As car enthusiasts, we love cars—that’s a given. But it goes so much deeper than that. We love race tracks, we love old gas pumps, heck—some of us have a jonesing for taillights. And yes, some of us go crazy for badges. So what’s your favorite?
I’m not immune to this. I’ve always had a taste for good design, though unlike Adrian, I’m not particularly good at it myself. I like typefaces and logos and nice swooshy lines. More than all that, I like it when they’re used tastefully to perfection. I’m detail-oriented. The little flourishes on a car can make it or break it for me.
My favorite badge is a classic of the Rad era. It’s from the Volvo 740 Turbo, of which I was lucky enough to own one myself. It was a beautiful wagon with exquisite proportions and clean lines. But more than that, the badges were absolutely on point.
Just look at these things! A sleek, modern typeface that said this thing was from the near future. A great number paired with the best automotive word of them all – TURBO. When that wasn’t enough, they slapped INTERCOOLER on there as well so you really knew this car had the works.
It wasn’t just limited to the rear end, either. Volvo scattered additional Turbo badges around the body, on the fenders, and on the front grille to boot. Hilariously, the model is joking referred to as the Jurbo, because of the shape of the T used on the script-format badges.
If you asked me for my favorite brand badge, though, I certainly wouldn’t say Volvo’s. It always came across a bit old-hat to me. Instead, I’m a fan of the lions. I dig the Holden roundel, but the marching lion of Peugeot really does it for me.
I’ll also give honorable mentions to the griffin of Vauxhall, and the scorpion of Abarth. Carlo Abarth chose the yellow field for the Italian town of Merano, and red as the traditional color of Italian motorsport. The scorpion was because that was his Zodiac sign, and because it fit the brand’s philosophy—”small but mean.” That’s just rad to me.
Of course, this isn’t Autopian Tells. It’s Autopian Asks. We want to know what your favorite badges are. Maybe you love Skoda’s little round thing, or the way Nissan puts that special S on the Skylines. Sound off, and lament the fact that you can’t post images in the comments. We’ll use our imaginations. Go!
Image credits: Lewin Day, Peugeot, Abarth
I kinda dig the Seat performance sub-brand Cupra. Simple but has a sort of menacing motion to it.
feels modern in that bronze color
Any of them that are not glued on.
I gotta go with the one depicting a snake eating a baby.
is that Alfa Romeo or am I tripping
Yes it is.
The iconic Ford V8 badge with the 8 nestled within the V
Oooo, that’s a good one!
solid choice
Winner!
I tend to remove badges from my vehicles when possible. Some badges have cool designs (like the Abarth badge shown above) but I think badges (particularly elaborate or colorful ones, again like the Abarth badge shown above) make a car look busy and distract from the styling.
While I am not a fan of two-dimensional badges on modern cars, I like ostentatious hood ornaments on old land yachts. I’m not sure if a hood ornament counts as a badge, but if they do, the Cadillac crest from ’80s and earlier cars are my favorite. The Spirit of Ecstasy hood ornaments are also awesome, although they better be considering how much a Rolls costs.
Honorable mention for the various GM model specific crests from the ’80s maybe?
Like the Monte Carlo emblem, or (my fav) the Fiero’s flattened chicken shield.
Cadillac logo was great. It’s been on a gradual downward trend since 2000 though. Bring back the ducks and the details. I don’t hate it today, but it’s a shadow of its former glory.
“Cadillac” spelled out in cursive does it for me.
Technically…Merlette Swans, but they do look like ducks on the logo.
Ooooo. Tough choice.
The Gremlin badge is all kinds of mischievous fun.
But being a Texas Ex, I have to go for the mid 60’s Ranchero.
My dad’s buddy has one that he swaps from car to car. Currently it’s on a green chevy SS
I like the screaming chicken Saab logo. Er, griffin.
I’ve always liked the Viggen logo on the fenders. Just enough to hint at what’s inside (torque steer, that’s what’s inside).
I’ve always liked the Chevrolet crossed flags emblems with the engine displacement in a rectangle. They’re just cool to me.
On Corvairs (which only ever came with one engine displacement at a time: 140 CID in 1960, 145 in 1961-63, and 164 from 1964-69), some years had an adapted version of those badges on the rear decklid with the advertised horsepower instead. So you can tell by looking at mine that the original owner paid the extra $27 to upgrade from 95 HP to 110 HP (gross!).
70s SAAB Turbo badge with the turbo wheel in the O
The one that tells me which car dealer sold it originally. Haha
Serious answer is the Hyundai Tuscani emblem. Like why would you make a whole new emblem for a Hyundai Tiburon for only a handful of markets? It’s so ridiculous that I cant help but love it.
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/acgAAOSwBkNc74Hq/s-l1600.webp
Interesting! The logo itself is visually cool, but I dislike how the “Tiburon” is actually hard to see as raised letters rather than painted or otherwise visually distinctive.
You caught me before I edited it. I changed the link to the Tuscani logo I was thinking of. I really like the logo but yea the name underneath either as Tiburon or Tuscani is definitely too hard to see.
I think lots of the typical nameplates (Chevy, Ford, Toyota…) have elegant simplicity in their logos. (Dishonorable mention: Kia’s new logo stinks.) But that’s to be expected.
I generally like simple, small-ish badging. Letting the world know it’s a V8 with a badge is fine (although I guess there’s not many proudly proclaiming “I4” or “I6” that way?), diesel, hybrid, PHEV, or EV indicators, and maybe the trim level.
For example, I’ve seen a few Ford Expedition Max Limited, and it’s easy to identify. The badges are simple on the back and you know some basic things about the vehicle from them: it’s the extended-length model, and it’s got all or most of the bells and whistles. Admittedly that’s very much a wealth indicator too, but I think that’s almost intrinsic to car ownership at this point.
4×4 is fine too when it’s not some enormous graphics package on the side of a truck bed. Just a small badge is fine.
I like my car mostly plain, but I will repeat: I detest when cars don’t have their models written anywhere, and especially when it’s not on the back. Okay, you’ve got a friggin’ Ferrari or Lambo, cool. What exact type is it? Oh, I have to rip my dashcam footage and do a reverse image search?…never mind then.
Much as I hate BMW, Mercedes, Infiniti, Volvo, Mazda, etc. and their obsession with alphanumeric code model names, at least they’re nice enough to put them on the vehicle.
Jeep’s current refusal to notify the model on the back end is always frustrating. Yeah, we all know which one’s the Wrangler, but… And esp. annoying not too long ago when there were a bunch of very similar models running around.
I wish Kia had gone with the Korean logo I would often see put on Stingers; I’m on the fence on whether it was actually good, but it was better than the current one and it least it wasn’t generic as hell like the old logo.
I’ve always thought the Mitsubishi three-diamond logo was perfectly balanced.
Every time I see that logo I think of the commercial where the guy is painting the logo. It was a cool ad.
Yes! It grabbed my attention as a kid because it was just so symmetrical and clean. Brilliant, timeless design.
(Interestingly, my understanding is that the three-diamond logo is a variation on Mitsubishi’s original logo, which represented a propeller, in keeping with their aircraft business. So along with BMW’s roundel, that makes two current car logos that can be traced back to propellers.)
The light-up P O N T I A C on the decklids of certain ’80s and ’90s Pontiacs.
Always on 2-doors, it was the perfect bookend to pop-ups on the front to signal not-too-distant-future, and I appreciate the ingenuity of having the license plate lamps do double duty. It just encapsulated the silly yet somehow cool feel of Pontiac in those days.
This also expanded to 4-door Sunfires and Grand Ams of the ’90s.
Honorable mention for the 99-04 F-150 Lightning emblem
1960 Impala fender emblem is what immediately popped in to my mind so I will go with that. Something about the flow of it and thought that went in to it appeals to me. The flag rolling in to the jet just seemed so futuristic(relative to the vehicle age) and optimistic.
Mine is the BMW roundel. However, props to KIA for their NIN badge.
People mock the new KIA logo, but literally anything (including “KN”) is better than the previous cheap-ass oval that only existed because they were once a contract manufacturer for Ford, and they wanted their logo to fit into the same space on a grille as Ford’s blue oval.
And for what it’s worth, I genuinely, unironically like the new KIA logo.
Agreed on all counts. The KN logo is not great… But that red oval K I A was so bad that it’s an improvement.
I actually do like the new logo, but I still get a chuckle about every time I see it.
Authentic: I absolutely love the Maserati trident. It’s the only badge that I think looks better when it’s bigger.
Fake: A while ago I saw someone who’d made a “Timbo” badge, in the style of the old Porsche Turbo badges. And it did actually say “Timbo”. Hilarious.
If we are including fake badges, you gotta love the Prancing Moose.
Call me boring, but the Mercedes-Benz 3 pointed star is iconic for a reason.
It’s a timeless elegant design that is just at place on modern cars as it is on the classics.
Yeah, a R109, R129, C126 with the big star on the front is just….right.
Equally boring, for a “font”, I’d go with the Porsche cursive Turbo. I think they’ve been tweaking it lately, but the 993/996 cars definitely had the right one.
Correct answer.
Easily the turtle with laurels on a field of piss
-Gordon-Keeble
I came here for the express purpose of ensuring that this badge got mentioned
Saab brand griffin badge, though that Abarth scorpion is cool.
Volvo’s Turbo badges in the ’80s with the blocky lettering (not the script as shown in the lead image). I have numerous copies of them turned into magnets for my toolboxes and refrigerator, along with other placements.
Honorable mention to the individual lettered “TURBO INTERCOOLER” ones from the late-’80s and early ’90s, as mentioned and shown in the article. Even as a young enthusiast I was mesmerized by these new and fascinating words so proudly emblazoned upon the trunks and wagon liftgates of some of the Volvos in my community, and my curiosity made me explore the reasons why some had them and others didn’t. I adore that font.
My excitement was almost palpable when I finally got to own one (and part of the inspiration for my screen name). Mine was one of less-common 760 Turbo (wagon), though, which was unconventional as the second letter in Volvo’s numbering scheme meant the cylinder count. Since it was positioned as a higher and more-luxurious model to the 740 I guess, but without the wheezy PRV V6 of the non-turbo 760s (shared with Peugeot, Renault, and DeLorean). I guess we can thank the 780 for breaking that trend, since it didn’t have 8 cylinders, but as a Bertone-designed coupe was positioned as the flagship/halo car of the line. They all had Redblocks as the standard engine.
Non-Volvo honorable mention: the Ford engine badges with the (ideally) 8 overlaying the V. Also done with V6s and V10s.
The Datsun badges from the 70s. Maybe it’s just nostalgia for the 240z I owned for years, but these just do it for me.
https://www.thezstore.com/images/product/medium/935.jpg
MG is my favorite car badge.
I like it esp. in juxtaposition to the Triumph badge. The accessible Britishness of two of them has always made me happy.
This is my favourite badge:
https://i.ebayimg.com/images/g/X6EAAOSwobJjAm7E/s-l1200.jpg
https://www.ebay.ca/itm/115641055351
Say what you will about the company, and especially its leader, but the Tesla emblem is a solid design.
I dunno…it’s always looked like an IUD to me.
I mean…how would you stylize the letter T? Feels like that’s an easy comparison and “Tesla” feels like a letter too many to spell out in a logo.
And either way, they’re supposed to be “minimalist”, aren’t they?
I was always surprised it wasn’t an italic, sans serif minimalist T of some sort, to go along with the design and its iphone-style ethos.
Without a single doubt in my mind, the Nissan Stagea double unicorn badge.
That’s cool. Never seen it before.