The logo has evolved – modern logo requirements

Go back to the print age and logos previously had a much narrower set of considerations. Does it work in greyscale? Can it be scaled up without a loss of quality? Is it readable at small sizes?

Back in today’s world, however, and a logo needs to do so much more. It’s this change in logo considerations that is the reasoning behind Google’s logo refresh of last week – their previous logo no longer met the requirements needed. So what exactly do we need to consider now when creating a new logo? What are the modern logo requirements?

• RWD (Responsive Web Design) – Does the logo scale well for mobiles and tablets? Could it be designed to display differently?
• Favicons and Touch Icons – how well does the logo translate into an icon format? (Particularly important for brands that use apps)
• SVG – For higher image quality and scalability across devices, logos need to work as an SVG.
• File size – These days we strive hard to make the internet as fast as possible – logos need to be lightweight and download quickly.

These are issues that Google addressed with their update. Their new logo exists as an SVG, so it’s pure vector format and can be drawn with a few simple circles and rectangles. This achieves most of the above goals – it has a tiny file size which is great for mobiles and slower connections, and by switching to a sans-serif font the logo is more readable when scaled down.

Depending on your browser windows size/device size, the logos on this page will adapt. Try resizing your browser to see what happens.

http://www.responsivelogos.co.uk

Google’s new logo also works responsively, a now critical factor in logo design.

What this all means is that, as a business owner, when you hire an agency to design your company or product a new logo, the end result needs to consider these requirements – which can mean that it may not be quite what you requested. The agency has a responsibility when designing your logo to ensure that it works well across many different criteria, unfortunately, you may need to sacrifice your own personal needs. That motif you insist on may not scale at all well, or be readable on a smaller scale.

You’ll also need to be aware that with these increased requirements, the logo design process is longer and more complicated, which means inevitably the cost of re-branding is higher.