Logo Design App Mac Free

If you need a new logo design or to refresh your current logo, we've looked at the best logo design software for Mac of 2021.

Your brand's logo is one of the first things customers or clients see when they visit your website and plays a crucial role in your branding success.

Macs are the best computers on the market when it comes to any kind of creative work from graphic design to desktop publishing.

In these reviews, we've looked at the best vector editing software and logo makers for all abilities from beginners to professionals to suit all budgets from free to premium logo design software.

If you're serious about branding for your business we recommend going with one of the paid solutions because a professionally designed, eye-catching logo can play an important role in your business success.

For professionals, the best logo designers reviewed here can be used with drawing tablets too.

You can also be assured that all of the logo makers for Mac reviewed here work with the latest versions of macOS Big Sur and are compatible with Apple Silicon M1 Macs.

After extensive research, we found that that by far the best logo design software for Mac is Adobe Illustrator for creating incredibly professional looking logos of any size online and in print.

In judging which were the best logo design software for Macs, we considered a number of factors mainly:

Features
Ease of use
Mac desktop app
Templates
Pricing

Is Photoshop Good For Logo Design?

When it comes to graphic design, by far the most popular software on the market is Adobe Photoshop. However, we don't recommend Photoshop for designing logos.

Creating logos in Photoshop cannot be enlarged or manipulated in the same way as in Adobe Illustrator.

That's because Illustrator is a Vector based graphic design software whereas Photoshop is raster based on pixel editing.

When you enlarge logos made in Illustrator, they do not lose any quality. When you enlarge images created in raster based design apps like Photoshop, the images will look pixelated.

It's also much easier to export files from Illustrator to be used in print, online, videos, apps and other projects than Adobe Photoshop.

Logo Design Software Tips

Whichever logo design tool you choose, there are 5 principles of effective logo design you should bear in mind.

Simplicity

The most memorable logos such as Nike's swoosh or McDonald's golden arc are simple but memorable. Study those successful logos that stick in the mind and consider what makes them work.

Memorable

What kind of message do you want your logo to convey? What's the identity of your business? When you've worked this out, it gives you a great basis to build your logo on and keep it focused.

Timeless

Some of the best logos haven't changed much in hundreds of years. Make sure that your logo is not time sensitive or making any references to current cultural trends.

Appropriate

A logo should reflect the image the business or organization wants to convey such as playful or serious. The type of font and colors used can have a big impact on this.

Versatile

The best logo design software allow you to create vectors of your logo so that it can be used in a variety of sizes and colors. These are crucial to allow you to resize your images for a variety of uses from posters to websites.

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With this in mind here is the best logo design software for Mac of 2021.

1. Adobe Illustrator

Adobe leads the industry when it comes to graphic design and Adobe Illustrator is by far the best logo design software for Mac.

Adobe Illustrator has been around for almost 40 years now and in that time has always been up there as one of the best tools for creating logos and branding of any kind.

Adobe Illustrator is a vector editing software that allows unrivaled levels of precision and control in graphic design on a Mac.

Adobe have enhanced it in recent years with the release of the amazing Creative Cloud which is collection of design tools that includes Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop to create the ultimate professional design suite.

It also includes professional resources such as Adobe Stock which gives you access to millions of professional stock photos, videos and other multimedia assets.

Adobe Illustrator is also the only logo design software that allows you to use Adobe Capture to capture sketches you've done by hand and then enhance them in Illustrator.

Adobe Illustrator takes some learning for beginners but once mastered, you've got a professional branding tool that's used by some of the biggest companies in the world.

If you don't have the time to learn Adobe Illustrator, we also recommend taking a look at the excellent Adobe Spark which is a simplified design tool for beginners to graphic design.

On its own Adobe Illustrator costs $19.99 per month.

However, if you're entitled to an educational discount, Adobe Illustrator is an absolute bargain right now as Adobe is currently offering 60% off the entire Adobe Creative Cloud suite

This means you get all 20 Creative Cloud apps for just $19.99.

For everyone else, Creative Cloud normally costs $52.99 per month so the 60% off offer is a huge saving.

That's not just Illustrator you get – Creative Cloud includes 20 industry leading apps including Photoshop, Lightroom, Spark, Adobe XD, InDesign, Premiere Pro and Acrobat Pro.

So you're basically getting 20 Adobe applications for the price of one copy of InDesign

You can try a free trial of Adobe Illustrator for Mac to test it for yourself.

You can also read our full Adobe Illustrator review for more.

Pricing: 60% off with Creative Cloud Educational Discount or $19.99/m

Pros:

Industry leading logo design software
Incredible set of features and tools
Over 16,000 different fonts
Integrated with the amazing Creative Cloud suite
Edit multiple art boards simultaneously
Mac desktop app
60% discount for students and teachers
Works on M1 Macs

Cons:

Steep learning curve for beginners
Raster graphic support could be better

2. Adobe Spark

If you don't have the time or need to learn Adobe Illustrator, then you should take a look at the excellent Adobe Spark.

Adobe Spark is a logo design tool which provides hundreds of customizable templates so that you can create logos in minutes rather than hours.

Adobe Spark works by asking you details about what your logo is about and then automatically suggesting a range of styles and templates that it thinks you're looking for.

You then simply take the ideas that Adobe Spark generates and turn them into your own personalized logos. In fact, you may find that many of the professional looking logos that Adobe Spark suggests are perfect just as they are.

When done, you can download high quality PNG or JPG versions of your logo which you can use anywhere.

The Adobe Spark starter plan is even free although it doesn't allow you to fully customize logos. The individual plan starts at $9.99 per month and to completely personalize your designs.

You can try Adobe Spark for free to judge it for yourself.

Pricing: Free / $9.99/m

Pros:

Very easy to use
Automatically generates professional logos
Starter Plan is free to use

Cons:

Free plan doesn't allow much customization
Doesn't offer precision controls or many editing features

3. Canva

Canva is a powerful online logo designer that allows you to create logos for free. Canva allows you to drag and drop objects onto the canvas and has over 50,000 templates to get you started.

Canva is very easy to use and requires no previous design experience. You can share designs immediately to social media although only Twitter and Facebook.

You can export a transparent PNG version of your logo although you can only create a vector image if you subscribe to a paid plan.

Canva also has a Mac desktop app which doesn't offer any major advantages over using it in a browser but it's one of the few online logo design apps to have a Mac desktop client.

The free version of Canva is free for creating quick an simple logos with few customization options. Canva Pro starts at $12.99 per month and allows simultaneous collaboration with other designers, access to over 400,000 templates, version history tracker and much more.

You can try Canva for free to judge it for yourself.

Pricing: Free / $9.95/m

Pros:

Easy to use
Drag and drop objects
Free and paid version
Exports to PNG
Mac desktop app
Pro version offers lots of powerful tools

Cons:

Free version very limited
Mac client doesn't work on M1 Macs

4. CorelDRAW

CorelDRAW for Mac is a powerful graphic design software that's up there with Adobe Illustrator in terms of creative power when it comes to logo design.

Like Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW takes some learning. In fact, we think that Illustrator has become easier to use over the years and has far more learning resources than CorelDRAW which was only recently re-released on Mac.

Also like Adobe Illustrator, CorelDRAW is a vector based graphic design tool which means it produces vector graphics that can be enlarged to any size with no loss in quality.

Logo sketching in CorelDRAW offers incredible color accuracy and flexibility with powerful non destructive bitmap and vector editing.

For those that like to use a drawing tablet to do their logo designing, the CorelDRAW LiveSketch tool is an amazing asset which uses an advanced neural network to instantly create an editable vector image from a freehand sketch.

Although you can use LiveSketch with the CorelDRAW cursor, it's best used with a sketching tablet for complete freedom when drawing.

You can try CorelDRAW for Mac for free to judge it for yourself.

Pricing: $669

Pros:

Powerful industry standard logo design tool
Incredible color and palette controls
LiveSketch allow you to create hand drawn tablet sketches
Mac desktop app
Works on M1 Macs

Cons:

Steep learning curve
High up front cost
Not as widely used as Adobe Illustrator

5. Turbologo

As the name suggests, Turbologo is for those that need to create a logo in a hurry. You won't find highly specialized logo design tools here but you will create a logo in literally seconds with Turbologo.

A little bit like with Adobe Spark, Turbologo asks you to define some parameters for your logo and then automatically suggest some designs based on it.

Turbologo is very good at creating simple, minimalist logos although you can't customize them very much. Exporting is also limited to PNG in the free version but you can download a vector format version of your logo with a paid plan starting at $3 per month.

There are thousands of logo templates to choose from and editing them is very easy in a WYSIWYG interface. However, we found that overall the choice of templates in Turbologo is considerably less than online tools like Canva and Adobe Spark.

You can try Turbologo for free to see for yourself.

Pricing: Free / $3+ for high res images

Pros:

Very quick and easy to use
Online and works in seconds
Simple, minimalist logo designs

Cons:

Not many customization tools
High resolution images require payment
No Mac desktop app

Best Logo Design Software For Mac Compared

	Adobe Illustrator	Adobe Spark	Canva	CorelDRAW	Turbologo
Ease of Use
Free Version
Mac Desktop App
Pricing	$19.99/m + 60% off	Free / $9.99/m	Free / $9.95/m	$669	Free / $3+
	Free Trial	Free Trial	Free Trial	Free Trial	Free Trial

Best Free Logo Design Software For Mac

All of the Mac compatible logo makers reviewed so far have free versions that you can test before deciding whether to subscribe.

If you search for "free logo design software" you'll find that most of them claim to be free but charge you to download the final results anyway and they're not suitable for professional use.

The following tools are the best free logo designers we've found that don't require subscriptions though and work on a Mac.

They all allow you to create basic logos for free although expect to pay if you need to download high res versions or different formats.

6. Shopify Hatchful

Shopify Hatchful is a free logo design software from the Shopify e-commerce platform. Although there's no Mac app, you can use it in any browser and on Android or iOS devices via an app.

You simply answer some questions about your brand or logo requirements and Shopify Hatchful will automatically generate some logos based on your responses.

Shopify Hatchful is designed for those using the Shopify platform but anyone can use it to create and download logos for free.

7. Squarespace Logo Creator

Squarespace Logo Creator is about as basic as it gets but you can make logos for free with it. It works in any browser on Mac or Windows PC.

Simply enter the name of your brand and Squarespace Logo creator will present you with a canvas which you can edit. You can change shapes,, colors and positioning but that's about it.

You'll also need to have a Squarespace account to use it and although you can download the low resolution version of the logo for free, you need to pay $10 for the high res version.

8. Ucraft

Ucraft is a very basic logo maker that allows you to drag and drop shapes and text onto a blank canvas in any browser.

It's easy to use but there's very little else you can do with it apart from add text and select a range of generic icons.

Unlike most free logo software, you can download a hi res version of your logo for free although if you want an SVG file it costs an extra $10.

9. Logo Maker

Logo Maker is designed for beginners to logo designed and is free to use but requires s subscription in order to download and use logos you create within it.

Logo Maker is aimed at total novices that aren't familiar with concepts such as Layers, Gradient and Textures but need a business logo as quickly as possible.

However, you can't use your own custom images or in fact customize logos in Logo Maker much at all without a subscription which start at $9.99 per month.

10. Inkscape

inkscape for mac

Inkscape is an open source graphic design software that's free to use and can be used to create logos on a Mac.

Inkscape is a vector editing application which means it takes a bit of learning for beginners but for experienced graphic designers, it offers some powerful logo creation tools for free.

Some of the highlights of Inkscape for Mac include calligraphy tools and a color selector tool for RGB, HSL, CMYK, color wheel and CMS palettes.

Inkscape also has a gradient editor and can export results to SVG, EPS, PDF, PNG and Adobe Illustrator AI format.