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50 free logo trivia questions with answers. Every famous logo has a story, and most people have never heard it. This logo trivia quiz collects fifty of them: the student who was paid $35 for the Nike Swoosh, the arrow hidden inside FedEx, the bear in the Toblerone mountain, the fighting bulls behind Lamborghini, the runes in the Bluetooth symbol, the surrealist who drew the Chupa Chups wrapper and the Wikipedia hoax that named the Pringles man. Car badges, sports leagues, cereal mascots, fashion houses and tech icons all get a turn. It is written as text questions, so it works read aloud at a pub quiz or on a phone in the car; nobody needs to see the picture. Easy questions ask which brand a symbol belongs to; hard ones ask who designed it, when and why. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia's article on the company or logo, and each question shows its source once you have answered.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Which sportswear brand's logo is the Swoosh?
Nike
Nike began as Blue Ribbon Sports and adopted the Swoosh as its official mark in 1971.
Q 02How much was design student Carolyn Davidson paid for creating the Nike Swoosh in 1971?
$35
Phil Knight later gave her a diamond Swoosh ring and 500 shares of Nike stock, now worth a fortune.
Q 03Which coffee chain's logo is a two-tailed siren?
Starbucks
The 1971 original was topless with a fully visible double fish tail; it has been cropped and simplified ever since.
Q 04What is hidden in the negative space between the E and the X of the FedEx logo?
An arrow
Designer Lindon Leader created a custom typeface in 1994 just to make the arrow work.
Q 05The Toblerone logo mountain hides which animal, the symbol of the bar's home city of Bern?
A bear
The triangular bar itself was inspired by the Matterhorn, and Theodor Tobler designed the shape in Bern.
Q 06Which US TV network's logo is a peacock, first used in 1956 to promote colour broadcasts?
NBC
The original had eleven feathers to signal 'richness in color'; the modern six-feather bird dates from 1986.
Q 07Apple's very first logo, before the bitten apple, showed whom sitting under a tree?
Isaac Newton
Ron Wayne drew it; Rob Janoff's rainbow bitten apple replaced it in 1977.
Q 08The Shell logo is based on which sea creature?
A giant scallop
It is called the pecten after Pecten maximus; Raymond Loewy drew the current version in 1971.
Q 09Ferrari's prancing horse was originally painted on the plane of which Italian flying ace?
Francesco Baracca
Baracca's mother suggested Enzo adopt it for luck; the canary-yellow background is the colour of Modena.
Q 10What inspired Ferruccio Lamborghini to choose his company's famous animal emblem?
A Spanish fighting-bull ranch
He was born under Taurus and later named cars after Miura's famous bulls.
Q 11Which French fashion brand's logo is a green crocodile?
Lacoste
Tennis star René Lacoste was nicknamed 'the Crocodile' after a bet with his team captain over a crocodile-skin suitcase.
Q 12Twitter's original cartoon mascot was named after which NBA legend?
Larry Bird
The cartoon version was replaced by a solid silhouette in 2010, and the bird was retired when Twitter became X.
Q 13What is the real name of the Michelin Man?
Bibendum
He was introduced at the Lyon Exhibition of 1894 as a stack of white tyres, and is one of the oldest trademarks still in use.
Q 21Whose silhouette is the NBA logo based on?
Jerry West
Alan Siegel designed it in 1969 from a Wen Roberts photograph, a year after doing the MLB logo; the league has never officially confirmed it.
Q 22Contrary to legend, the batter in the MLB logo was NOT modelled on which Hall of Famer?
Harmon Killebrew
Jerry Dior drew it in 1968 from several photographs, deliberately ambiguous so it could be any player.
Q 23In which year did the Golden Arches replace Speedee as McDonald's universal mascot?
1962
The arches themselves were introduced as building architecture in 1953.
Q 14The moustachioed man on Pringles cans is called Julius. Where did that name come from?
A Wikipedia hoax
An editor inserted the name in 2006, news outlets repeated it, and the company eventually went along.
Q 15The face on the KFC logo is that of which real person?
Colonel Harland Sanders
He started selling fried chicken from a roadside restaurant in Corbin, Kentucky, and the first franchise opened in Utah in 1952.
Q 16What do the three points of the Mercedes-Benz star represent?
Engines for land, sea and air
Gottlieb Daimler devised the symbol; DMG registered the three-pointed star as a trademark in 1909.
Q 17The blue and white quarters of the BMW roundel come from where?
The flag of Bavaria
The propeller story is a myth; the roundel evolved from the black ring of the Rapp Motorenwerke logo.
Q 18What do the rings in the Audi badge stand for?
The firms that formed Auto Union
Audi, DKW, Horch and Wanderer merged in 1932; Volkswagen revived the Audi name in 1965.
Q 19The six stars in the Subaru logo depict which star cluster?
The Pleiades
Subaru is the Japanese name for the Pleiades; one of the Seven Sisters is traditionally invisible, hence six stars.
Q 20The Alfa Romeo badge's red cross and man-swallowing serpent come from which city?
Milan
The cross is Milan's emblem and the biscione belonged to the Visconti family who ruled the city.
Q 24Which soft drink's script logo was written by the bookkeeper of its inventor in 1886?
Coca-Cola
Frank Mason Robinson chose the Spencerian script and the name; the drink first sold for five cents at Jacob's Pharmacy in Atlanta.
Q 25In Ruth Kedar's 1999 search-engine logo, why is the L green rather than a primary colour?
To show the company breaks the rules
Designer Ruth Kedar built the 1999 logo on the Catull typeface; the 2015 redesign switched to a sans-serif.
Q 26What is the Wikipedia logo?
An unfinished jigsaw globe
Each piece carries a glyph from a different writing system, and the missing pieces symbolise a perpetual work in progress.
Q 27Which number is hidden in the Baskin-Robbins logo?
31
One flavour for every day of the month; the company has introduced more than 1,400 flavours since 1945.
Q 28Which famous artist designed the Chupa Chups lollipop logo in 1969?
Salvador Dalí
He put the name inside a daisy shape and insisted it go on top of the wrapper where it would always be seen.
Q 29The wireless standard whose logo combines two runes is named after which king, whose initials they spell?
Harald Bluetooth
The 10th-century Danish king united the tribes; the technology's namers hoped it would unite communication protocols.
Q 30Who designed the Playboy bunny logo?
Art Paul
The tuxedo-bow-tied rabbit first appeared as an endnote in the second issue in 1953 and never left.