Introduction

Creating a good logo is an important part of starting a new business, it defines your brand. Many logo makers claim to have a free online logo maker, but when customers want to access the end product, they have to pay to download the logo. Other free logo makers provide a 198-by-198 pixel version, but they charge for high-quality vectors, scalable vector graphics (SVG), and Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) files. Some may ask you to pay for full commercial rights. Using a free logo maker might be an easy process, but when you require a custom logo for your website, business cards, or promotional merchandise, you may find that you have to pay for a higher-quality logo. The logo creator may have other requests, such as asking for your details or persuading you to buy into a paid subscription.

Although there are many reputable online sites where you can build your own logo, it is valuable to be aware that a free logo often comes with a minimal cost.

This article explains brands and logos and discusses some critical elements when creating your logo design. We then list the five best free logo makers and three almost free ones.

Brands and What They Achieve

A good brand takes a person to an enjoyable place and makes them want to buy it rather than purchasing another product. A brand identifies the company or the product, and if it is a successful brand, it gets a competitive advantage.

A brand adds intangible value to a product that is difficult to quantify. It lures in consumers who love that particular brand for whatever reason. As consumers, we convince ourselves that we make rational decisions when buying certain products — yet psychologists suggest our social identity and emotions play a large part in our decision-making.

When a company or its products have identifying markers, these act as a brand identity and push sales and profits. For this reason, many businesses obtain a trademark to protect their brand.

Brands and logos are not the same. The brand must trigger happy thoughts or memories, give social expectations, and fit into consumers’ lifestyles. When considering the brand and its logo, consumers conclude that the chosen brand outperforms all other brands.

Logos and What They Achieve

Your logo design should represent your brand and what your business does. A custom logo is integral in branding because its symbol and design should immediately identify the product, company, or individual.

Most logos have a visual brandmark accompanied by a tagline. Other logos focus solely on the business name, such as IBM, with no graphic detail. The logo designs are more memorable if they contain graphics. The globally recognized Apple logo uses only one image without a tagline.

Logos contain messages, ideas, and values in the simplest form and aim to do all or some of these things:

• Give a company a competitive edge
• Identify the type of business industry
• List the company name
• Identify the service provided
• Target and identify the business market
• Identify the brand value

Common Logo Design Elements

Most professional designers spend time researching the company, individual, or product before designing the logo. They need to know the product or business intimately by breaking down the mission statement, core business components, values, goals, and consumer base.

There are ten main elements to consider when designing a logo:

Typography

The design of logos, known as typology, is essential in marketing and advertising. Companies aim to attract people and generate profits, and typography creates an image for the brand by evoking emotions.

Designers take great care in choosing the correct font. It must be readable and easily convey the right message to the customer, creating trust between the customer and the brand. The slope of the font, its size and weight, balance, and adjustment are all vital parts to get the brand message across through typography.

Simplicity

Successful brands have simple logos that people recognize as standalone items. Many logos do not describe the business idea in detail, but they become familiar brands through their logo. For example, the leaping jaguar on the Jaguar logo gives nothing away from being a luxury car but instead, it links the animal with the car’s name. Jaguar is a simple but very effective logo.

Memorability

People remember excellent logos like FedEx, Nike, Apple, Starbucks, and Coca-Cola. In most cases, people can visualize the image, color, and font. The creators of these memorable logos have made these companies instantly recognizable globally.

Symmetry

The weight of the visual design should be balanced. Dark colors dominate lighter colors. Every component of the logo must balance vertically and horizontally. This symmetry creates order and harmony with the other elements.

Versatility

A logo must work well in different formats. The logo design must look just as good on business cards, brochures, or billboards. 

Colors

The logo colors must emphasize and strengthen the personality of the business or product. A dominant blue color is often used in banking or finance because it is fresh and conveys trust and loyalty. The IBM and Hewlett Packard logos are examples of blue logos. Green logos represent relaxation, health, and the environment. Think Starbucks, Spotify, and WholeFoods Market. A red logo shows a powerful high-energy brand for restaurants (Wendy’s, Kentucky Fried Chicken) and drinks like Coca-Cola and Red Bull. Orange logos such as Penguin Publishers, Shell, and Lufthansa show a mixture of being light-hearted and fun and oozing confidence. Yellow logos such as Hertz and Nikon signify youth and energy.

The logo must work well with dark and white backgrounds if printed in black and white.

Timeless

A timeless logo has stood proud and confident for many years. A timeless logo can be modified but does not need substantial rebranding. Logos like Coca-Cola, Dior, and Rolex have essentially stayed the same but with minor additions.

How Much Does a Logo Cost?

A logo is part of a brand’s identity because it is the first thing people see. Employing a designer to create a logo can be an effective way of communicating the brand’s message. If you need a logo for your product, you should weigh up the cost of the logo design against what a professionally designed logo will add to your bottom line.

There are many different options and prices to consider when hiring a professional logo maker, and the packages can be confusing. So it’s essential to know whether you are getting value for money or not. Some professional logos for corporations and large companies cost over $10,000. Prices go down from there, and a logo for a small business costs between $300-$1300.

If you’re cash-strapped, have a limited budget, or are a startup business, you can use the best free logo maker to make logo templates quickly and simply. You can also use these free logo makers for social invitations, talks, or presentations.

The Best Free Logo Makers

TRUiC

TRUiC has launched the best free logo maker in the business. One of the highlights of this logo maker is that it does not require any registration details, and you are not obliged to give away your personal details. It is easy to use and creates high-resolution original industry-specific logos. Simply enter your business’s name, the industry type, and tagline to try it out. You then decide on colors and aesthetics, and in just a few clicks, you can choose a selection of generated logos.

What Truic Do Well:

• Free
• No personal details asked
• High-resolution logos
• One of the best logo makers 
• TRUiC’s designers create logo designs
• No legal issues regarding the logo design
• It costs nothing to continue generating logo designs 

Where Truic Could Improve:

• More editing options

Canva

Canva is a credible logo maker with a sign-up requirement. Canva offers free templates for social media images, flyers, invitations, business cards, and so much more. You can start with a generic industry logo template and change the text, colors, and fonts or you can start from nothing and drop in your background and element details. Canva is free with an option of paid logos.

What Canva Do Well:

• Straightforward
• Options of added features
• Innovative logo designs
• Many editing options
• No personal information required

Where Canva Could Improve:

• A greater selection of logos
• Vector file formats
• Individualize templates to avoid repetition 

Namecheap

Namecheap has a fast and free logo generator where you can choose three icons from the selection and then customize your logo. There is a design wizard to help you select styles. The service is free.

What Namecheap Do Well:

• Fast process 
• Easy editing options
• High quality
• High resolution
• Fully customizable
• Easy-to-use design tool
• Easily import into site maker and card maker

Where Namecheap Could Improve:

• Increase the variety of icons and graphic options
• Refrain from asking for personal information

Hatchful

Hatchful is an easy free logo maker that requires entering a few facts about the business, the logo style, and how you’ll want to use it. The logo maker generates plenty of potential logos, and you can adjust the font, palette, icon, and layout. The log maker works well on mobile phones.

What Does Hatchwell Do Well:

• Simple to use
• Easy to edit
• Many choices
• Mobile-friendly tool
• Suitable for sole proprietors or small partnerships
• Free PNG file format

Where Hatchwell Could Improve:

• Be transparent that only Portable Network Graphics (PNG) files are free
• Increase the limited editing options
• Support vector file formats
• Be transparent about added fees for other file formats 
• Refrain from asking for your personal information

Ucraft

Ucraft gives you a large selection of icons to supplement with different features. You start with a clean slate vector editor, so you do need to be some form of computer boffin to operate Ucraft. The process is a drag and drop of images and texts according to the type of logo you want. They have many motifs to work with, and if you get stuck, they have a chatbot. The PNG file (low-resolution) is free, but it costs $7 for SVG vector files.

What Ucraft Does Well:

• Large selection of icons
• One-stop shop for website and logos
• Lots of elements to play with
• Free PNG download

Where Ucraft Could Improve:

• Make it easier to use
• Introduce templates or Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Simplify the vector editor 
• Simplify the user interface
• Be transparent that only the low-resolution file is free
• Refrain from asking for personal information

The Best Almost Free Logo Makers

Wix Logo Maker

With the Wix logo maker, you answer a few questions about your business or visual preferences, and the logo maker automatically generates your custom logo template. You can then edit the color, font, text, and sizing. Creating the logo is free, but if you like the design and want to download it, you have to pay $12.99, which includes high-resolution logo files and full commercial usage rights.

What Wix Logo Maker Does Well:

• Straightforward to use
• Easy to edit
• High-quality images
• A website and a logo costs $14
• One-stop for websites and logo

Where Wix Logo Maker Could Improve:

• Be transparent that Wix Logo is free to try but not to download
• Be transparent that only the 198-by-198 pixel version of the logo is free
• Inform users that higher-quality images are not free
• Inform users that commercial rights cost $50
• Inform users that downloading your logo’s source files (in SVG format) costs $20

Tailor Brands

Tailor Brands is a capable graphic tool that creates great custom logos. You start by following the prompts and answering questions. You enter your company details, industry type, branding details, aesthetic preferences, and Tailor Brands creates the logo.

Tailor Brands logo makers do not use templates but present you with a choice of several unique logo designs. When you have selected a plan, you can edit various features like icons, colors, and fonts, and then you can buy it.

The unique logo, keyword-based, can be created in just a few clicks. The company charges for high-quality vector, SVG, or EPS files that you can use for your website, business cards, or merchandise with full commercial rights included.

What Tailor Brands Does Well:

• AI-powered generator
• Choice of logotypes
• Custom designs

Where Tailor Brands Could Improve:

• Be transparent that only 192px PNG is free
• Be transparent that selected files cost $3.99 a month 

LogoMakr

LogoMakr is an easy-to-use software program logo maker that allows you to customize your logo. You search shapes and icons, edit the colors, fonts, and sizes, add the text where you want it and crop the free stamp. There is a logo library to help you with ideas, or you can build your logo with your ideas. If you want to rework your current logo, you can do that too.

LogoMakr has many editing options and pre-made icons. It is not as user-friendly as some of the other free logo makers, and you pay $19 for the commercial use of the logo. This payment gives you a high-quality professional logo that you can put on your website, business cards, or corporate gifts.

What LogoMakr Does Well:

• Many editing options
• Variety of pre-made icons
• Tooltips to help you along

Where LogoMakr Could Improve:

• The design tools could be made less challenging 
• Be transparent that users have to pay for the commercial use of the logo

Conclusion

Before designing your own logo, remember that a successful logo must be simple, memorable, versatile, and timeless. The font type and its weight, color, and balance are also important. When you research the best free logo maker to create your own logo, be aware that free logo maker tools may not be completely free.