Brand guidelines examples: 12 public brand books to learn from

Search for brand guidelines examples and you mostly find screenshots of PDFs you cannot open. The useful examples are the ones companies publish for real: pages you can read today, with the clear space, the HEX values and the typeface names written down.

We opened the brand sites of 21 well-known companies on October 15, 2026. Some sat behind a login, one had an expired certificate, and a few had nothing but a download button. These are the 12 that are public and say something concrete, with the rule from each one worth copying.

What brand guidelines include

Brand guidelines are the rules for how a brand looks and sounds. Frontify's guide says they "define how your brand looks, sounds, and behaves", and Bynder's definition is almost word for word the same. In practice, a complete set covers:

• Logo: the versions, the clear space around them, the smallest size allowed, and misuse.
• Color: the palette with HEX, RGB, CMYK and Pantone values, and contrast rules.
• Typography: the typefaces, the weights and where each is used.
• Imagery: photography, illustration and icons.
• Voice and tone: how the brand writes.
• Co-branding: how the logo sits next to a partner's.
• Accessibility: contrast and legibility minimums.

The logo, the palette and the typefaces are the company's brand assets; the guidelines are the rules for using them.

12 brand guidelines examples you can open today

1. IBM Design Language

ibm.com/design/language goes far past a logo sheet: typography, color, a 2x Grid, the logos, iconography, illustration, photography, data visualization, infographics, layout and animation.

• The 8-bar logo is Paul Rand's design, unchanged since 1972. Its black stripes are drawn thicker than the white ones so they look equal.
• The palette has ten color families of ten swatches, each with HEX, RGB, Pantone and CMYK values: Blue 60, for example, is #0f62fe. The palette downloads as .ase and .clr files.
• "IBM Plex® is our corporate typeface": open source, in Sans, Mono, Serif and Condensed.

Worth copying: every color in every format, plus contrast rules taken from WCAG (4.5:1 for text under 24 pixels, 3:1 for large text and charts).

2. Netflix

Most of brand.netflix.com needs an account, but the logos page is public, and it is one of the clearest pages on this list.

• "Netflix Red is our brand's signature color": #E50914, RGB 229 9 20, Pantone 1795 C.
• Lead with the N symbol where people know the brand, and with the wordmark where they do not.
• Clear space is the width of one leg of the N for the symbol, and the width of the T for the wordmark. Backgrounds need a contrast ratio of at least 2.25:1.
• Co-branding: the Netflix logo comes first, at equal size and prominence, with a red rule between the two logos by default.

Worth copying: a misuse list specific enough to remember. One item says not to place the logo "on food which could potentially be bitten, eaten, or disfigured".

3. Audi

The Audi CI portal calls itself "a living styleguide that is being extended continuously across all touch-points". It covers brand appearance, user interface, co-branding, motion, the brand in physical space and even dealer buildings.

• The four rings come in black or white only, with no effects.
• Minimum height is 24 pixels on screen, and 5 mm (positive) or 10 mm (negative) in print.
• Clear space is one ring height on every side, and the rings never sit over the product or a person's face.
• The typeface is Audi Type Variable, which varies in both weight and width.

Worth copying: a hard number for every medium, and a size calculator for the rings and type together.

4. Mozilla

brand.mozilla.com holds separate guidelines for Mozilla, the Mozilla Foundation and Firefox, with downloads for logos, icons, illustration and press material.

• The primary palette is black and white with green, used in a ratio: "approximately 45% Black, 45% White and 10% Green". The values are Black #161616, White #fafafa and Green #00d230.
• Palettes download as ASE, LESS and SCSS files.
• The typefaces, Mozilla Headline and Mozilla Text, are open source, with a minimum size for each weight.

Worth copying: a ratio for how much of each color to use, not just a list of colors.

5. Discord

discord.com/branding is short, and written in the brand's own playful voice ("Make sure to get our good side.").

• The colors come with HEX values: Blurple #5865F2, Light Blurple #E0E3FF and Black #000000.
• The symbol on its own is only for places where the Discord brand is already clearly visible.
• The legal rules are blunt: digital use only, no Discord marks in server, bot or company names or in domains, and no merchandise.

Worth copying: rules that answer the questions partners actually ask, such as "can I call my bot Discord-something?"

6. Spotify for Developers

Spotify's design and branding guidelines are written for apps that show Spotify content, so they reach into your interface.

• The logo is never smaller than 70 pixels on screen or 20 mm in print, and the icon 21 pixels or 6 mm. The green logo goes only on black or white; anywhere else, use the monochrome one.
• Album and playlist artwork gets a corner radius of 4 or 8 pixels.
• Playlist and album names are cut at 25 characters, and a set of content shows at most 20 items.

Worth copying: rules for how partners display your content, not only your logo.

7. Mailchimp

Mailchimp splits its guidance in two. Brand assets covers the logo and colors: the name is one word, with a big M and a little c, and the logo is always paired with Freddie, the winking mascot. "Cavendish Yellow is Mailchimp's hero color."

The Content Style Guide covers writing: voice and tone, writing about people, grammar, accessibility, translation and a word list. "You have the same voice all the time, but your tone changes."

Worth copying: a writing guide of its own, published under a Creative Commons license (CC BY-NC 4.0) so other teams can adapt it.

8. NASA

The NASA brand guidelines tell the story of two logos. The insignia, the "meatball", was designed by James Modarelli in 1959. The logotype, the "worm", was designed by Richard Danne and Bruce Blackburn in 1975 and was NASA's official logo from 1976 to 1992. Today it is a supplemental graphic that only appears with the insignia nearby.

• Clear space is "1N height from the edge of the sphere".
• "The recommended typefaces for all uses are Helvetica and Garamond."
• The 1976 Graphics Standards Manual is still online as a PDF.

Worth copying: explaining why each element exists. In the insignia, the vector stands for aeronautics, the stars for space, the orbit for space travel and the sphere for a planet.

9. Dropbox

brand.dropbox.com covers framework, voice and tone, logo, typography, iconography, color, imagery and motion. The typeface is DB Sharp Grotesk, a custom cut made with the foundry Sharp Type.

Worth copying: the attitude. "All of this information is a toolkit. Go use it to make things."

10. Uber

Uber's brand site now sits behind a sign-in, but its partner pages are public. The partner guidelines set the clear space at no less than the height of the U in "Uber", and forbid stretching the logo or typing "Uber" in other fonts or in capitals. The Uber Eats co-marketing page gives the core colors: black, white and Uber Eats green #06c167 (Pantone 7480 C).

Worth copying: a stated approval process. Partner materials go to a brand desk, and "Standard response time is 3-5 business days."

11. Figma

Figma's brand usage guidelines are about the trademark more than the look. Your own branding must be "larger and more prominent than the Figma marks", and Figma is an adjective (the Figma platform), never a noun, a verb or a possessive.

Worth copying: naming examples. "Tom's plugin for Figma design" is fine; "Tom's Figma plugin" is not.

12. LinkedIn

brand.linkedin.com sets the [in] logo in blue, black or white, blue on white being preferred. It also lists where the logo is welcome: next to a link to your profile, on business cards, in email signatures, beside a QR code and in a row of social icons.

Worth copying: a list of approved uses, not only a list of don'ts, and one memorable don't: "No [in]vesting or Love[in]."

What the best brand guidelines have in common

• Numbers, not adjectives. Audi, Spotify, Netflix and NASA give clear space and minimum sizes in pixels and millimeters. "Leave plenty of space" is not a rule anyone can check.
• Every color in every format, with the contrast it needs: IBM, Netflix and Mozilla.
• Named typefaces you can get. IBM Plex and Mozilla's typefaces are open source; Atlassian, by contrast, keeps its brand fonts for signed-in users.
• Rules for partners. Netflix's co-branding, Figma's naming and Spotify's interface rules answer questions before anyone has to email the brand team.
• A voice as well as a look. Mailchimp and Dropbox give writing as much room as the logo.

A brand guidelines template

If you are writing your own, start from the sections the examples above share. Copy this outline into a document and fill it in:

# <Brand> brand guidelines

## 1. Brand core
Mission, audience and personality, in a few lines.

## 2. Logo
- Versions: full logo, symbol and wordmark, for light and dark backgrounds
- Clear space: measured in a part of the logo, such as the height of one letter
- Minimum size: <pixels> on screen, <millimeters> in print
- Misuse: stretched, recolored, rotated, or placed on a busy background

## 3. Color
| Name    | HEX    | RGB    | CMYK    | Pantone   | Use            |
|---------|--------|--------|---------|-----------|----------------|
| Primary | <HEX>  | <RGB>  | <CMYK>  | <Pantone> | Buttons, links |

Contrast: at least 4.5:1 for body text and 3:1 for large text.

## 4. Typography
Typefaces, weights and sizes, plus a fallback stack for the web.

## 5. Imagery and icons
Photography, illustration and icon style, with examples.

## 6. Voice and tone
How the brand writes, with do and don't examples.

## 7. Co-branding
How the logo sits next to a partner's logo, and who approves it.

## 8. Downloads and contact
Logo files, fonts, palette files, and who to ask about new uses.

Getting another company's brand assets

Guidelines tell you how a company wants its logo used. When your product shows other companies (an integrations page, a CRM, a partner directory), you also need the files and the values. Brand Identity API returns them from the domain: the logos in each variant, the brand colors in HEX and the fonts the website loads.

curl https://brandidentityapi.com/v1/brands/ibm.com \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $BRAND_IDENTITY_API_KEY"

You can also browse the brand pages for several companies above: IBM, Netflix, Spotify, Mailchimp, Dropbox, Discord, Figma and LinkedIn. Those pages show what each company's website actually uses. Where a website and its brand guidelines disagree, follow the guidelines, and use a logo to identify the company, never to suggest it endorses you.

For the colors and typefaces of more brands, see famous brand colors with HEX codes and the fonts famous brands use.