By Mehdi HassanHow much does a brand sprint cost?
A brand sprint costs from a few hundred dollars to around £10k, depending on who runs it and what you get at the end. In our research, freelancers on Dribbble and Contra quoted $249 to $2,300 for "brand sprints", studios offered one-week identity sprints at around $3,000, and agency-run sprints came in at about £10k over four weeks.
These are typical ranges we see quoted and they vary widely. The label "brand sprint" covers everything from a single logo with a palette to a multi-week strategy engagement, so price alone tells you little. Our hub on what a brand sprint is explains the formats; this page is about what each price buys.
Option | Typical price quoted | What you usually get | What's usually missing |
|---|---|---|---|
DIY GV workshop | Free | Team alignment on values, audience, personality | Any design output |
Freelance sprint | $249–$2,300 | Logo and palette, sometimes type and a short guide | Positioning, copy, applied screens |
Studio one-week sprint | Around $3,000 | Identity plus applied screens and source files | Naming, research, full brand book |
Agency-run sprint | About £10k, about four weeks | More research and stakeholder sessions | Often the build-ready screens |
Full identity system | $5k–$25k | Complete system and guidelines | Speed |
Scope inside the freelance range varies most: some sprints at the top end include a type system and a short guide, while many at the bottom are a logo and a palette. For the wider branding market, the cost guides we reviewed put logo-only work at $100 to $2k and strategy-led identities at $25k to $200k or more. How much branding costs for a startup covers that full range.
What does a $3,000 brand sprint include?
Our brand & design sprint is $3,000, fixed. It covers a brand refresh or new identity plus 10 website or product explorations, delivered as Figma files you own. It's design only: building the website is a separate, fixed-price package. We confirm the exact scope on the intro call; a typical sprint covers the following.
- Brand & design sprint, fixed price
- $3,000
- Website or product explorations
- 10
- Our fixed-price landing page build, if you need one next
- $6,000
- Positioning and messaging. We start with the words: who it's for, why you, and the homepage headline.
- Identity. A refreshed or new logo or wordmark, color palette with roles and typography.
- Voice. Short do-and-don't rules with sample lines your team can copy.
- 10 explorations. The brand applied to website sections or product screens, so you see it working before you build.
- Figma source files. Organised files you own, plus exported logo assets.
We don't include naming, trademark searches, customer research or a printed brand book. The full list of files and formats is in brand sprint deliverables, and our brand identity checklist shows how a sprint compares with a complete branding project.
What drives the cost of a brand sprint?
Five things drive brand sprint cost: how much strategy is included, how many directions you see, whether the brand is applied to real screens, who does the work, and how many people need to approve it. Hours matter less than scope.
Cost driver | Lower cost | Higher cost |
|---|---|---|
Strategy | Founders bring positioning | Studio runs workshops and research |
Copy | Not included | Headline, messaging and voice rules |
Applied screens | Logo on artboards | Website and product screens |
Who works on it | One freelancer | A team covering words and design |
Stakeholders | Two founders | Leadership team with sign-off rounds |
Applied screens are the driver most worth paying for. They're the difference between a logo and a brand you can build a website from. A cheap sprint that stops at the logo often costs more overall, because someone has to do the application work later.
What costs aren't included in a brand sprint?
Rollout, font licences, naming and legal work are rarely included in any brand sprint price. Cost guides from ManyPixels and others advise budgeting an extra 20 to 40% for rollout, which is the work of applying the new brand to your website, deck, product and templates.
- Website build. The sprint gives you designs; someone still has to build them.
- Pitch and sales decks. The brand gives you the look; the narrative and slides are separate.
- Font licences. Some typefaces need paid licences for web and app use. Ask before you approve a font.
- Naming and trademark. Legal clearance needs an IP lawyer.
- Product UI. Applying the brand across an app is usually design system work.
Hypothetical example: budgeting a sprint plus rollout
For example, suppose a seed-stage startup buys a $3,000 sprint. Using the 20 to 40% rollout guideline, it should expect another $600 to $1,200 of work to apply the brand to templates, social profiles and a deck cover, whether done in-house or by a designer.
The website is separate. With us, a single conversion page is $6,000 and a site of up to six pages is $8,000, both fixed. The sprint's 10 explorations become the starting designs for that build, so the website work starts from approved screens instead of a blank file.
How do you compare brand sprint prices fairly?
Compare what each sprint ends with, not what it costs. Line up the deliverables, check which ones include copy and applied screens, and ask each provider the same ownership and file questions. A $1,500 sprint and a $3,000 sprint can be very different products.
- List the outputs side by side. Positioning, headline, logo set, palette, type, voice, applied screens, source files.
- Ask who owns the work. Full assignment on final payment is standard.
- Ask what happens after. Can the same team build the website, or will you brief someone new?
- Check the stakeholder model. If more people must approve, a cheaper sprint will stall.
- Test the team. A paid trial week with a design partner shows how a studio works before you commit.
If you're comparing sprints to logo packages and full identities, startup branding cost puts every option on one page, and what a brand design sprint should cost covers the related label.
