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Australian State Flags Quiz

Drag the flags of Australia's six states and two mainland territories onto a flat map of Australia, three tries each. No labels.

Six Blue Ensigns and a badge each

Six of the eight flags on this map are the same flag with a different badge. New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania all fly a British Blue Ensign: a dark blue field, the Union Jack in the canton, and the state's badge in the fly. The pattern comes from the colonial era, when the Admiralty required the government vessels of each colony to wear the Blue Ensign with a distinguishing badge, and the colonies kept those ensigns as their state flags after Federation in 1901. Most of the badges were settled in the 1870s; South Australia's, from 1904, is the youngest of the six.

The Australian national flag is itself a Blue Ensign, which is why Victoria is the state flag most often taken for it. Both carry the Southern Cross in white, but Victoria has a royal crown above the stars and no large seven-pointed Commonwealth Star beneath the Union Jack.

Lions, a swan and a magpie: the badges

New South Wales carries a white disc with the red cross of St George; a golden lion walks across the centre of the cross and an eight-pointed gold star sits on each arm. Tasmania's white disc holds a red lion, walking, and nothing else. Queensland's white disc has a light blue Maltese cross with a crown at its centre. The two badges of the west and south are gold discs with a black bird: Western Australia's is a black swan, the bird that gave the Swan River its name and has been the emblem of the colony since its foundation, swimming towards the hoist; South Australia's is the piping shrike, a white-backed magpie shown from the front with its wings raised. Victoria has no disc: five white stars of the Southern Cross with a crown above them.

The two that break the pattern

The mainland territories came to their flags long after the ensign era and chose a different scheme: a panel at the hoist with the Southern Cross, and the territory's own colours in the fly. The Northern Territory's flag, adopted at self-government in 1978, has a black panel and an ochre field with a stylised Sturt's desert rose, the territory's floral emblem: seven white petals around a black seven-pointed star, the seven standing for the six states and the Territory itself. The Australian Capital Territory's flag, from 1993, has a blue panel and a gold field, Canberra's colours, with the city's coat of arms: a castle, a crown, a crossed sword and mace and a rose, held up by a black swan and a white swan.

Telling the six apart in a hurry

With the six ensigns the only thing that changes is the badge, so look there and nowhere else. A white disc means New South Wales, Queensland or Tasmania: a red cross with a lion and stars, a blue cross with a crown, or a red lion alone. A gold disc means Western Australia or South Australia: a swan in silhouette, or a bird with its wings spread. Stars and a crown with no disc is Victoria. The two lions are the usual mix-up: the Tasmanian one is red and fills its disc, the New South Wales one is small and gold and sits on a red cross. Between the territories, a black panel and ochre means the Northern Territory, blue and gold the ACT, and the ACT, the smallest unit on the map, is the wedge inside New South Wales rather than the large block across the north.

All 8 states and their capitals

8 states are on this map, listed in alphabetical order with their capitals — the same facts the Hint button draws on. All of them are in the deck.

1. Australian Capital TerritoryCanberra
2. New South WalesSydney
3. Northern TerritoryDarwin
4. QueenslandBrisbane
5. South AustraliaAdelaide
6. TasmaniaHobart
7. VictoriaMelbourne
8. Western AustraliaPerth

Questions about these flags

What is the bird on the South Australian flag?

The piping shrike, the name South Australians give to the white-backed form of the Australian magpie. On the badge it faces the viewer with wings raised, in black and white on a gold disc, and it has been the state's emblem since 1904. It is the one bird on the map shown face on; Western Australia's swan is a side-on silhouette.

Why does the Northern Territory flag have no Union Jack?

Because it was designed in 1978, when the Territory gained self-government, long after the colonies had chosen their ensigns. It uses the Territory's own colours, black, white and ochre, with the Southern Cross on the black panel and a Sturt's desert rose in the fly. The ACT followed the same scheme in 1993, in Canberra's blue and gold.

Why does Victoria's flag look like the Australian flag?

Both are Blue Ensigns with the Southern Cross, and Victoria was flying the constellation on its ensign decades before Federation. The difference is in the fly and under the canton: Victoria has a crown above the stars, while the national flag has no crown and a large seven-pointed Commonwealth Star below the Union Jack instead.

More maps

Other maps: US states, Ukrainian oblasts, UK counties, French regions, Spanish regions, Italian regions, Japanese prefectures, Brazilian states, Polish voivodeships, German states, Dutch provinces, Swedish counties, Canadian provinces, Mexican states, Argentine provinces, Swiss cantons. All 235 flags of the world with their capitals: Flags of the world · all modes.