Flag of Nicaragua

How to read it

The flag is set by the Law on the Characteristics and Use of the Patriotic Symbols (Ley sobre Características y Uso de los Símbolos Patrios), Decree 1908 of 25 August 1971, published in La Gaceta on 27 August 1971. Article 2 calls the Pabellón de la República or Bandera Nacional the national emblem and describes three equal horizontal stripes, white in the centre and blue above and below, with the coat of arms in the centre of the white. The flag is 3 units high by 5 long, and its blue is the one commonly known as cobalt blue. The arms date from a decree of 5 September 1908 and must appear on the flag (article 46), except that the flag may be used without them at rallies and to decorate houses and squares on national holidays (article 36). The Academia de Geografía e Historia de Nicaragua writes that the historian Eduardo Pérez-Valle, appointed in 1969 by the ministries of Education and the Interior, defined the cobalt blue, the flag’s dimensions and the design of the official arms for the 1971 law. Article 35 makes 14 July Flag Day.

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The coat of arms as the law describes it

Article 42 describes an equilateral triangle with a gold border, standing on one side. Near its base is a strip of land, an isthmus “washed by both seas”, carrying a chain of five volcanoes, and the seas lie below the isthmus and beyond it up to the horizon. Over the volcanoes is a rainbow of seven colours, red on the outside, and between the rainbow and the horizon is the cap of liberty in profile, giving off rays of light. Article 43 gives the colours: yellowish green volcanoes, ultramarine seas with white foam, white rays on a pale blue sky and a vermilion cap. Around the triangle the words REPUBLICA DE NICARAGUA run above and AMERICA CENTRAL below, in gold capitals. On a flag of 1.50 by 2.50 m (about 4 ft 11 in by 8 ft 2 in), the ring of lettering is 45 cm (about 18 in) across and each side of the triangle is 32.5 cm (about 13 in), by article 44.

The Academia explains the parts: the triangle is equality, justice and harmony, the rainbow brotherhood and peace, the cap liberty, and the five volcanoes the five republics of Central America and the will for their union. It also notes that a reform of 18 July 2002 dropped the number five from the law’s description of the volcanoes, and that no official drawing of the arms to match the reform had been published.

Nicaragua’s, El Salvador’s and Honduras’s flags

All three come from the flag of the United Provinces of Central America, approved on 21 August 1823 with three horizontal stripes, blue above and below and white in the centre, according to the Academia. El Salvador’s flag has the same stripes and a coat of arms built on the same triangle, five volcanoes, cap and rainbow. What tells them apart is the setting of the triangle: on El Salvador’s arms five Salvadoran flags spring from it, the motto DIOS UNION LIBERTAD runs along its base, and a laurel wreath curves below, inside the words REPUBLICA DE EL SALVADOR EN LA AMERICA CENTRAL. Nicaragua’s triangle stands alone inside its ring of lettering. The flag El Salvador’s law sets for public buildings and offices carries the words DIOS UNION LIBERTAD in the white stripe instead of the arms. Honduras’s flag has the blue and white stripes with five blue five-pointed stars in the white stripe and no coat of arms.

The red and black flag in the 2025 constitution

A reform of Nicaragua’s constitution approved by the National Assembly in January 2025 rewrote article 13, which now names as patriotic symbols the national anthem, the blue and white flags of Nicaragua “and the red and black of the anti-imperialist struggle of General Augusto C. Sandino and of the Sandinista popular revolution”, and the coat of arms, as the news agency EFE reported. The red and black flag is the flag of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), the party in government since 2007. The reform was published in La Gaceta on 18 February 2025, Bloomberg Línea reported.