How many stars are on the Flag of Europe?

The Flag of Europe has twelve stars.

The stars are golden, five-pointed and arranged in a circle on a blue field. Their number is fixed at twelve; it does not represent the number of European Union member states, so the flag remains unchanged when membership rises or falls. The circle symbolizes unity and completeness, while the design serves as a broader symbol of Europe.

The Council of Europe officially adopted the flag on 9 December 1955. The European Communities adopted it in 1985, and it became associated with the European Union when that organization was formed in 1993. The same emblem is therefore seen both at Council of Europe institutions and across EU buildings and documents.

A frequent mistake is answering twenty-seven, the EU’s current number of member states, or assuming the stars correspond to countries. They do not. The twelve-star design predates the EU’s present membership and is intended as a stable symbolic emblem rather than a membership count.