By Mehdi HassanWhat are the steps of the logo design process?
The logo design process moves from words to sketches to tested routes to final files, in eight steps. Each step narrows the options, so by the time a founder chooses, they're choosing between strong candidates rather than gambling on taste.
This article walks through each step, then shows a hypothetical project with the sketches, the routes that were rejected and why each one was killed. That last part is what most process articles leave out, and it's the part that shows how decisions really get made. For where the logo fits in a wider brand system, start with our guide to logo design for startups.
1. Write the brief
Positioning, audience, three to five adjectives, competitors, where the logo will appear, and any must-haves or no-gos.
2. Research the category
Gather competitor and adjacent logos on one board and name the clichés to avoid.
3. Define the strategy in words
Agree what the logo must signal and which logo type suits the name and product surfaces.
4. Sketch widely
Explore many quick directions, from type-only ideas to symbols, before refining anything.
5. Choose and refine two or three routes
Develop the strongest directions properly, with real type, spacing and color, and record why the others were dropped.
6. Test on real surfaces
Favicon at 16px, app icon, website header in light and dark, deck cover, social avatar and monochrome.
7. Select and refine with feedback
The decision-maker picks one route against the brief; the designer refines curves, spacing and small-size versions.
8. Deliver files and rules
Vector sources, SVG and PNG exports, light and dark versions, small-size versions, color values and a short usage page.
How do the brief and research shape the logo?
The brief and research shape the logo by setting the criteria every route will be judged against and by showing what the category already looks like. A logo designed without them is judged on taste, which leads to endless rounds.
A useful brief is short and specific. 'Modern and clean' says nothing, because every brief says it. 'Calm and exact, not cold; for finance teams who distrust hype' gives the designer something to design toward and the founder something to judge against. Our logo design brief guide has a template.
Category research is where distinctiveness starts. Put the logos of ten competitors and a few adjacent companies on one board and look for patterns: the same colors, the same symbol ideas, the same type styles. In AI, for example, the board is often full of gradients and soft abstract loops, a pattern explored in why do all AI logos look the same. The aim is to know the clichés before sketching, so you can avoid them on purpose.
How does sketching lead to logo routes?
Sketching leads to logo routes by exploring many ideas cheaply and keeping only the few that meet the brief and stand out from the category. A route is a developed direction, not a single drawing, and it usually comes with a short rationale.
Good sketching is broad before it's deep. It covers type-only ideas, such as custom letterforms, ligatures or a distinctive weight; letter-based symbols, such as monograms; abstract shapes that express the adjectives; and occasionally a pictorial idea if the name suggests one. The logo type is often settled here, guided by the questions in our guide to the types of logos.
From the sketches, the designer picks two or three routes to develop properly: real type, careful spacing, a color proposal and a first small-size version. Each route should feel genuinely different, otherwise the choice becomes a debate about details.
How are rejected logo routes killed, and why?
Rejected logo routes are killed by checking each one against the brief, the category board and the surface tests, and writing down which test it failed. Recording the reason stops the same idea from coming back in round three.
Hypothetical example: the routes for a fintech startup, and why most were killed
For example, suppose a seed-stage startup called Tallow builds cash-flow forecasting for finance teams. The brief says: calm and exact, not cold; trusted by CFOs; must work as a favicon and in a dense product header.
Sketching produces about a dozen ideas. Here's how they were narrowed.
Killed: a rising-chart symbol. Reason: every forecasting tool on the category board uses an arrow or a chart, so it fails distinctiveness.
Killed: a gradient droplet, a nod to 'cash flow'. Reason: too literal, and the gradient fails in monochrome on invoices.
Killed: a playful rounded wordmark. Reason: it reads as consumer and friendly, not 'trusted by CFOs'.
Killed: an interlocking TL monogram. Reason: at 16px it closes up into a dark blob.
Kept, route A: a custom wordmark with a squared, slightly condensed T and precise spacing. Calm, exact, and the T works alone as a favicon.
Kept, route B: a combination mark pairing a simpler wordmark with a symbol made of two offset bars, suggesting a ledger. Distinctive in the category and strong as an app icon.
Both kept routes then go to surface testing. Route A wins because the product is web-only for now and the name is short; route B is saved as the basis for a future app icon.
Notice that none of these reasons is 'the founder didn't like it'. Taste matters, but it should work inside the criteria, not replace them. Our checklist of what makes a good logo lists the criteria we use most often.
How do you test logo routes on real surfaces?
You test logo routes by placing each one on the surfaces where it will actually live and looking for failures. A route that only works on a white presentation board isn't ready to be chosen.
Surface | What to check |
|---|---|
Favicon at 16px | Is the silhouette still recognizable? |
App icon | Does it fit a rounded square on light and dark wallpapers? |
Website header, light and dark | Is it legible at nav height on both backgrounds? |
Pitch-deck cover | Does it hold presence at large size next to a headline? |
Social avatar in a circle | Does it center and crop well? |
Monochrome | Does it work in one color, without gradients? |
We go further and show the identity on full website and product screens, because that's where most people will see it. It's the same principle as our website design process: decide using real contexts, not abstractions.
What happens in the refinement and delivery stage of the logo design process?
In refinement, the chosen route is polished: curves are corrected, spacing is tuned optically, a heavier small-size version is drawn and color values are set for screen and print. In delivery, the logo is handed over as a complete, usable set of files with simple rules.
- Vector source files in the designer's tool and as SVG.
- Exports in PNG and SVG, full color, black and white, on light and dark.
- Small-size versions for favicon and app icon, drawn rather than shrunk.
- Color values for screen and print.
- A usage page covering clear space, minimum sizes and what not to do.
How long all this takes depends far more on how quickly feedback comes back than on drawing time. We explain what drives the schedule in how long logo design takes, and the cost side in brand identity design pricing.
