# ICQ new logo (2020)

> ICQ launched a new logo in Apr 2020. New logo.

## Key facts

- Brand: ICQ
- Launched: Apr 2020
- What changed: New logo.
- Why: Mail.ru said the red petal was removed because the offline state it symbolised no longer exists for people who are constantly connected.
- Industry: SaaS
- Logos: https://rebrandlog.com/logos/icq-2020/before.svg (before), https://rebrandlog.com/logos/icq-2020/after.svg (after)

## The rebrand, explained

ICQ was, as Rossiyskaya Gazeta's Anton Blagoveshchensky put it, a service launched more than twenty years earlier that everyone had half forgotten, lost among bigger players such as WhatsApp and Viber. On 6 April 2020 its owner Mail.ru Group relaunched it as ICQ New, billed in the company's release as its first AI messenger, with a new interface and visual style alongside a complete overhaul of its internal systems.

The features were aimed at a world in lockdown. The release highlighted group calls for up to 30 people and chats for tens of thousands, noting that many people were separated from relatives and working remotely, as well as Smart Reply, a neural network that suggests short phrases or stickers based on the conversation, automatic transcription of voice messages built by MRG Tech Lab, screen sharing on desktop, channels, and a bot platform. Coronavirus headquarters in 32 regions were already running channels in the app.

The logo change is the part with a story. Mail.ru said the visual style was completely changed: the new icon keeps the flower metaphor but is more minimalist, in a new, brighter and juicier green. The famous flower lost its red petal, because the temporary offline state it symbolised does not exist in modern messengers, where people never part with their smartphones and are always connected. Rossiyskaya Gazeta told the same story, describing the original logo as a flower with seven green petals and one red one that stood for the option to go offline completely, and the new one as all green: modern users are always connected, whether they want to be or not.

The paper also quoted IT expert Aleksandr Baulin, who was sceptical that relaunching an app with group features and video would be enough; serious users would care about connection stability, and a real leap needed something genuinely new.

The red petal reasoning is a perfect, slightly bleak piece of brand logic, and the paper's gloss, connected whether they want to be or not, is better copy than anything in the release. Simplifying the flower was sensible; it was always ICQ's only real asset. But nostalgia is not a product. As Baulin suggested, a greener daisy will not by itself give anyone a reason to come back.

In short: The offline petal is gone.

## Sources

- https://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/archives/new_logo_for_icq.php
- https://vk.company/ru/press/releases/10584/
- https://rg.ru/2020/04/07/kakie-vozmozhnosti-poiavilis-u-icq-new.html

## Cite this

Rebrand Log, "ICQ new logo (2020)", https://rebrandlog.com/rebrand/icq-2020/, last updated 2026-10-21.