Audi Reveals Updated Logo

We don’t know exactly how many of you were expecting this, but we were taken by surprise when we saw that following its centennial celebration, the four-ring brand decided to change its logo. No major changes though, just a bit freshened up.

Thus, the new logo is so slightly different from its predecessor that the changes stay unobserved unless you bring them next to each other. The modern Audi logo shows a three-dimensional texture and shadowing, resulting in a polished chrome look, motortrend.com reports. In fact, it’s like seeing the real badge emblazoned on the hood.

Moving on to the Audi name itself, that too was changed. It is now smaller, has moved away from the center to the bottom left corner, while the font has changed as well. Not much of a change, but still... the overall look of the logo has received a well-deserved refresh.

The old logo stayed with Audi since the early 1930s, when it represented the emblem of the Auto Union. Each of the four overlapping rings symbolized the four marques: the first ring represented Audi, the second represented DKW, third is Horch, and the fourth and last ring Wanderer.

Things, however, have not always been rosy for the German carmaker, due to the fact that its similarity to the Olympic rings caused the International Olympic Committee to sue Audi in International Trademark Court in 1995.

It was found that the four rings in the logo have nothing to do with the five Olympic rings, as they “represent the five parts of the world which now are won over to Olympism and willing to accept healthy competition,” according to Pierre de Coubertin, one of the founders of the Olympic Games.