NBC logo

1926–1937 NBC debuted as a radio network in 1926, with a logo depicting a microphone surrounded by lightning bolts, superimposed over a map of the United States. The "NBC" letters appeared in an arc above the graphic. 1931–1943 In 1931, NBC introduced its second logo – a square with a diagonal NBC text in it, with lightning bolts around the "B." This logo was later adopted in 1941 for use as the original logo for the newly formed NBC television network. ==As a television network (1943–1975)==

In 1943, NBC introduced its third logo, a microphone surrounded by lightning bolts. Lightning bolts denoting electricity were common in the iconography of broadcasting in the early 20th century, and were also depicted in the logo of corporate parent RCA, as well as that of one-time sister company RKO Pictures. The waves placed on the left side were meant for the radio network, and the right waves were meant for the television network. A network identification featuring this logo includes a male announcer saying "This is NBC, the National Broadcasting Company.", followed by the NBC chimes. On the network's flagship television station WNBT (now WNBC), this was accompanied by the same announcer saying "WNBT, New York.". At the beginning of telecasts, a card was shown with a different NBC logo with the letters in cursive and enclosed in a rectangle (a logo also used at the end of broadcasts in the early 1950s). This was replaced by another card depicting an NBC cameraman operating an RCA camera was shown underneath the text "NBC Television Presents". The letters "NBC", lighting in tune with the chimes, indicated time for station identification or the end of a telecast. In 1953, a stylized xylophone and mallet was introduced, symbolizing the NBC chimes, which were first heard on NBC radio in 1927 as a seven-tone sequence. Introduction of the Peacock (1956–1959) Network art director John J. Graham and designer Herb Lubalin of Sudler & Hennessey designed a new symbol for the television network in 1956: an abstraction of an eleven-feathered peacock indicating richness in color. This brightly hued peacock, which NBC called "the Bird", was adopted because of the increase in color programming. In the summer of 1957, beginning with Your Hit Parade, the peacock became animated and introduced every NBC color telecast until a revamped animation appeared in 1962. Its musical backing was a gong while the peacock began its formation, with a male announcer saying "The following program is brought to you in living color on NBC.", while the music crescendoed followed by a nine-note flourish while the peacock's feathers changed color and finally spread out. According to Game Show Network executive David Schwartz, the first announcer who spoke those famous words behind the Peacock graphic logo was Ben Grauer, who had been a familiar voice on NBC since 1930. A slide with the letters "NBC" in red, green, and blue respectively and with "TELEVISION" underneath appeared at the end of every color telecast. Snake logo (1959–1975) Starting in September 1959, an animated monogram logo joined the Peacock, appearing at the end of every telecast. Starting with the "N", each letter would grow from the other, forming a stacked typographic logo consisting of an "NB" ligature with the "C" forming the base. This would be known as the "NBC snake". The "Laramie Peacock" made special appearances throughout the ensuing years, mostly in a retro-kitsch context or to commemorate a significant broadcast event on NBC. It was used to promote the network's coverage of the NASCAR Cup Series race held at Darlington Raceway in the Florence, South Carolina region from 2015 to 2020, when it was the series' annual throwback round, where many racecars featured a throwback motif. The Peacock also made an appearance before the premiere of ''The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien in 2009. The "Laramie Peacock" has also been used by local stations: the sequence was shown at the beginning of Pittsburgh Dad's Guide to Christmas'', a special aired on Pittsburgh NBC affiliate WPXI on December 19, 2014. On December 6, 2024, in celebration of the 60th anniversary of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, as well as its return to NBC after over 50 years of annual airings on CBS, the "Laramie Peacock" logo made a brief return as a nod and tribute to its original broadcast, though shortened to 3 seconds. Additionally, the logo also made appearances during that year's airings of Frosty The Snowman and How the Grinch Stole Christmas!. =="N" logos (1975–1986)==

Trapezoid "N" (1976–1979) In a bid to modernize the network, NBC retained New York corporate identity consultancy Lippincott & Margulies in June 1974, to create a modern and standardized identity program across all of its divisions. At its center was an abstract "N", a bold geometric design consisting of two trapezoids – one red and one blue. One of the technological innovations of this logo was its use in the first electronically animated ident for a United States television network. On the January 10, 1976 episode of ''NBC's Saturday Night (now Saturday Night Live), Weekend Update host Chevy Chase mocked the new logo and its reported $1million design cost. Johnny Carson also discussed the new logo and its cost on The Tonight Show''. In February 1976, the Nebraska ETV Network (now Nebraska Public Media), the PBS member network for Nebraska, filed a trademark infringement lawsuit against NBC. Nebraska ETV had adopted a virtually identical logo upon their own rebranding the previous June; the only difference being NBC's inclusion of blue whereas NET's symbol was rendered in solid red. The logo, designed in-house by the network's art director, reportedly only cost around $30; this fact was often contrasted against the "million dollar" - later revealed to be around $62,500 - development cost of NBC's updated identity. In the ensuing litigation, NBC's preliminary identity proposals were revealed to have been completed by the agency in January 1975, whereas NETV's was designed and selected around March; however, the latter were the first to publicly display the symbol. An out-of-court settlement was reached Proud "N" (1979–1986) The Peacock became so closely associated with NBC that in 1979, the network's sitting president, Fred Silverman, moved to reintroduce it as the logo of the network. This decision was influenced by research conducted in 1977 by Peter H. Kliegman from NBC's corporate planning department, which recognized the Peacock's value in identifying NBC-TV, and recommended its use as a logo. The "N" and the Peacock were combined by creative directors Gene Kolomatsky and Ted Szumila in September 1979 to create the "Proud N." This marked the first time that the Peacock was part of NBC's official logo rather than a signifier of color programming. It was simplified in keeping with the letter's pared-down design. Although all eleven feathers were intact, the teardrop tips were removed, while a simpler color scheme was used for the feathers themselves (blue for the feather behind the peacock's body; yellow, orange, red, violet and indigo respectively for the other feathers on both sides). The Peacock's body became a simple triangular shape, without any feet. On several occasions, the new Peacock was used independently of the "N," starting with the new "Proud as a Peacock" advertising campaign that reintroduced the Peacock; however, the "N" and the Peacock were usually combined between 1979 and 1986. In 1986, the "N" was retired and the Peacock became the sole logo used by NBC, including the radio network. == Current Peacock logo (1986–present) ==

In 1980, just one year after the "Proud N" was introduced, NBC hired renowned design firm Chermayeff & Geismar to create a new brand identity for the network. Steff Geissbühler designed the simplified peacock that became the network's new logo. The 11 feathers of the previous peacock logo were pared down to six, encompassing each of the primary and secondary colors in the RYB color palette and also representing NBC's six divisions: which it would not do until 1985. Despite the first use of the new logo on August 26, 1985, it was only ultimately unveiled on May 12, 1986, during the finale of the NBC 60th Anniversary Celebration TV special, where past and present NBC stars stood on stage to introduce the new logo. Although NBC had been popularly known as "the peacock network" for some time, it was the first time that "The Bird" had been used as NBC's official symbol all by itself. The ".com" suffix added to create the URL for promoting the network's website was sometimes featured beside the logo. 2008–2009 Starting for the fall 2008 television season, a 3D glass version of the NBC peacock was introduced, in which a sharp, metal version of the peacock's body zooms out when the feathers blooming out of the body, then forming the logo as they flashed in tune to the NBC chimes like before, with the "Chime In" slogan transforms to the ".com" suffix next to the logo. 2009–2011 On September 14, 2009, with the introduction of the network's "More Colorful" image campaign by design agency Capacity Studios, the network incorporated a flickering effect for a gradient version of the NBC peacock – seen at the end of promos and ID sequences – in which the logo cycles through all six colors before switching to the standard multi-colored logo, usually displayed next to a clip featuring a main character or host of a particular program. Even though the logo was updated throughout the 2010s and 2020s, this logo was still used as its ID sequence until 2024, even it was later used for NBC News from 2013 to 2023. 2011–2013 In May 2011, NBC introduced a glossy 3D version of their logo, which was designed by Zoic Studios and officially came out on September 13, 2011. Other aspects of the 2009 graphics package remained intact, with the absence of the "More Colorful" slogan. Although the 2009 graphics package stays the same, in fall, the graphics package was updated to include computer-generated color bars. A different graphics package was introduced in 2012, featuring the 2011 logo on a bright colored gradient background. 2013–2022 In April 2013, NBC altered and modified their 3D logo and changed its wordmark to use Sweet Sans Pro, which officially came out on September 30, 2013. On September 17, 2018, NBC changed its wordmark to use a new in-house typeface made by Capacity, "NBC Tinker", named after former NBC chairman and CEO Grant Tinker. In July 2020, NBC temporarily added six vertical pips to the right side of the 2018 logo, which radiate out from each color of the peacock to form the vertical row in order to tie into it being used in the same position for the logo of NBCUniversal's Peacock streaming service, to promote its launch, before reverting to its regular logo in March 2021. 2022–present In the 2022–23 television season, NBC began to phase in an updated version of the peacock symbol, with its colors made brighter to match the logo of Peacock, the feathers repositioned to make them more "balanced", the peacock's "beak" made larger and more prominent, and more frequent uses of versions of the logo without a white outline. Loyalkaspar and Kerns & Cairns created a variable version of the NBC Tinker font known as "Tinker Pro", with the wordmark using a bolder version of the font. Sibling Rivalry designed the visual identity and branding, which featured the logo cycling through various gradient colors until settling in its usual colors. The updated peacock was soft-launched in September 2022 as part of the new logo of Sunday Night Football. An associated on-air identity by design agency Sibling Rivalry began to be implemented in December 2022, with a formal launch during its New Year's Eve special. To promote Wicked: For Good, as well as the special, Wicked: One Wonderful Night, the logo was temporarily changed to pink and green colors to match the colors of the Wicked logo, with the peacock in pink (or half pink and half green if the wordmark is not shown) and the wordmark in green, both with gold borders. ==Other variations==

eye. This variant appeared at WTVJ Sales Presentation in 1988. '' advertisement in 2017 (parent company of NBC) from 2013 to 2022 In the early 1950s, the bold upper case NBC letters (later used in the 1953 "Xylophone" logo) were also used as an animated "light-up letters" logo in synchronization with the NBC chimes in front of a gray background. This closing sequence was edited in at the end of a network program. Another variant was later used with a darker gray background and a disclaimer underneath the light-up letters: "This program was reproduced by the Kinephoto process," a reference to a live program put onto black and white film identified as a Kinescope recording. This variant was widely used throughout the 1950s and 1960s. Many programs were originally recorded in this manner before the advent of two-inch videotape. NBC, however, continued to use its Kinephoto recording system to archive many of its videotaped programs so the videotapes can be erased and reused for other programming. This is evident with such 1960s programs as Hullabaloo using both archived Kinescope footage with rare color videotape finds, which was later re-released for home video on VHS and DVD. For NBC's 1965 fall preview special, the peacock introduction began as normal with announcer Mel Brandt's standard introduction; however, when the peacock faded, Brandt is heard saying "It just starts in black and white!" Used to begin the special, the variant – with the voice-over being featured at the beginning of the ident, instead of during the middle – led into almost the complete pre-title teaser of Get Smart's pilot episode, which was shot in black-and-white. This variant is also known as the "Pink Peacock" on video-sharing websites such as YouTube due to the faded color of the video. For the first American television broadcast of The Beatles' black-and-white film, ''A Hard Day's Night, on October 24, 1967, NBC replaced the peacock with a penguin: a caption showing I Dream of Jeannie and The Jerry Lewis Show (the programs NBC was pre-empting that night) was pushed off-screen by an animated, waddling penguin adorned with a top hat and flapping its flightless wings (imitating the peacock), accompanied by announcer Mel Brandt drolly saying "I Dream of Jeannie and The Jerry Lewis Show'' will not be seen tonight. Instead... (music cue) The following very, very special program is brought to you in lively black and white, on NBC." At the end of the sequence, the penguin is shown taking off its top hat and unzipping its chest, with The Beatles jumping out and performing, before running away while being chased by fangirls. In 1968, a variant of the 1965 "in living color" peacock ID was featured at the start of an episode of ''Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. At the very end of the sequence, the peacock sneezes, sending its feathers flying off-screen, after which the puzzled peacock is shown looking in each direction in notice that its feathers are missing. This clip was later re-used in 1985 to open an episode of TV's Bloopers & Practical Jokes, and in the 2002 special The Most Outrageous Game Show Moments 2''. The sneezing peacock was only an animation added onto the end of the original clip of the 1965 peacock ID, as the peacock's feathers became brighter upon switching to the portion in which it sneezed. In 1993, NBC commissioned several artists such as Al Hirschfeld, Peter Max, John Kricfalusi, J. J. Sedelmaier, David Daniels, Joan C. Gratz, and Mark Malmberg to devise abstract variations of the peacock for promotional use. However, the Gratz bumper was first used in 1992. Animated versions of the Hirschfeld, Sedelmaier, Gratz, and Kricfalusi peacocks acted as stings, and continued to air on the network until 2002. The NBC late-night talk show ''Late Night with Conan O'Brien'' occasionally featured sketches with "Polly, the NBC Peacock", a puppet of the logo who overpraised the network's programming, while mocking the ratings, programming, and stars of its competitors. In 2017, NBC published a print advertisement in The New York Times marketing itself as the United States' number-one television network, which featured a variant of the peacock with a flipped beak to resemble the number "1". On January 6, 2026, a special logo commemorate NBC's 100th anniversary designed by Joshua Ecton was unveiled, combining golden "100" number and the redesigned peacock. The logo was accompained by tagline "A Century Together", which was unveiled on February 6 on that year. ==See also==