The flag of Ireland
The whole flag is an argument for peace: green for one community, orange for the other, and white between them for the truce. That is why the order matters and why flying it reversed — orange at the hoist — is taken as a deliberate insult rather than a mistake. The tricolour was presented to Thomas Francis Meagher by French sympathisers in 1848 and only became the national flag with the 1937 constitution. Ireland's green is a mid-green, not the emerald used in tourism material, and the flag has no official Pantone specification at all.
Flags it gets confused with
Field and colours only. Not shown: the navy Ashoka Chakra, a 24-spoke wheel, centred on the white band.
Drawn at each flag’s own official ratio, which is itself the difference in some of these pairs.
| Flag | How to tell them apart |
|---|---|
| Ivory Coast | The mirror image: Ivory Coast has orange at the hoist and green at the fly. Ivory Coast is also squarer at 2:3. |
| Italy | Italy's third band is red, not orange, and its ratio is 2:3. |
| India | India's bands are horizontal, saffron rather than orange, and carry a blue wheel. |
What the colours mean
- Green
#169B62The Gaelic and Catholic tradition - White
#FFFFFFA lasting truce between the two - Orange
#FF883EThe followers of William of Orange — the Protestant tradition
Flag laws usually specify a Pantone chip, a CMYK mix or just a colour name. Converting any of those to sRGB is lossy, which is why published hex values disagree.
- Ratio
- 1:2
- Current design adopted
- 1937
- Colours
- green, white, orange
Common questions
- What does the flag of Ireland look like?
- Three equal vertical bands of green at the hoist, white, and orange.
- What do the colours of the Ireland flag mean?
- Green: the Gaelic and Catholic tradition. White: a lasting truce between the two. Orange: the followers of William of Orange — the Protestant tradition.
- How do you tell the Ireland flag from the Ivory Coast one?
- The mirror image: Ivory Coast has orange at the hoist and green at the fly. Ivory Coast is also squarer at 2:3.
- When was the Ireland flag adopted?
- The current design dates from 1937, and its official ratio is 1:2.
Related pages
- Ireland Capital, area, population and currency
- The flag of Ivory Coast Routinely mistaken for this one
- The flag of Italy Routinely mistaken for this one
- The flag of India Routinely mistaken for this one
- Every flag with green in it
- The flag of Brazil Ratio 7:10
- The flag of Mexico Ratio 4:7
- The flag of South Africa Ratio 2:3
- The flag of Jamaica Ratio 1:2
- The flag of Pakistan Ratio 2:3
- The flag of Palestine Ratio 1:2
- The flag of Portugal Ratio 2:3
- The flag of Saudi Arabia Ratio 2:3
Sources
- Official vendor product documentation — At One Place