Yahoo! is an American web portal that provides various services, including mail and a search engine. It was launched in January 1994 as Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web, named so for founders Jerry Yang and David Filo. Yahoo! had a prominent presence as an early search engine in the late 1990s, but the burst of the dot-com bubble in 2000 gave way to competitors like Google, resulting in a gradual decline of Yahoo!, although it maintains minimal prominence to this day.
Yahoo
1994–1995
Designer:
Unknown
Typography:
Times New Roman
Launched:
April 1994
In April 1994, 3 months after the launch of the web portal, Jerry and David's Guide to the World Wide Web was renamed to Yahoo, which is a backronym for "Yet Another Hierarchically Organized Oracle" or Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle". The logo simply displays the word "Yahoo" in Times New Roman font and was likely kept simple initially due to limitations in the early internet.
Yahoo!
March–August 1995
In March 1995, when the company changed its name to Yahoo!, it introduced another logo with a much more elaborate text that includes an exclamation point at the end, but it was short-lived, being used for only 5 months.
August 1995–1996
Designer:
David Shen
Typography:
Able (modified)
Launched:
August 1995
In August 1995, a new logo was introduced which consisted of a stylized yellow jumping "Y" figure on a blue circle with the "Yahoo!" wordmark above often written below. Nicknamed "the jumping "Y" guy", the logo was designed in-house by David Shen,[1] with a later revision made with the assistance of Organic Online that introduced a new wordmark that would be used in its next few logos until 2013.
“We made sure the letters rose towards the right so that, upon reading the word, you would get a sense of rising energy with the exclamation point punctuating that energy at the end.”
— David Shen
1996–2013
1996–2009
Designer:
David Shen Organic Online
Typography:
Able (modified)
Launched:
January 1, 1996
On January 1, 1996, Yahoo! introduced a new logo with a red wordmark (the one originally introduced in late 1995 by David Shen and Organic Online) and a slight shadow behind the text. The font in this logo and below is a modified version of Able. A variant of this logo is still used for Yahoo! Japan (due to being independent from the main site).
2009–2013
Designer:
Unknown
Typography:
Able (modified)
Launched:
May 1, 2009 (soft-launch) November 12, 2009 (official)
On May 1, 2009, Yahoo! launched a recolored version of the 1996 logo in purple without an outline or shadow, but it didn't fully replace the previous one until November 12, 2009, when the site received a revamp, entirely removing the previous red color from 1996. This was first used as a variant of the previous logo (which was also used as a variant of the 1996 logo), as well as its headquarters and on Yahoo! Messenger's favicon in 2004. It was not used in some countries, most notably Yahoo!7 (of Australia), which still used the 1996 logo until 2014. Coincidentally, the now-related AOL also received a new logo in the same year.
2013–2019
Designer:
Marissa Mayer In-house
Typography:
Optima (modified)
Launched:
September 5, 2013
On August 7, 2013, Yahoo! announced a logo change that would occur. They began cycling through thirty different logos before implementing the actual logo later on September 5.
In January 2017, Yahoo! sold the majority of its core business to US telco Verizon, which already owned AOL. This move follows in a series of security breaches in the previous year where roughly one billion accounts were compromised.
In summer 2017, AOL and Yahoo! were merged into Oath (currently Verizon Media). Following the merger, the remainder of Yahoo! was rebranded as Altaba, focusing as an investment company. However, these companies still exist as a division of Verizon Media.
Centra No. 2 (logo, modified) Yahoo Sans (brand, custom-designed)
Launched:
September 23, 2019
On September 23, 2019, Yahoo! rolled out a new logo[2] with a new bolder typeface and now all lowercase for the first time. It also saw a newly-redesigned logo for Yahoo! Mail. The visual refresh, designed by Pentagram[3], accompanies an upcoming slew of new products. The font is rendered in a modified version of Centra No. 2.
“Our new look is just a sign of bigger, more important changes in the works. We’re rolling out a series of new products and features to help you get more of what you love”
