Flag of Sudan

What the flag of Sudan looks like

The national flag of Sudan is made of three horizontal bands of equal height: red at the top, white in the middle and black at the bottom. A green isosceles triangle has its base on the hoist, the side next to the pole, and points toward the fly, covering the full height of the three bands. The proportions are 1:2, so the flag is twice as long as it is high. There is no emblem on it.

The flag is easy to confuse with the flag of Palestine, which uses the same four colors in a different arrangement: black, white and green stripes with a red triangle. It also resembles the flags of Jordan, Kuwait and other Arab states. You can see the design in small form in the Sudan flag emoji.

Sudan flag meaning and symbolism

Red, white, black and green are the Pan-Arab colors, which have long been linked to the Arab people and to Islam and stand for Arab unity and independence. Each color has a traditional meaning in Sudan. Red represents the struggle for independence and the sacrifices of the country's martyrs, white represents the people, light and optimism, and black represents Sudan itself. The name Sudan comes from the Arabic for "land of the black people". The white is also linked to the White Flag League, a nationalist group that rose against colonial rule in 1924, and the black to the black flag of the Mahdist movement in the late 19th century. The green triangle stands for Islam, agriculture and the prosperity of the land.

These meanings are traditional interpretations.

History of the Sudan flag

From 1899 until 1956, Sudan was administered jointly by Britain and Egypt under the Anglo-Egyptian condominium, which had no flag of its own: the flags of both countries were flown together. On independence on 1 January 1956 Sudan adopted a horizontal tricolor of blue, yellow and green, designed by the poet Macki Sufi. The blue stood for the River Nile, the yellow for the Sahara and the green for farmland, chosen as colors neutral between ethnic groups and political parties.

In May 1969 a coup led by Gaafar Nimeiry brought a military government. After the coup a competition was held for a new flag. The winning entry, designed by the artist Abdel Rahman Ahmed Al-Jali on Pan-Arab colors, was adopted as the national flag in May 1970 (20 May 1970). It is based on the Arab Liberation Flag of the Egyptian Revolution of 1952, and it has stayed in use through several changes of government. In December 2025, during the Sudanese civil war, the head of the Transitional Sovereignty Council, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, proposed readopting the blue-yellow-green tricolor.

In 2011, the south of the country became independent as South Sudan, which has its own flag. The question of the two Sudans' flags comes up often: Sudan uses the red-white-black flag with a green triangle, and South Sudan uses black, red and green bands separated by white, with a blue triangle holding a yellow star.

Sudan flag vs Palestine and other Arab flags

The Pan-Arab colors appear on the flags of Palestine, Jordan, Kuwait, Egypt, Iraq, Syria and others. Sudan's flag is closest to those of Palestine and Jordan, which also have a triangle at the hoist, but the order of the stripes and the color of the triangle differ. Egypt, Iraq and Yemen use red, white and black stripes rather than a triangle (Egypt has an eagle emblem, Iraq has Arabic text and Yemen is plain). See the flags of the world for more comparisons.