Napster Logo PNG
Napster is an online music sharing platform, which was created in 1999 in the United States. Today the service, owned by Rhapsody, provides various music-related services, including sharing and selling audio files.
Meaning and history
The iconic Napster logo is composed of a wordmark and an emblem on its left. Designed with a playful idea in mind, the Napster emblem depicts a cat, in response to a dog-logo of Lycos, which was the main competitor of the company.
1999 — 2003
The cat in the original logo had darker eyes and a darker outline than in the current one. Also, the shape of the eyes was different – the parallelogram in the original logo and the leaf in the current one.
The lines forming the glyphs used to be a little more angular, with sharp turns, while the current logo is smoother.
Eventually, there was one more difference. There was a curve between the wordmark and the cat’s headphones in the old logo. This element represented the sound wave.
2003 — Today
The Napster wordmark in all the lowercase lettering is executed in a bold italicized sans-serif typeface with clean and neat lines. The lettering looks confident and traditional, which balances the modern and funny brand’s icon.
The emblem depicts a cat’s head wearing headphones. It looks stylish and contemporary era en in thick distinct lines. In the first version of the logo, the Napster cat featured sharper ears, which made it look like a devil’s head, so the original design was slightly modified and the ears gained a more rounded shape.
The monochrome palette of the nameplate logo makes it look powerful and adds a sense of authority. The black and white combination also allows to place the logo on various items, and it keeps looking good on any background.