Flag of Zimbabwe

What the flag means

• 🟢Green — agriculture
• 🟡Yellow — minerals
• 🔴Red — the blood of liberation
• 🐦White triangle of peace with the Zimbabwe Bird and a red star

Design set by: ⁨Flag of Zimbabwe Act [Chapter 10:10], Schedule⁩ · Adopted 1980

Highlights

• 💦 "Smoke That Thunders" falls
• 🪨 Great Zimbabwe stone ruins
• 🐘 Hwange's elephant herds
• 🛶 Views over Lake Kariba
• 🥁 Soulful mbira music

Quick facts

Region

Africa · Eastern Africa

Population

16,950,795 people (2025)

Area

390,757 km²

Capital

Harare

Languages

Shona, North Ndebele

Currency

Botswana pula (BWP), Chinese yuan (CNY), Euro (EUR), British pound (GBP), Indian rupee (INR), Japanese yen (JPY), United States dollar (USD), South African rand (ZAR), Zimbabwe Gold (ZWG)

Organizations

United Nations, African Union

Neighboring countries

• Botswana
• Mozambique
• South Africa
• Zambia

Land neighbors, approximated from simplified map outlines.

Symbols in History (1)

Coats of arms and emblems whose historic seat lies within this country’s present-day territory.

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  Zimbabwe Bird

  Zimbabwe, southern Africa · Modern reconstructed design

  OriginGreat Zimbabwe, the stone capital of a Shona kingdom that flourished between the 11th and 15th centuries, yielded eight birds carved in soapstone, each set on top of a tall stone column. Taken from the ruins in the late 19th century, they became the country's best known sign: the same bird stands today on the flag and the coat of arms of Zimbabwe. The drawing shown here is a modern rendering of those carvings rather than the stone itself.

  DescriptionA golden bird in a heavy black outline stands in profile facing left: a round head, a small ring for the eye, and a short blunt beak crossed by one straight line for the mouth. Below the long neck the body runs off to the lower right as a long triangle that ends not in a point but in a rounded tip, and a thick curve leaving the breast splits that triangle into two layers which meet again at the same end. Inside it one curve drops toward the leg and a small crescent marks the folded wing, while the claws come down as pointed toes hooked over the left front of the pedestal. The front of that pedestal is divided into three bands — two open circles, two rows of zigzag, and a plain foot — and the zigzag is the same pattern as the chevron courses of stonework on the walls of Great Zimbabwe. Which bird the carving copies is disputed, but in Shona tradition the eagle is held to be a messenger between the living and their ancestors.

  Image source: Wikimedia Commons — Zimbabwe Bird.svg