🇮🇷 The colours of Iran
7 meanings recorded, 15 colours tied to the country and 4 colour cities.
Iran’s flag features green, white, and red horizontal bands, with a red Islamic emblem and repeated script. These colours, known as the pan-Iranian colours, are linked to national identity and have roots in Iran’s long history. Green, white, and red are officially recognised, each carrying its own meaning.
Where no official value is given, the swatch shows the colour family, not the exact shade.
- The flag’s script repeats 'Allahu Akbar' 22 times.
- Green, white, and red are called the pan-Iranian colours.
- The Islamic emblem uses four crescents and a sword.
- The flag’s current form dates from July 1980.
- The Lion and Sun flag is banned from public use.
The colours of the flag of Iran
Iran’s flag is made up of three horizontal stripes: green at the top, white in the middle, and red at the bottom. The white band in the centre holds a red emblem, which is a stylised form of the word 'Allah' using four crescents and a sword, topped by a shaddah. Along the edges where green and red meet the white, the phrase 'Allahu Akbar' (God is greatest) is written 11 times on each side in white Kufic script, for a total of 22 times. The colours green, white, and red are described as the pan-Iranian colours, symbolising the nation and its identity. The meanings are officially recognised, and the colours are shared with other regional flags.
How the colours were chosen of Iran
Iran’s earliest known flag dates to the Bronze Age. Over centuries, various dynasties used different symbols and colours, such as golden birds, lions, suns, and eagles. The pan-Iranian colours—green, white, and red—became prominent in modern times. After the 1979 Islamic Revolution, the flag was redesigned in 1980 to its current form, replacing older emblems like the Lion and Sun with the present Islamic emblem. The tricolour itself, however, has a longer association with Iranian identity.
Official shades and rules of Iran
The flag’s design, including the emblem and script, is governed by the Iranian national standard ISIRI 1. This standard sets out the construction details, such as the proportions of the stripes and the geometric method for drawing the emblem and the Kufic script. The bands are of equal width, and the script and emblem have specified placements.
The facts in this overview come from the Wikipedia article "Flag of Iran", written by its contributors and used under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence. Rang rewrote the text in its own words, with AI assistance, and compares every page with the article to make sure no passage is copied. It may be reused under the same CC BY-SA 4.0 licence with a link back.
What colours mean in Iran
Customs vary by region, faith and family; these are the meanings most often recorded.
On the last Tuesday night before Nowruz, people jump over small bonfires and chant a line that gives their yellow, meaning sickness, to the fire and takes its red, meaning health.
Festival and celebrationProtection and healingEnergySource: Chaharshanbe SuriOn Yalda, the longest night of the year, families sit up late eating pomegranates and watermelon. The red fruit stands for the glow of dawn and of life.
Festival and celebrationHopeSource: Yalda NightThe flag is green, white and red. The green is linked with Islam, and the phrase Allahu Akbar is written in white along the edges of the green and red bands.
Sacred and holyPolitics and protestSource: Flag of IranIn the disputed 2009 election, supporters of Mir-Hossein Mousavi wore green wristbands and scarves. The protests that followed are known as the Green Movement.
Politics and protestHopeSource: Iranian Green MovementFor Nowruz, the new year at the spring equinox, families grow a dish of green sprouts called sabzeh for the haft-sin table. It stands for rebirth.
Nature and renewalFestival and celebrationHopeSource: Haft-sinTurquoise, firuzeh in Persian, has been mined near Nishapur for thousands of years. It is worn against the evil eye, and its colour covers the domes of mosques in Isfahan.
Protection and healingSacred and holyAweSource: TurquoiseIn Muharram, Shia Muslims wear black for Imam Husayn. Among clerics, a black turban marks a sayyid, a descendant of the Prophet, and others wear white.
Mourning and deathSacred and holyGriefSource: Mourning of MuharramColour and feeling in Iran
Persian poetry and painting pair the red rose with the nightingale, gol o bolbol, as the beloved and the lover who sings to her.
Shia Muslims wear black during Muharram, above all on Ashura, to mourn the death of Imam Husayn at Karbala.
For Nowruz, the spring new year, families grow a dish of green sprouts called sabzeh as a sign of renewal and set it on the festive table.
Persian calls a disgraced person ru-siyah, 'black-faced', and one whose honour is intact ru-sefid, 'white-faced'.
The mosques and madrasas of Isfahan and Samarkand are faced in blue and turquoise tile, with domes meant to recall the sky.
Colour cities of Iran
🇮🇷 Half the world, in turquoiseIsfahanSafavid mosques around a vast square are covered inside and out with turquoise and deep blue tiles.
🇮🇷 The mud-brick desert cityYazdAn earth-coloured city of domes and wind towers in central Iran, with one tall gateway of blue tile.
🇮🇷 The village carved in grey conesKandovanA village in north-west Iran where homes are hollowed out of pale cone-shaped rocks of volcanic ash.
🇮🇷 City of the Pink MosqueShirazA mosque tiled in pink roses, where morning sun through coloured glass paints the carpets.Colours tied to Iran
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Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Isfahan Ir: Pedram forouzanfar, CC BY-SA 4.0, source
- Yazd Ir: Ninara, CC BY 2.0, source
- Kandovan Ir: Rəcəb Yaxşı, CC BY-SA 4.0, source
- Shiraz Ir: آرش (Arche), CC BY-SA 3.0, source