Argentina is the second-largest country in South America, stretching from the subtropical north down to sub-Antarctic Patagonia and Cape Horn. Buenos Aires, the capital, is a cosmopolitan city strongly influenced by European immigration and known for its tango music and dance, vibrant cultural scene, and world-class restaurants. Argentina has won the FIFA World Cup three times and produced celebrated writers including Jorge Luis Borges.
Population and area are rounded.
Light blue and white were worn by the patriots of the May Revolution of 1810 and turned into a flag by Manuel Belgrano in 1812. The Sun of May, a golden face with 32 rays, represents Inti, the Inca sun god, and the sun said to have broken through the clouds on 25 May 1810. Argentina's Flag Day, 20 June, marks Belgrano's death.
Horizontal light blue-white-light blue with a yellow Sun of May in the centre.
Argentina has produced more Nobel Prize winners in the sciences than any other Latin American country.
Argentina's flag is often mixed up with these. Learn to tell them apart:
Every flag that has flown over Argentina, from today back through time.
The Sun of May — representing Inti, the Inca sun god, and commemorating the May Revolution of 1810 — was officially added to the flag on February 25, 1818. The sun is depicted with alternating straight and wavy rays and a human face, copied from the reverse of Argentina's first coin minted in 1813. It distinguishes the "official ceremonial flag" from the plain-striped civil flag.
The plain horizontal tricolor of light blue-white-light blue was created by General Manuel Belgrano on February 27, 1812, using the cockade colours of the revolution. It flew at the Declaration of Independence on July 9, 1816 — before the Sun of May was incorporated. This simpler version remains in use today as the "civil flag" (without the sun) on non-official occasions.
Manuel Belgrano improvised the first Argentine flag in 1812 to rally troops at the Battle of Rosario, using the blue and white colours of the Buenos Aires revolutionary cockade. He raised it on February 27, 1812 — a date now celebrated as Flag Day in Argentina. Belgrano had to seek permission from the revolutionary government to use it officially, permission that came only gradually.
Before Belgrano's blue-and-white, the lands of Argentina were the Spanish Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, governed from Buenos Aires and flying the red Cross of Burgundy of the Spanish Empire. The May Revolution of 1810 began the break from Spain, replacing the saltire with the revolutionary cockade colours that became the national flag.
Empires, kingdoms and republics that once covered part of Argentina.
Blue-white-blue with a Sun of May and four red liberty caps, flown while Buenos Aires seceded from the rest of the Argentine Confederation for nearly a decade.
Warlord Francisco Ramírez's federalist republic flew the blue-white-blue flag of Artigas, crossed by a red diagonal bar for the federal cause.
The state that declared independence at Tucumán in 1816 and is the direct forerunner of Argentina; its sky-blue-white flag gained the golden Sun of May in 1818.
A short-lived independent province-state during the anarchy that followed the collapse of central authority in the Río de la Plata, before rejoining the Argentine confederation.
The 24 states, provinces and regions of Argentina with their own flags.
Salta
Buenos Aires Prov.
Buenos Aires City
San Luis
Entre Ríos
La Rioja
Santiago del Estero
Chaco
San Juan
Catamarca
La Pampa
Mendoza
Misiones
Formosa
Neuquén
Río Negro
Santa Fe
Tucumán
Chubut
Tierra del Fuego
Corrientes
Córdoba
Jujuy
Santa CruzArgentina shares a land border with 5 countries: Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay.
4 other national flags use the same main colours as Argentina's.
Play Globalio and learn Argentina's flag
Uruguay
Honduras
Guatemala
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile
Paraguay
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Kosovo
Nauru