The national flag of Azerbaijan (Azərbaycan bayrağı), often referred to as the tricolour flag (üçrəngli bayraq), is a horizontal tricolour that features three equally sized bars of bright blue, red, and green; a white crescent; and a centred eight-pointed star.

The day commemorates the first official adoption of the tricolour as a national flag by the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, which occurred on 9 November 1918.

It was reinstated, with slight variations to the colours and size, on 5 February 1991 following the country's independence from the Soviet Union.

[6] Within a few months, the newly adopted flag began to be questioned due to it exclusively representing Turkism.

Created by Ali bey Huseynzade,[12] the new flag was a horizontal tricolour of blue, red and green with a white crescent and an eight-pointed star placed in the centre.

In a speech to the parliament, Mammad Amin Rasulzade, the Azerbaijani National Council chairman who had declared ADR's independence, stated: "[...] and for this reason, gentlemen, the National Council has raised this three-coloured flag, which represents Azerbaijan, and this flag, the symbol of Turkic sovereignty, Islamic culture, and modern European power, will always fly above us.

[14][15] After the fall of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in April 1920 following the Red Army invasion, their flag was used by emigrant organizations outside the Soviet Union.

In 1956, a protester named Jahid Hilaloghlu raised the ADR flag over Maiden Tower in Baku, showing his defiance of Soviet Azerbaijan.

[24][25] At the time, the state language of Soviet Azerbaijan was Azerbaijani Turkic and its alphabet was based on the Arabic script.

The flag's definition was as follows: The national flag of Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic is a panel consisting of two horizontal bands of colour: the upper red part of three-quarters of the width and the bottom is blue, nearly one quarter the width of the flag with the image on the top left corner of the red band, at the flagpole and gold hammer and sickle, and above them a red five-pointed star framed by gold fringe.

[29][13] The first constitution since independence was adopted on 12 November 1995 after a national vote; one of the articles described the three-colour flag of the republic.

[28][29] On 17 November 2007, the Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev issued a decree "On creation of the National Flag Square" in Baku.

[34] The flagpole was dismantled in 2017 due the risks of the structure falling onto Baku Boulevard grounds.

[35] The national flag of Azerbaijan consists of three horizontal stripes of equal width, from top to bottom: light blue, red, and green.

The exact specifications for its colours were issued in the 2004 decree "On the Rules of the National Flag of the Republic of Azerbaijan".

The colour scheme used in 1918–1920, and between 1991 and 2013 is as follows: The colours, updated in 2013[39] and ratified in 2018[40] and specified in Pantone, are as follows: The bright blue symbolizes the Turkic heritage of Azerbaijan, the red reflects the creation of a modern state and the development of democracy, and green symbolizes Islam.

Fatali Khan Khoyski points to the eight letters in the word "Azerbaijan" (آذربایجان) when written in Arabic.

[11] The eight points of the star are also thought to stand for the eight Turkic peoples classified in pre-Soviet times:[28] Azeris, Ottomans (Turks), Jagatais, Tatars, Kipchaks, Seljuks, and Turkomans.

[47] Desecration can be expressed in the commission by persons over the age of 16 of a wide variety of active public actions, indicating a disrespectful attitude towards the flag, for example, its destruction, damage, or cynical drawings or inscriptions.

[50] In 1919, Jafar Jabbarly wrote the poem, "To Azerbaijani flag" in dedication to the state symbols of Azerbaijan.