What is a brand kit?
A brand kit is the set of assets a business reuses in everything it publishes, kept in one place so nobody has to rebuild or guess. At minimum it holds the logo in a few forms, the colors as exact codes, the fonts, and a note on how photos and words should feel. It also holds the facts a writer needs: what you sell, to whom, the problem it solves, your proof and the offer.
Without a kit, whoever makes this week’s ad opens last month’s flyer, eyedrops the blue, screenshots the logo and picks a font that looks close. Each copy drifts. In the 2016 Lucidpress and Demand Metric survey behind most brand consistency statistics, over 60% of organizations said materials are at least sometimes created that do not follow their guidelines, and 95% had guidelines but only a quarter enforced them.[8] A kit is enforcement that costs nothing: the easiest file to find is the one that gets used.
The measured picture is similar. A 2025 Journal of Brand Management study of 125 UK packaged-goods brands found that brands use their own branding elements with 65% consistency on average.[7] Big companies with design departments manage two-thirds; a one-page kit is how a small business does better.
What should a brand kit include?
Seven items: what to store, the formats to keep and why.
| Item | What to store | Formats | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Logo | Full logo, a square icon, a one-color version for dark and light backgrounds; a clear-space rule | SVG, plus transparent PNG at 1,000 px or more | Vector scales without blur; PNG is for tools that cannot read SVG; Meta accepts JPG or PNG[2] |
| Primary and secondary colors | Two to four hex codes (#1F3A5F), and which pairs may carry text | Plain text | Hex is what every tool reads; the pairs that pass 4.5:1 are the ones allowed to hold words |
| Typefaces | One or two families with the weights you use, and where they come from | Font files (OTF, TTF, WOFF2) or the Google Fonts name | The file is what a tool installs; a name alone is not enough if the family is licensed |
| Photo style | Three to six reference photos and one line on light, crop and subject | JPG | A tool can match a look it can see, not an adjective |
| Voice | Five lines: how you talk, three words you use, three you never use, how you sign off | Plain text | Copy is the fastest thing to drift off-brand |
| Offer and audience | What you sell, to whom, the problem it solves, your proof, the current offer | Plain text | Every headline comes from these facts |
| Sizes and safe zones | The two shapes you export to and the areas to keep clear | A note: 4:5 feed, 9:16 story; top 14%, bottom 35%, sides 6% clear on 9:16 | From Meta’s Ads Guide[2][3] |
The last row is the one most kits skip, and it is where a good logo ends up under Instagram’s buttons. Meta’s Reels page asks you to leave “roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom, and 6% on each side of your asset free from text” and logos.[3] Meta static ad sizes has every placement in pixels.
Brand kit vs brand guidelines: what is the difference?
The kit is the thing; the guidelines are the rules about the thing. A kit is files and facts: here is the logo, here are the colors, here are the fonts. Guidelines say how the files may be used: minimum sizes, clear space, which color goes on which background, what the logo must never do. A large company publishes guidelines because hundreds of people touch the brand. A small business needs the kit and about ten rules.
Spotify’s developer design page is a compact example of guidelines rather than a kit. It tells you the rules: the exclusion zone “is equal to half the height of the icon”, the logo “should never be smaller than 70px in digital or 20mm in print”, the icon never smaller than 21px or 6mm, and the green logo “should only be used on a black or white background”, with a monochrome version for anything else.[6] Those three rules belong in any kit.
Write rules as sentences a new hire can apply: “logo clear space is the height of the letter S” beats “give the logo room to breathe”. Where the two disagree, the kit wins: the hex code is the brand.
Which numbers set the sizes in a brand kit?
Contrast. The W3C’s WCAG 2.2 criterion 1.4.3 says text needs “a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1”, with an exception for large text, at least 18 point or 14 point bold, which needs 3:1; the stricter AAA level asks for 7:1.[1] Run every pair you plan to put words on through a contrast checker and record which pass.
Ad sizes. Meta’s Ads Guide page for a Facebook feed image recommends “File Type: JPG or PNG”, “Ratio: 4:5” and “Resolution: 1440 x 1800 pixels”, with a 30 MB maximum and a 600-pixel minimum width; its text advice is 50 to 150 characters of primary text and a 27-character headline.[2] The Instagram Reels page recommends 9:16 at 1440 × 2560 and 44 characters of primary text.[3]
Fonts. Google Fonts’ FAQ says all its fonts “are open source and are without cost”, that “you can use them commercially”, that “you can use Google Fonts within any logo”, and that they can go “on any surface”; the licenses are the SIL Open Font License, Apache or Ubuntu.[4] The one thing the SIL license forbids is selling the font files by themselves.[5] A paid family needs its license noted in the kit.
Clear space and minimum size. Pick a unit from the logo itself, the way Spotify uses half the icon’s height,[6] and write down the smallest size at which the mark still reads on a phone.
Brand kit examples: what a finished one looks like
An invented coffee shop, as a worked example. Logo: wordmark as SVG, bean icon as SVG and 1,024-pixel PNG, each in brown and white, clear space equal to the bean’s height. Colors: espresso #3B2314 and cream #F3E9DC as the text pair (about 12:1, well past WCAG’s 4.5:1),[1] terracotta #C4552D as an accent that never carries body text. Type: a Google Fonts serif in Bold for headlines and a sans in Regular for body, so no license note is needed.[4] Photos: daylight, hands and cups, no stock smiles. Voice: short, warm, first person plural; we say “roast” not “blend”, never “artisanal”. Offer and audience: single-origin pour-overs and a loyalty card for people who work within a ten-minute walk; proof, the review score and count. Sizes: 4:5 and 9:16, with the 14 / 35 / 6 safe zone noted.[3]
That is the whole kit, and it is enough to brief a designer or an ad tool. Notice what is not in it: no mission statement, no mood board, no twelve-color palette. What is not reused does not belong.
How to build a brand kit from your website in an afternoon
- 1
Extract what the website already knows
Paste your address into the free brand kit extractor. It reads the page and its stylesheets and returns the logo file, the colors as hex codes, and the typefaces the headings and body use. No sign-up. - 2
Check the colors against the contrast rule
Test each pair that will carry text against WCAG’s 4.5:1,[1] and demote the pairs that fail to accents. - 3
Find the real logo file
The extractor returns the logo the site serves, often a PNG. Ask whoever built the site for the SVG. Save a square icon and a white version too. - 4
Settle the fonts and their licenses
If the families are on Google Fonts, write the names and weights; they are free for commercial use, logos and print.[4] If they are paid, save the files and the license note. - 5
Write the profile in plain words
What you sell, who buys it, the problem it solves, your proof, the offer, five lines of voice. Twenty minutes, no adjectives. - 6
- 7
Put it where the next ad starts
One folder, one page. In Showfolk, pasting the website does steps one and five at once: it reads the logo, colors and fonts and writes a brand profile (offering, audience, problems, proof, offers), and every ad uses both. How website to ad works.
Questions people ask
- What is a brand kit in simple terms?
- A brand kit is the small set of files and facts every piece of your marketing starts from: logo files, hex colors, one or two typefaces, a note on photo style, a few lines on voice, and the offer and audience in plain words, kept in one folder.
- What should a brand kit include?
- Seven things: logo files in SVG and PNG, two to four hex colors with the pairs that may carry text, one or two typefaces with weights, a few reference photos, five lines of voice, the offer and audience with proof, and the ad sizes and safe zones.
- What is the difference between a brand kit and brand guidelines?
- The kit is the assets (files and facts); the guidelines are the rules for using them (minimum size, clear space, which color on which background). A large company needs a guidelines document; a small business needs the kit and about ten rules.
- Which file formats should a brand kit use for the logo?
- SVG for the master, because vector scales without blur, plus a transparent PNG at 1,000 pixels or more for tools that cannot read SVG. Meta accepts JPG or PNG for ad images.
- Can I use Google Fonts in my brand kit for free?
- Yes. Google Fonts says all its fonts are open source and without cost, and can be used commercially, in any logo and on any surface, under the SIL Open Font License, Apache or Ubuntu licenses.
Sources
Every figure above points at one of these. Facts were last checked on .
- [1]W3C: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.2, Success Criterion 1.4.3 Contrast (Minimum). “a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1”; large text (at least 18 point or 14 point bold) at 3:1; 1.4.6 Contrast (Enhanced) at 7:1
- [2]Meta Ads Guide: Image ad specs for Facebook Feed. “File Type: JPG or PNG”, “Ratio: 4:5”, “Resolution: 1440 x 1800 pixels”; primary text 50 to 150 characters, headline 27; maximum file size 30 MB, minimum width 600 pixels
- [3]Meta Ads Guide: Image ad specs for Instagram Reels. 9:16 at 1440 × 2560; primary text 44 characters; “roughly 14% of the top, 35% of the bottom, and 6% on each side of your asset free from text”
- [4]Google Fonts: Frequently asked questions. “all Google Fonts are open source and are without cost”; commercial use; “you can use Google Fonts within any logo”; “on any surface”; SIL Open Font License, Apache and Ubuntu licenses
- [5]SIL Open Font License: OFL FAQ. Logos, print and design work are welcome; fonts may not be sold by themselves
- [6]Spotify for Developers: Design and branding guidelines. Exclusion zone equal to half the height of the icon; logo never smaller than 70 px or 20 mm, icon 21 px or 6 mm; green logo only on black or white
- [7]Journal of Brand Management, July 19, 2025: Ward, Beal, Dawes, Trinh and Romaniuk, Keeping it in the family: measures and drivers of portfolio brand cohesion. Open access; 125 UK packaged-goods brands; 65% average consistency; cohesion falls with more elements and sub-brands
- [8]Inc., June 20, 2017: If You Want to Make 23% More Money, Then Get Consistent. Quotes the 2016 Lucidpress and Demand Metric survey: 95% have guidelines but a quarter enforce them; over 60% create off-guideline materials
