What do the colours of the Palau flag mean?

Light blue: the Pacific Ocean, and the transition to self-government. Yellow: the full moon.

How do you tell the Palau flag from the Japan one?

Japan is a red disc on white, centred. Palau is a yellow moon on light blue, off-centre.

When was the Palau flag adopted?

The current design dates from 1981, and its official ratio is 5:8.

The flag of Palau

A light blue field with a large yellow disc set slightly toward the hoist of centre.

Ratio 5:8 · current design adopted 1981

Palau

The disc is the moon, not the sun, which is the fact people get wrong: Palauan custom holds the full moon to be the optimal time for almost every important activity, so the emblem is a calendar rather than an astronomical statement. Like Bangladesh's, the disc is deliberately off-centre toward the hoist so that it looks centred on a flying flag. The design was chosen in 1981 from among 1,000 entries. Japan's flag is the obvious comparison and the colours are entirely different.

Flags it gets confused with

Palau

Japan

Bangladesh

Drawn at each flag’s own official ratio, which is itself the difference in some of these pairs.

Flag	How to tell them apart
Japan	Japan is a red disc on white, centred. Palau is a yellow moon on light blue, off-centre.
Bangladesh	Bangladesh is a red disc on dark green.

What the colours mean

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.

The symbols on it

What	What it stands for
The disc	The full moon — considered in Palauan tradition the best time for fishing, planting, harvesting and celebration

Ratio: 5:8
Current design adopted: 1981
Colours: light blue, yellow

Common questions

What does the flag of Palau look like?: A light blue field with a large yellow disc set slightly toward the hoist of centre.
What do the colours of the Palau flag mean?: Light blue: the Pacific Ocean, and the transition to self-government. Yellow: the full moon.
How do you tell the Palau flag from the Japan one?: Japan is a red disc on white, centred. Palau is a yellow moon on light blue, off-centre.
When was the Palau flag adopted?: The current design dates from 1981, and its official ratio is 5:8.

Palau Capital, area, population and currency
The flag of Japan Routinely mistaken for this one
The flag of Bangladesh Routinely mistaken for this one
Every flag with light blue in it
The flag of Luxembourg Ratio 3:5
The flag of Honduras Ratio 1:2
The flag of Fiji Ratio 1:2
The flag of San Marino Ratio 3:4

Sources

The World Factbook — Central Intelligence Agency (Public domain (US Government))

How these figures are compiled and checked