere, and clearing your browser’s site data removes them.

More geography

• Countries of the World: name all 197 countries in 10 minutes
• Capitals of the World: the capital of every country
• All quizzes, including each continent’s countries and capitals

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• Capitals of the World: Name the capital of every country before the clock runs out.
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