Flag of Algeria

Two equal vertical bands, green at the hoist and white at the fly, with a red crescent and a red five-pointed star in the centre.

What the flag means

The crescent and star are Islamic emblems, and the green is generally linked with Islam. Algerian writers differ on the rest: Malek Chebel reads white as purity, while Khaled Merzouk reads green as the land and white as peace. The historian Benjamin Stora suggests that the three colours first stood for a union of the three Maghreb countries.

History

According to Stora, the colours were chosen in 1934 by the nationalist North African Star (Étoile Nord-Africaine). Émilie Busquant, wife of the nationalist leader Messali Hadj, is credited with sewing an early version. The Algerian People's Party took up a crescent-and-star design in 1943. The flag was carried at the Sétif demonstration in 1945 and adopted by the Provisional Government of the Algerian Republic in 1958. It was officially raised as the national flag on 3 July 1962, and Law No. 63-145 of 25 April 1963 formalised it.

Algeria's mission to the United Nations published a description that defines the colours by light wavelength and gives the crescent's two circles radii of a quarter and a fifth of the flag's height.

Earlier flags of Algeria

1830–1962French tricolour, used in French Algeria

Flags of Algeria's neighbours

Sources

Wikipedia: Flag of Algeria
Flags of the World: Algeria

Last reviewed 24 October 2026. Read how we research flags in our editorial policy, or report a mistake.