Europe

Flag of Serbia

Serbia is a landlocked Balkan country that was historically the dominant republic within the former Yugoslavia. Belgrade, the capital, sits at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers and has been an important regional hub for thousands of years — it has been destroyed and rebuilt more than 40 times in its history. Serbia is known for its vibrant music scene, including the Exit Festival, and a rich Eastern Orthodox Christian heritage with important medieval monasteries.

CapitalBelgrade
RegionEurope
Current flag since2010
Main coloursRed, Blue, White
Populationabout 6.7 million
Areaabout 88,000 km²
GeographyLandlocked
Flags in history5

Population and area are rounded.

What the flag of Serbia means

Red, blue and white are the Pan-Slavic colours, in the reverse order of Russia's flag. The coat of arms shows a white double-headed eagle with a shield bearing a cross and four firesteels, which are often read as four letters for the motto “Only unity saves the Serbs”. The current state flag was adopted in 2004 and redrawn in 2010.

How to recognise it

Horizontal red-blue-white with a small coat of arms on the left.

Did you know?

Serbia is the world's largest exporter of raspberries, producing about 95,000 tonnes per year.

Easily confused with

Serbia's flag is often mixed up with these. Learn to tell them apart:

Russia

Slovakia

Flag history of Serbia

Every flag that has flown over Serbia, from today back through time.

2010–present

Flag of Serbia

A 2010 standardization set the coat of arms in its present form — the double-headed white eagle and the cross with four firesteels (the "Serbian cross").

2004–2010

Tricolor with arms (2004)

In 2004 Serbia restored the double-headed eagle and shield, reviving royal-era symbolism abandoned under socialism.

1992–2004

Plain red-blue-white

After the communist era Serbia simply dropped the star, leaving a bare tricolor that carried no coat of arms throughout the Milošević years.

1947–1992

SR Serbia

The Socialist Republic flew a red-blue-white tricolor with a centered gold-bordered red star — visually identical to the flag of SR Montenegro.

1882–1918

Kingdom of Serbia

When Serbia became a kingdom in 1882, its state flag was the red-blue-white tricolor charged with the royal coat of arms — the double-headed eagle beneath a crown. This is the direct ancestor of the modern flag; the kingdom dissolved into Yugoslavia in 1918.

Related historical states

Empires, kingdoms and republics that once covered part of Serbia.

1918–1941

Kingdom of Yugoslavia

The blue-white-red Pan-Slavic tricolor symbolized the union of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes, flown by the Kingdom until the Axis invasion of 1941.

1945–1992

Socialist Yugoslavia

Tito's Partisans added a red, gold-bordered star to the tricolor; it marked the country's communist character until the federation's violent breakup in the 1990s.

1882–1918

Kingdom of Serbia

The red-blue-white tricolor with the royal arms flew over the independent Serbian kingdom whose alliances and crisis with Austria-Hungary helped ignite World War I.

1835–1882

Principality of Serbia

An autonomous principality that won self-rule from the Ottomans under the rival Obrenović and Karađorđević dynasties before being raised to a kingdom in 1882.

1402–1459

Serbian Despotate

The last independent medieval Serbian state, a despotate that briefly flourished at Smederevo before the Ottomans conquered it, ending Serbian statehood for centuries.