Alabama 2x3 Feet Nylon State Flag Made in USA

A 2x3 foot flag is the size you fly where a 3x5 foot flag would be too much. A boat transom. The side of an RV. A garden flagpole. A wall bracket on a narrow porch where a bigger flag would brush the siding every time the wind turned.

This is the Alabama state flag at 2x3 Feet (6 square feet) in nylon, made in the United States and finished with brass grommets.

Built to the Alabama flag specification

The Alabama flag is set out in Alabama Code Section 1-2-5. It is a crimson St. Andrew’s cross, a saltire, on a white field, with the bars required to be not less than six inches broad.

Adopted February 16, 1895 by Act 383, introduced by its designer, Representative John W. A. Sanford Jr.

Alabama Code Section 1-2-5 says nothing about the overall size or even the shape. The only absolute measurement in it is that the saltire bars be not less than six inches broad, which on a small flag is proportionally impossible to satisfy and has never once been enforced. The Attorney General addressed the shape question in 1987 and concluded that where the statute is silent, precedent and practice govern.

We reproduce that design faithfully, in the standard outdoor flag sizes the whole industry uses and that the states themselves buy. What matters on an outdoor flag is that the colors, the seal and the emblems are right, and they are.

The law that defines it, in its own words

Code of Alabama Section 1-2-5 reads:

The flag of the State of Alabama shall be a crimson cross of St. Andrew on a field of white. The bars forming the cross shall be not less than six inches broad, and must extend diagonally across the flag from side to side.

You do not have to take our word for any of that. Read Code of Alabama Section 1-2-5 in full at Justia, and check what we sell against it.

This is the flag we make. Not an approximation of it.

What is on it and what it means

The statute itself describes only a crimson saltire on white. It carries no seal and no lettering, which is why it reads clearly from a distance at every size.

What most listings get wrong

Because the statute sets a minimum bar width of six inches, a very small flag technically does not meet the legal definition. That is a curiosity rather than a problem, but it is the kind of detail nobody else on the internet mentions.

Where the Alabama flag flies

A thirty eight by twenty foot flag on a seventy foot pole at Camp Liberty in Cullman County is billed only as Cullman County's largest, not a statewide record.

Fly it on Alabama’s birthday

Alabama became the 22nd state on December 14, 1819. Under the United States Flag Code as amended July 7, 1976, a state flag flown on the state’s birthday takes its place beneath the United States flag, and that day is the one date every year the Alabama flag has an official reason to go up.

Buy it now and it is on the flagpole for the day. The full list of state birthdays is on our state birthdays page.

Nylon or polyester in Alabama

Nylon inland at Birmingham, Montgomery, Huntsville and Tuscaloosa. Polyester on the Gulf Coast at Mobile for salt, humidity and hurricane exposure.

Take any flag down for tornado and tropical events.

For scale, the National Weather Service ultraviolet index forecast for Mobile on July 23, 2026 was 11 at solar noon, in the extreme band. That is the sun this flag has to survive.

At this size, six square feet, material choice is about how fast it dries and whether it flies in light air, not about surviving the elements.

This is the nylon listing, suited to the sheltered and moderate wind sites named above, to any house bracket, and to anywhere you bring the flag in during storms. Two factors drive that choice. Nylon is light, catching the breeze most yards actually get instead of hanging still, and it dries quickly, which is what keeps mildew at bay in humid air. The cost is ultraviolet life: nylon’s amide bonds absorb and break under ultraviolet exposure, fading faster than polyester, and it loses about a tenth of its strength wet. On one of the exposed sites named above, look instead at the polyester version.

Here is the part usually learned the hard way, after a second purchase: nylon catches wind on days polyester simply will not move. When the flag needs to be visibly flying — a quiet morning, a holiday, a funeral, a ceremony — that argues for nylon even on a site where polyester would technically last longer. A flag that just hangs there is not doing its job either.

Institutions commonly cite the American Legion’s figure: the federal government expects about ninety days from a flag flown daily sunrise to sunset, and roughly a quarter of that flown around the clock. On the ground, retailers report three to six months for nylon flown daily, four to eight for polyester, and one to three years for occasional flying. Take these as working estimates, not warranties — exposure can move them a long way in either direction.

How the 2x3 Feet is built

Six square feet does not spare the fly end — it cracks more than people expect, because a small flag is usually low and close to a building, where turbulent air does more damage than open wind. Four rows of lock stitching on the fly end answers that.

The arithmetic behind that: 6 square feet of nylon at roughly two ounces a square yard. In a thirty mile an hour wind the fly end of a flag this size travels faster than the wind itself, because the wave running out to the tip accelerates as it goes. That is why the tip wears out first and why the stitching count at that end is the number worth reading on any listing.

One hand is all it takes to remove this from the bracket, and it folds down to coat-pocket size, the only one in the range you handle without thinking.

Lock stitching means each stitch is knotted into the next, so a broken thread stops where it broke rather than unzipping the seam. 4 rows does not mean 4 times the strength; it means 3 backups. Two solid brass grommets sit in an inch and a half of reinforced heavy duty white heading. Every snap of a small flag puts the whole load on those grommets, which is why a thin heading with stamped grommets fails first.

Commercial grade nylon is the material in this flag. Light enough to catch a gentle breeze, it sheds water rather than holding onto it and dries fast, which keeps a flag from staying heavy and stressing its seams. The ink is UV resistant and field tested, since sun exposure is what determines how long the color lasts.

A design that reproduces cleanly

Two colors and no seal. It is one of the cheapest state flags to build well and one of the most durable, because there is no fine detail to crack or fade unevenly.

For what it is worth, the North American Vexillological Association surveyed 72 state, provincial and territorial flags in 2001 and rated them from zero to ten. The Alabama flag placed 29, at 6.06 out of 10.

Will it fit my flagpole?

Garden flagpoles, boat staffs, and four to six foot house brackets are the right fit. Beyond roughly eight feet of flagpole, this size looks lost.

Questions about the 2x3 Feet

Will a 2x3 foot flag look right on a house bracket? It is the size that looks right on a short bracket, a boat staff, a garden flagpole or a narrow porch, anywhere a 3x5 foot flag would drag or wrap. On a full six foot bracket it reads small.

Is a 2x3 foot flag the same design as the big ones? Yes. Every size reproduces the same official design in the same proportions. Only the size and the hardware change.

How long will a 2x3 foot flag last on a boat? Salt, sun and constant motion make a boat the hardest place to fly a flag. Expect months, not years, in any material, and rinse it in fresh water when it comes off the water.

Handled more than it is flown

A small flag gets taken down and put up constantly, far more than a house flag does. It goes on the boat for the weekend and comes off Sunday night. That handling is its own kind of wear, and it is why the heading and the grommets on this size matter more than the square footage suggests.

Specifications

• Size: 2x3 Feet
• Area: 6 square feet
• Material: 100 percent nylon
• Fly end: 4 rows of lock stitching
• Heading: heavy duty white, reinforced, 1-1/2 inch
• Finish: Brass Grommets
• Ink: UV resistant, field tested
• Made in the United States by FORTISVEX

Which size do I need?

Underneath both tables is a single ratio: a flag a quarter to a third the flagpole’s height. When you land between two rows, that is a real choice, not a rounding error — smaller flies more often, bigger reads further.

If you know your flagpole height, start here.

• 6 Feet house bracket: 2x3 Feet or 3x5 Feet
• 15 to 20 Feet flagpole: 3x5 Feet or 4x6 Feet
• 20 to 25 Feet flagpole: 4x6 Feet or 5x8 Feet
• 25 to 35 Feet flagpole: 5x8 Feet or 6x10 Feet
• 35 to 45 Feet flagpole: 6x10 Feet or 8x12 Feet
• 45 to 60 Feet flagpole: 8x12 Feet or 10x15 Feet
• 60 to 80 Feet flagpole: 10x15 Feet or 12x18 Feet
• 80 to 100 Feet flagpole: 12x18 Feet or 15x25 Feet
• 100 to 120 Feet flagpole: 15x25 Feet or 20x30 Feet
• 120 to 150 Feet flagpole: 20x30 Feet or 20x38 Feet
• 150 to 200 Feet flagpole: 20x38 Feet or 30x50 Feet
• 200 to 240 Feet flagpole: 30x50 Feet or 30x60 Feet
• 240 Feet and above: 30x60 Feet or 50x80 Feet, engineered to the flagpole

If you know your flag size, start here.

• 2x3 Feet: 4 to 8 Feet bracket or garden flagpole
• 3x5 Feet: 6 Feet bracket, or 15 to 20 Feet in-ground flagpole
• 4x6 Feet: 18 to 25 Feet in-ground flagpole
• 5x8 Feet: 25 to 35 Feet flagpole
• 6x10 Feet: 30 to 40 Feet flagpole
• 8x12 Feet: 40 to 50 Feet flagpole
• 10x15 Feet: 50 to 60 Feet flagpole
• 12x18 Feet: 60 to 80 Feet flagpole
• 15x25 Feet: 80 to 100 Feet flagpole
• 20x30 Feet: 100 to 120 Feet flagpole
• 20x38 Feet: 120 to 150 Feet flagpole. This is the garrison size under Executive Order 10834, at a one to one point nine ratio rather than the two to three of the commercial sizes, and it is the size flown at the White House and the Capitol
• 30x50 Feet: 150 to 200 Feet flagpole
• 30x60 Feet: 200 to 240 Feet flagpole. This is the largest standard commercial size
• 50x80 Feet: 240 Feet and above, engineered to the flagpole

The quarter to a third rule holds all the way up, but above about a hundred feet the flag and the flagpole stop being two purchases and become one engineered system: the truck, the halyard, the foundation and the wind load all have to be specified together, and a flag bought without checking the flagpole rating damages the flagpole first. Several famous installations deliberately fly longer than the rule, which is a choice made with an engineer rather than from a chart.

The full range is available to order even where a size is not shown on the site. If what you need is not listed here, ask and we can still get it made.

About the back of the flag

It is normal for a printed flag to read backward from behind — almost every flag flown in America works this way. A flag that reads correctly from both sides is double sided: two flags sewn together with a liner, at roughly double the weight and cost. Single sided stays the standard and the right choice except where a state’s own law requires the double sided build.

Flying it with the United States flag

Title 4, Section 7 of the Flag Code is the source for this. The United States flag is never subordinate in position — nothing flies above it, and nothing takes its place at the viewer’s left when flags are level with each other. On matched flagpoles, the United States flag takes the viewer’s left and the flags should be sized the same; on unequal flagpoles, it goes on the taller one; and on a single pole flying two flags, it goes at the top. There is no penalty for civilians who do not follow the Code, but institutions treat it as the standard regardless.

Buy two and they both last longer

One flag flown month after month wears faster at the same point every time; two flags rotated monthly outlast three run to failure, because rest lets fabric recover. Bring the flag in ahead of severe weather — a hard storm overnight can outdo six normal months. And check the fly end first, since that is where fraying starts, and a small stitch repair there is worth a full extra season.

For cities, counties, schools and agencies

State flags go out to municipalities, school districts, fire and police departments, courthouses and state agencies as a matter of course. Tax exempt purchasing runs through the tax exempt page, and anything involving quantity, a replacement schedule or a size we do not list goes through the contact page.

Why buy it from us

We are a small, American-based company that stocks what it lists. Every flag is made in the United States, uses UV resistant ink, and is finished to the standard described above rather than cut down to hit a price. One flag that lasts is worth more to us than three that do not. Free shipping applies over twenty five dollars.