The flags and what each one means

Published Invalid Date · figures as of the 2026 season.

Marshals at posts around the circuit show flags, and the same signals appear on light panels beside the track and on the driver’s steering wheel. Each flag is an instruction.

Flag	Meaning	What the driver must do
Green	The track is clear	Resume racing after a yellow-flag zone
Yellow	Danger ahead, such as a stopped car or debris	Slow down, no overtaking in the zone
Double yellow	Serious danger, the track may be blocked or marshals are on it	Slow down a lot, be ready to stop, no overtaking
Red	The session is stopped	Return slowly to the pit lane
Blue	A faster car is about to lap you	Let it pass at the first safe chance; ignoring three blue flags brings a penalty
White	A slow vehicle is on the track, such as the medical car or a recovery vehicle	Take care
Yellow and red stripes	The surface is slippery: oil, water or debris	Take care in that zone
Black and white, split diagonally, with a car number	Warning for unsporting behaviour	Stop doing it; the next offence is penalised
Black with an orange disc, with a car number	The car has a mechanical problem that could endanger others	Pit at once for repair
Black, with a car number	Disqualified	Return to the pit lane and stop
Chequered	The session has ended	Complete the lap at reduced speed and return to the pits

How the yellow flags work with the safety car

A yellow flag covers only the marshals’ sector where the incident is. A double yellow over the whole circuit, with “VSC” or “SC” boards, means the virtual safety car or the safety car is in use, and the race pages mark those laps on the lap chart. The explainer on safety cars and red flags covers what each does to the race.

Qualifying under yellow flags

A lap set while a yellow flag is shown in any sector is usually deleted if the driver did not slow, and drivers who fail to slow enough under double yellows are penalised. That is why a late crash in Q3 can decide the grid: everyone behind the crash loses their final lap.

The chequered flag

The race ends when the leader takes the chequered flag after the set number of laps, or at the two-hour time limit. Every other car is classified when it next crosses the line, which is why a car one lap down finishes “+1 lap”: it has completed one fewer lap than the winner. The results tables on this site show these gaps as “+1 lap” or “+2 laps”, and lapped drivers who did not finish the final lap are listed with the laps they completed.