TheGoogle logo appears in numerous settings to identify thesearch engine company.Google has used severallogos overits history, with the first logo created bySergey Brin usingGIMP. A revised logo debuted on September 1, 2015. The previous logo, with slight modifications between 1999 and 2013, was designed byRuth Kedar, with awordmark based on theCatull font, anold style serif typeface designed by Gustav Jaeger for theBerthold Type Foundry in 1982.[1]
The company also includes various modifications or humorous features, such as modifications of their logo for use on holidays, birthdays of famous people, and major events, such as the Olympics.[2] These special logos, some designed byDennis Hwang, have become known asGoogle Doodles.
In 1997,Larry Page created a computerized version of the Google letters using thefree graphics programGIMP. Thetypeface was changed and an exclamation mark was added mimicking theYahoo! logo.[3]
"There were a lot of different color iterations", says Ruth Kedar, thegraphic designer who developed the now-famous logo in May 1999. "We ended up with the primary colors, but instead of having the pattern go in order, we put a secondary color on the L, which brought back the idea that Google doesn't follow the rules."[4] The fontCatull was used, "I was trying to find something that was both traditionally tied to the beautiful fonts in the past and also had a very current and in some ways surprising ways", says Ruth, "I really loved the way that it had these very elegant stems and ascenders and descenders and also had these Serifs that were very, very precise and I wanted something that when you looked at it, it was very clear that it's something you haven't seen before".[5]
In 2010, the Google logo received its first major overhaul since May 31, 1999. The new logo was first previewed on November 8, 2009,[6] and was officially launched on May 6, 2010 exclusively for Google Search, replacing the 1999 Google logo.[7] It utilizes the same typeface as the previous logo, but the "o" is distinctly more orange-colored in place of the previously more yellowish "o", as well as a much more subtle shadow rendered in a different shading style. The old 1999 Google logo remained in use as the corporate branding for the company as well as all other Google services until November 15, 2010, when a slightly modified version of the 2010 Google logo was used for the corporate branding, Google Apps (including all its associated apps such as Gmail), other Google services such as Google Sign-In, country-specific versions of Google, and Google Search itself, replacing all instances of the 1999 Google logo. The capital 'G' and lowercase 'g' of the logo featured a more saturated blue color than the initial logo.[8]
On September 19, 2013, Google introduced a new "flat" (two-dimensional) logo with a slightly altered color palette.[9][10] The old 2010 Google logo remained in use on some pages, such as the Google Doodles page, for a period of time.[11] On May 24, 2014, the Google logo was slightly updated with some minor typographical tweaks, with the second 'g' moved right one pixel and the 'l' moved down and right one pixel.[12][13]
On September 1, 2015, Google introduced a controversial "new logo and identity family" designed to work across multiple devices.[14][15][16] The notable difference in the logo is the change in the typeface. The colors remained the same as with the previous logo, however, Google switched to a modern, geometric sans-serif typeface calledProduct Sans, created in-house at Google (which is also used for theAlphabet logo).[17] On May 12, 2025, Google updated its logo in the Google app on iPhones and Pixel phones. The notable change is the updated color scheme, to include a gradient between sections of color instead of solid blocks.[18]
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The first GoogleDoodle was in honor of theBurning Man Festival of 1998.[19][20] The doodle was designed byLarry Page andSergey Brin to notify users of their absence in case the servers crashed. Subsequent Google Doodles were designed by an outside contractor, until Larry and Sergey asked then-internDennis Hwang to design a logo forBastille Day in 2000.[21][22] Today, doodles are designed and published by a team of employees ("doodlers").[23]
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A colorless version of the logo is particularly used on a local homepage in recognition of a major tragedy, often for several days. It was first used on the Google Poland homepage in April 2010 following theSmolensk air disaster that killed, among others,Polish presidentLech Kaczyński. A few days later, the logo was used in China and Hong Kong to pay respects to the victims of the2010 Qinghai earthquake.[24]
On September 7, 2010, a colorless Google logo going by the name of the "Keystroke Logo" was introduced, which lit up with the standard Google colors as the first 6 letters of a search query were entered.[25]
A new version of the colorless logo was introduced on December 5, 2018, following thedeath of George H. W. Bush,[26][27] and was used again on May 27, 2019 forMemorial Day (and every Memorial Day holiday since), on September 8, 2022, following thedeath of Queen Elizabeth II (a black version of the colorless logo was used for thefuneral of Queen Elizabeth II a week later on September 19, 2022[28]) and on January 9, 2025, following thedeath of Jimmy Carter.[29]
A white version of the colorless logo is used in Google Chrome when a background image is set on the main home page, which can also appear whendark mode is selected in the browser.
Google's firstfavicon from May 31, 1999, to May 29, 2008, was a blue, uppercase "G" on white background accompanied by a border with a red, blue, and a green side, debuting alongside Google's then-new logo design in May 1999.
On May 30, 2008, a new favicon was launched. It showed alowercase "g" from Google, colored in blue against a white background,[30] and originally was intended to be a part of a larger set of icons developed for betterscalability onmobile devices.[31]
A new favicon was launched on January 9, 2009. It included a left-aligned white "g" with background areas colored in red, green, blue and yellow, with the top, bottom, and left edges of the "g" cropped. It was based on a design by André Resende, a computer science undergraduate student at theUniversity of Campinas in Brazil. He submitted it for a contest launched by Google in June 2008 to receive favicon submissions. The official Google blog stated: "His placement of a white 'g' on a color-blocked background was highly recognizable and attractive, while seeming to capture the essence of Google".[32]
The favicon used from August 13, 2012, to August 31, 2015, showed the small letter "g" in white, centered on a solid light blue background.
On September 1, 2015, a new favicon was launched in conjunction with the new logo design that day, which shows a capital letter "G" in the tailor-made font for the new logo, with segments colored red, yellow, green, and blue.[33] It was updated with a gradient between the colored segments on May 2025, which visually connects with the gradient present in the logo of Google'sgenerative artificial intelligencechatbotGemini.[34][35]
Media related toGoogle logos at Wikimedia Commons
