Spot the Real Logo: Can You Tell Fake from Genuine?

B) The siren faces forward, her two tails spread to each side, wearing a star-shaped crown

Fun fact: A UCLA study asked 156 people to draw the Starbucks logo from memory. Fewer than 5% could accurately recall it. Most people forget that the siren has two tails, and many don't even realize there IS a figure in the logo — they just see "green circle." The siren is symmetrical and stares directly at the viewer, which is unusual for logo mascots.

A) The bite is on the right side, and the leaf points to the right

Fun fact: In a 2015 study, only 20% of participants correctly identified the Apple logo from a lineup of similar variations. The bite is always on the right side (when facing the viewer), and the single leaf leans to the right. There is no stem visible in the modern version. People who use Apple products daily performed only slightly better than non-users — proving that recognition and recall are very different cognitive processes.

D) Starting from the top going clockwise: Blue, Green, Yellow, Red

Fun fact: The Google "G" icon follows the same color order as the full Google wordmark. Despite seeing this icon hundreds of times a day on phones and browsers, research shows that fewer than 30% of people can recall the correct color order. The gap in the "G" where the horizontal blue bar creates the letter's opening is on the right side. Google introduced this four-color G icon in 2015.

A) The thick end is on the left, curving upward to a thin tail on the right

Fun fact: The Swoosh was designed to suggest movement from left to right — the same direction most people read. The thick end represents the ground, and the thin tail represents upward momentum and flight. This mirrors the wing of Nike, the Greek goddess of victory. Despite being one of the simplest logos in the world, many people draw it backwards, placing the thick end on the wrong side.

A) Two separate arches that meet at the bottom

Fun fact: The golden arches are two separate, rounded arches that meet at a point at the bottom of the M. They don't overlap, and there's no connecting bar. The shape was inspired by the actual architectural arches on the sides of early McDonald's restaurants, designed by Stanley Meston in 1953. When viewed from the front, these building arches merged visually to create the M. The logo has barely changed since 1968.

A) The tail of the first "C" passes under the "o"

Fun fact: The flowing Spencerian script has extremely specific letterforms. The tail of the capital C in "Coca" sweeps under the "o" and extends to the right. The two C's are actually different — the one in "Coca" has a longer, more dramatic tail. There IS a hyphen between Coca and Cola, but many people forget it. The script was handwritten by Frank Mason Robinson in 1886 and has been modified only subtly since then.

B) Four equal quadrants: alternating blue and white, starting with white in the top-left

Fun fact: When looking at the BMW logo with the text "BMW" at the top, the top-left quadrant is white, followed by blue (top-right), white (bottom-right), and blue (bottom-left). The colors come from the Bavarian flag, though they're reversed from the flag's pattern due to trademark laws. The common myth that it represents a spinning airplane propeller was actually created by a 1929 BMW advertisement and is not the true origin.

B) From the "a" to the "z" (lowercase)

Fun fact: The Amazon logo uses all lowercase letters, so the arrow runs from the lowercase "a" to the lowercase "z." This represents that Amazon sells everything from A to Z. The arrow also forms a smile, suggesting customer satisfaction. Turner Duckworth designed this version in 2000. Many people think the arrow goes from capital "A" to capital "Z" — but the Amazon wordmark has been entirely lowercase since 2000.

B) Three stripes — but D is also partially correct!

Fun fact: Adidas is defined by its three stripes, but the company actually uses different logo styles: the trefoil (three-petal flower with stripes) for Originals/heritage products, the mountain/triangle with three stripes for performance, and three parallel stripes for general branding. In all cases, there are always exactly three stripes. Adi Dassler bought the three-stripe design from Finnish brand Karhu for two bottles of whiskey and about $1,600.

B) Facing right — and also slightly upward

Fun fact: The Twitter bird was deliberately designed to face right and slightly upward to represent progress, optimism, and forward momentum (right = forward in left-to-right reading cultures). The bird was constructed from 15 overlapping circles and was named "Larry" after NBA player Larry Bird. When Elon Musk replaced it with "X" in 2023, the design community mourned one of tech's most beloved and well-crafted logos.