The Carlsberg logo is one of the most recognized marks in the global beer industry. Its script goes back to 1904, and honestly, it hasn’t changed that much. That kind of staying power is rare.
Danish architect and designer Thorvald Bindesbøll drew the lettering for the launch of Carlsberg Pilsner. The brewery itself is older: J.C. Jacobsen founded it in Copenhagen in 1847, and the Carlsberg Foundation he set up has been its majority owner since his death in 1887. The logo we recognize today is still built on Bindesbøll’s Art Nouveau script.
The most recent major update came in 2018, when the Bristol agency Taxi Studio redrew the wordmark, crown and hop leaf as part of a global rebrand.
What Is the Carlsberg Logo?
The Carlsberg logo is a green, hand-drawn Art Nouveau script wordmark with a small hop leaf above the end of the word. Danish designer Thorvald Bindesbøll created the lettering in 1904 for Carlsberg Pilsner. Taxi Studio refined the current version in 2018, launching it in Scandinavia that September.
| Symbol | Hand-drawn “Carlsberg” script with a hop leaf; a crown and J.C. Jacobsen’s signature appear on packaging |
| Designer/agency | Thorvald Bindesbøll (1904 script); Taxi Studio (2018 refinement) |
| Current version since | September 2018 (Scandinavia), rolled out globally in 2019 |
| Colors (hex) | Carlsberg green #00321E (Group design guide); light green #17B169 (Group guide); logo green approx. #006E34, sampled from the current logo; white |
| Typeface | Custom hand-drawn script, not a font; brand fonts are Carlsberg Sans, Carlsberg Slab and Probably Serif |
| Previous major version | Darker green script with the hop leaf, used from the 1970s until 2018 |
How Has the Carlsberg Logo Evolved Over Time?
The Carlsberg logo has gone through a handful of changes since the brewery’s founding in 1847, but the core script from 1904 has stayed intact. Each update was a refinement, not a full redesign.
That’s unusual for a brand this old. Most companies their size have completely reworked their look at least a few times.
Carlsberg has not published an official logo timeline. The middle dates below (1931 and 1971) come from logo reference sites and match the image above, so treat them as approximate.
Early Carlsberg Marks (1847–1904)
Before the script, the brewery used other symbols. The best known are the elephant and the swastika, which the brewery used as good-luck emblems in the late 19th and early 20th century.
The elephant connects to the Elephant Gate, completed in 1901 at the Ny Carlsberg brewhouse in Copenhagen. The swastika was dropped in the 1930s because of its association with the Nazi Party.
The Bindesbøll Script (1904)
In 1904 Carlsberg launched a bottled pilsner, and Thorvald Bindesbøll designed its label. His flowing Art Nouveau lettering, with the sickle-shaped “C” and a long wavy tail running back from the “g,” became the Carlsberg name as we know it.
Bindesbøll (1846–1908) was trained as an architect and was known for ceramics, silver and ornamental work. The label tied his style to one of Denmark’s biggest exports.
Old Carlsberg Logo: The Black Script (About 1931–1971)
This is the oldest version most logo histories show. The same Bindesbøll lettering appears in black, with heavier strokes and a thick ribbon-like tail under the word.
1931 is also the year the “Hof” nickname, which comes from Carlsberg’s status as a supplier to the Danish royal court, was adopted into the brand.
Green Script With the Hop Leaf (About 1971–2018)
The lettering turned dark green, the letters became cleaner and more even, and a small three-part hop leaf sat at the top right of the word.
This is the version most people grew up with on bottles, cans and football shirts. It carried the brand through the “Probably the best lager in the world” campaign, which started in the UK in 1973, and through Carlsberg’s sponsorship of Liverpool FC’s shirts from 1992 to 2010.
The Taxi Studio Refinement (2018–Present)
Taxi Studio, a Bristol agency that had worked with Carlsberg since 2010, led the 2018 rebrand. The new look launched in Scandinavian markets in September 2018 and rolled out globally over 2019.
The agency chose to redraw rather than replace. The wordmark, the crown and J.C. Jacobsen’s signature were kept but reduced to their essentials. The typography of the script was cleaned up, and the hop leaf was rebalanced for better symmetry with the word. The biggest change was the crown, which went from a chunky red-and-gold illustration to a simplified light green one.
The aim was to move the brand away from the “laddish” image it had in markets like the UK and back toward its Danish roots. Jessica Felby, Carlsberg’s design director at the time, said the new design looks like what Carlsberg should always have been.
In June 2026, Taxi Studio also introduced Probably Serif, a typeface inspired by Bindesbøll’s wordmark, for a wider brand evolution set to launch globally in 2027.
What Do the Design Elements of the Carlsberg Logo Mean?
Every piece of the Carlsberg identity ties back to the brewery’s Danish roots. The hop leaf is a direct reference to one of beer’s key ingredients.
The flowing lettering reflects the Art Nouveau style that was popular when Bindesbøll drew it. And the crown on product labels? It points to Carlsberg’s role as a supplier to the Danish royal court, the origin of the “Hof” (court) nickname in Denmark.
What Are the Carlsberg Logo Colors?
Green is the color people search for most, so here is the direct answer.
The Carlsberg Group design guide (February 2017) lists the official corporate colors:
- Carlsberg green: RGB 0-50-30 (hex #00321E), CMYK 100-50-80-60, Pantone 567. A deep, dark green.
- White: RGB 255-255-255 (#FFFFFF).
- Light green (secondary): RGB 23-177-105 (hex #17B169), CMYK 75-0-70-0.
The guide also lists a secondary palette of blue, light blue, golden yellow, yellow, bordeaux and pale pink, inspired by the Group’s brands and bottles.
The beer logo on bottles and cans is a mid green rather than the very dark corporate shade. Sampled from the current logo file, it sits at approx. #006E34. That value is not official.
Why green? Basic color theory links it to freshness and nature. There is also a practical reason: the green echoes Carlsberg’s green glass bottles.
The psychology behind these color choices is simple. Green feels fresh. White carries simplicity. Before 2018 the crown added red and gold, and gold signals heritage. Since the redesign, the color palette on pack is almost entirely green and white.
What Font Does the Carlsberg Logo Use?
The logo is not a font. It is custom hand-drawn lettering, originally by Bindesbøll and redrawn by Taxi Studio in 2018. You won’t find it on any font site.
Some letters connect while others stand alone. The “C” curves like a sickle. A long wavy line sweeps back from the “g” and underlines the word. It has the contrast of a serif face with Art Nouveau flourishes.
Carlsberg does have its own brand fonts for everything around the logo:
- Carlsberg Sans: the Carlsberg Group’s corporate sans-serif font, in light, bold and black weights with italics.
- Carlsberg Slab: a two-weight slab serif typeface designed by the Copenhagen agency Kontrapunkt and finished with LucasFonts. It won a Red Dot award in 2015.
- Probably Serif: a display typeface from Taxi Studio (2026), drawn by Alec Tear and Lewis MacDonald and inspired by the 1904 wordmark. It covers Latin and Cyrillic.
Is There a Hidden Meaning in the Carlsberg Logo?
Not really a hidden one. The hop leaf stands for hops. When it is shown in white on green, some people say it looks like a shamrock, but that is a coincidence, not a Carlsberg statement.
What is clever is the structure. The way the “g” tail sweeps left creates an underline that holds the whole word together. Bindesbøll was trained as an architect, and you can feel that structural thinking in how the letters support each other.
How Does the Carlsberg Logo Compare to Competitor Logos?
In the beer logo space, Carlsberg sits in a unique position. Many major lager brands lean on crests, shields or labels. Carlsberg went with script.
Look at the Heineken logo, with its red star and the smiling, tilted “e” letters. Totally different approach. Or the Budweiser logo with its bow-tie shape and Americana styling. The Guinness logo pairs a harp with a serif wordmark, leaning into Irish heritage.
The Corona logo is known for its crown and the label printed straight onto the glass. The Stella Artois logo goes heraldic with its crest and horn. And brands like Modelo or Dos Equis lean into Mexican heritage through their marks.
What makes Carlsberg different? It’s one of the few global beer brands where the lettering itself is the logo. No shield. No crest. The wordmark does the heavy lifting, which follows core logo design principles around simplicity and memorability.
The green color also sets it apart. Heineken and Tuborg use green too, but Carlsberg’s dark green script is easy to spot even from across a bar.
What Cultural Impact Has the Carlsberg Logo Had?
The Carlsberg logo became a fixture of European football through decades of sponsorship. It was on the front of Liverpool FC’s shirts from 1992 to 2010, and the brewer stayed a club partner after that. For a whole generation of fans, the script on a red shirt is a very familiar image.
For Liverpool’s match against Chelsea on 2 May 2010, the shirt sponsor logo was printed in Chinese characters. That kind of adaptation of a brand identity across writing systems is tricky to get right.
Then there is the slogan. “Probably the best lager in the world” was created in 1973 by Tony Bodinetz at the agency KMP for the UK market, and Orson Welles voiced some of its best-known ads. In 2019 Carlsberg UK even flipped it to “Probably not the best beer in the world” to launch a reformulated pilsner. The logo has sat next to that line for more than 50 years.
How Does the Carlsberg Logo Fit Into the Overall Brand Identity?
The logo anchors a larger system: the hop leaf (also used on its own as a graphic element), J.C. Jacobsen’s signature, the crown and the “Probably” line.
The Carlsberg Group’s brand style guide treats the script as the master element. The 2018 rebrand also tied the core beer closer to sub-brands like Carlsberg Export and Carlsberg Elephant. The corporate identity pairs the script with Carlsberg Sans for typographic hierarchy in reports, presentations and digital products.
The packaging design from the 2018 rebrand stripped things back to let the logo breathe. Less clutter, more white space, simpler labels. That approach to visual hierarchy puts the wordmark front and center.
How Should the Carlsberg Logo Be Used?
This is general advice for designers and writers, not a summary of Carlsberg’s internal rules.
- The Carlsberg name and logo are registered trademarks of the Carlsberg Group. Commercial use needs permission.
- Editorial use, such as news, reviews and commentary, is generally fine when the logo is shown accurately.
- Don’t redraw the script, change the spacing or recolor it. The lettering is the brand.
- Use a clean source file. Vector graphics (SVG or EPS) scale without loss, while a small PNG breaks down into visible pixels.
- If you print a raster version, check the DPI settings of the file first.
FAQ on the Carlsberg Logo
What does the Carlsberg logo look like?
It’s a green script wordmark spelling “Carlsberg” in custom hand-drawn lettering. A small hop leaf sits at the top right of the word. On packaging, a crown and J.C. Jacobsen’s signature appear with it. The style is pure Art Nouveau.
Who designed the Carlsberg logo?
Danish architect and designer Thorvald Bindesbøll drew the script in 1904 for the launch of Carlsberg Pilsner. In 2018 the Bristol agency Taxi Studio redrew and refined it for the current version.
When was the Carlsberg logo first introduced?
Bindesbøll’s lettering first appeared on the Carlsberg Pilsner label in 1904. Earlier Carlsberg marks included an elephant and a swastika, which was dropped in the 1930s.
What did the old Carlsberg logo look like?
The oldest version in most logo histories is the same script in black, with heavier strokes and a thick ribbon tail, dated from about 1931. From about 1971 it turned dark green and gained the hop leaf, a look that lasted until 2018.
What is the Carlsberg green color code?
The Carlsberg Group design guide gives Carlsberg green as RGB 0-50-30, which is hex #00321E, Pantone 567. Its light green is RGB 23-177-105 (#17B169). The beer logo itself samples at approx. #006E34.
What do the colors in the Carlsberg logo mean?
Green suggests freshness and echoes Carlsberg’s green glass bottles. White adds clarity. Before 2018 the crown also used red and gold, which leaned on the brand’s royal court connection.
Has the Carlsberg logo changed over the years?
Yes, but subtly. The main shifts were the move from black to green with the hop leaf (around 1971) and the 2018 refinement by Taxi Studio, which redrew the script and simplified the crown.
What font does the Carlsberg logo use?
None. The logo is custom lettering, so no font matches it exactly. Carlsberg’s brand fonts are Carlsberg Sans, Carlsberg Slab by Kontrapunkt and, since 2026, Probably Serif by Taxi Studio.
What is the hop leaf symbol in the Carlsberg logo?
It’s a small three-part hop leaf, a reference to hops, a core beer ingredient. The Carlsberg Group also uses it on its own as a graphic element in green or white.
Why does Carlsberg packaging have a crown?
The crown refers to Carlsberg’s role as a supplier to the Danish royal court. That is also why the beer is nicknamed “Hof” (court) in Denmark. The 2018 redesign turned the old red-and-gold crown into a simpler light green one.
Who owns Carlsberg?
The Carlsberg Group, headquartered in Copenhagen. Its majority owner is the Carlsberg Foundation, which founder J.C. Jacobsen set up in 1876.
Conclusion
The Carlsberg logo has held its ground for more than a century. Few beer logos can claim that kind of durability, and even fewer have done it with a design that still feels fresh.
Bindesbøll’s Art Nouveau script from 1904 gave the Carlsberg Group something most brands spend millions trying to find: a mark that doesn’t need replacing. The 2018 refresh by Taxi Studio proved you can update a logo without losing what made it work in the first place.
From Copenhagen to global markets, from green bottles to football shirts, the Carlsberg logo is a case study in how restraint and heritage can outlast trends. That hop leaf isn’t going anywhere.
Sources
- Carlsberg Group, Corporate Visual Identity Design Guide (February 2017) – https://www.carlsberggroup.com/media/xzsokgla/carlsberg_group_designguide_260417.pdf
- Transform Magazine, Tradition meets forward trajectory in Carlsberg’s global rebrand – https://www.transformmagazine.net/articles/2018/tradition-meets-forward-trajectory-in-carlsbergs-global-rebrand/
- Creative Review, Taxi Studio on creating a Carlsberg brand to last for the next 50 years – https://www.creativereview.co.uk/taxi-studio-on-creating-a-carlsberg-brand-to-last-for-the-next-50-years/
- Stash, Taxi Studio Faces Up to Probably Serif for Carlsberg – https://www.stashmedia.tv/taxi-studio-faces-up-to-probably-serif-for-carlsberg/
- LucasFonts, Carlsberg Slab – https://lucasfonts.com/custom/carlsberg-slab
- Wikipedia, Carlsberg Group – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlsberg_Group
- Logos-World, Carlsberg Logo – https://logos-world.net/carlsberg-logo/
Renowned for his expertise in logo design and visual branding, Bogdan has developed a multitude of logos for various clients.
His skills extend to creating posters, vector illustrations, business cards, and brochures. Additionally, Bogdan's UI kits were featured on marketplaces like Visual Hierarchy and UI8.
He also wrote in the past years on sites like Design Your Way, WebDesignerDepot, WPDean, Designmodo, Speckyboy, Slider Revolution, and more.
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Bogdan Sandu is a seasoned designer who has been designing websites since 2008. Renowned for his expertise in logo design and visual branding, Bogdan has developed a multitude of logos for various clients. His skills extend to creating posters, vector illustrations, business cards, and brochures. Additionally, Bogdan's UI kits were featured on marketplaces like Visual Hierarchy and UI8. He also wrote in the past years on sites like Design Your Way, WebDesignerDepot, WPDean, Designmodo, Speckyboy, Slider Revolution, and more.
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