PayPal’s smart brand refresh is ditching the blue logo it’s had for 20-plus years

PayPal recently underwent a sharp rebranding, and its wordmark is releasing the blue that has defined it for more than 20 years.

All in all, it may seem like the design changes in the PayPal brand refresh, from Pentagram partner Andrea Trabucco-Campos and her team, are subtle. But a closer look reveals why attention to detail is necessary. There is a new bespoke brand of branding and copy; cool monogram; a streamlined color palette, including a new wordmark color; and a new animation showing PayPall’s UX. It’s a move aimed at helping PayPal stand out from its competitors in the fintech space while giving the brand a more universally accessible look.

Subtle color difference, big change

First, perhaps the most obvious visual change is the updated branding. PayPal’s new wordmark is not slanted, unlike all previous iterations of the service mark, since the company’s launch in 2000.

PayPal’s new wordmark is also black rather than blue. This may not seem like a big visual change on the face of it, but it’s a strategic move when you’re operating in the sea of ​​homogeneity that characterizes fintech. (Consider fintech companies Webull, Revolut, and Wise, for example.) As the press release explains, PayPal’s new color choice “sets it apart from the blue that has come to be associated with fintech.” This choice could also help differentiate the PayPal brand from the more traditional banks like Citi and Chase.

As for PayPal’s overall new color palette, that, too, has been pared down to five core hues that can all be used in combination: white, black, bright blue, deep blue, and medium blue. Yellow, which was one of the brand’s former accent colors, has been completely removed from the palette due to its “outdated” look, Pentagram wrote in its release.

Sharp type, dynamic UI graphics

PayPal’s custom wordmark font is derived from an existing typeface created by Lineto Type Foundry, called LL Supreme. (LL Supreme itself was based on the sans serif Futura, designed by Paul Renner in 1927. It is now one of the most familiar fonts in the design world.) According to Pentagram’s report, the typeface is a “timeless universal typeface” that allows readers that they learn. focus on the message. “PayPal Pro similarly aims to be built without straight lines and rounded curves,” he adds.

Trabucco-Campos and his team separated PayPal’s monogram (the two “P”s joining each other) into the wordmark, so that each could be used individually. The monogram is slightly sharpened to match the rest of the refresh. Its colors have also been updated, so that the signature color of Venmo, a subsidiary of PayPal, appears in the monogram’s overlapping, Venn diagram-esque center.

Trabucco-Campos’ team also made changes to the experience within the program. For PayPal’s mobile version and its website, they created new animations that mimic the visual UI movements of mobile payment, such as tapping, swiping, and scrolling.

PayPal’s brand refresh is starting alongside its new debit card. As the product continues to grow, its refined appearance aims to make it versatile enough to be displayed on business cards, marketing materials, and during daily activities.