Practice · Asia
Philippines
How to draw the flag of Philippines
The flag of the Philippines is a horizontal bicolour of blue and red, with a white triangle at the hoist and a yellow disc and a yellow five-pointed star at the centre. Its official proportions are 2:1.
A note on the emblem. This flag carries detail that no one draws accurately from memory in a couple of minutes. Scoring treats it as a broad shape in the right place, so you are judged on the field, the colours and the position of the emblem — not on reproducing its interior.
Colours used
- blue —
#0038a8 - red —
#ce1126 - white —
#ffffff - yellow —
#fcd116
You do not need to match these hex values exactly. Scoring allows a generous margin on shade because nobody remembers the precise navy of a flag; what it does not forgive is putting the right colour in the wrong place.
How to draw it well
Because the bands run horizontally, the fastest route is one rectangle per band from the top down. Each band is half of the height, so divide the canvas before you start filling — the most common way to lose points here is drifting proportions, where the top band creeps larger and squeezes the one at the bottom.
The disc is the focal point, so its size and position carry real weight. Aim for a diameter of about 18% of the flag's height and centre it slightly towards the hoist rather than dead centre. Use the circle tool and drag outwards from the middle.
There are three star groups to place. Get their arrangement right before worrying about the points — scoring reads the pattern of coloured areas, so a cluster in the correct position beats beautifully drawn stars in the wrong one.
The triangle at the hoist should reach roughly to the middle of the flag. Draw it early: it defines where the horizontal bands get cut off, and adding it last usually means painting over work you already did.
- Fill the whole canvas with the background or the first stripe — an unpainted margin costs you points.
- Lay in the remaining bands with the rectangle tool, keeping the divisions level.
- Add the central detail last, checking its size against the height of the flag.
- Press Check my flag to see your drawing next to the real one.
Where people lose points on this flag
- Reversing the order of the bands. Half of all lost points on tricolours come from this alone.
- Over-investing in the emblem. It is scored as a shape in the right place, not as artwork — time spent on its interior is time not spent filling the field.
- Leaving a white margin around the edge of the canvas. Unpainted area is scored as wrong colour, so fill right to the borders.
Proportions
the Philippines flies its flag at 2:1 — noticeably wider than the 3:2 most countries use, so leave room. The drawing canvas is a fixed shape and scoring compares regions rather than absolute measurements, so you do not need to reproduce the ratio exactly; what matters is that the internal divisions land in the right relative places.