What Is the Rosneft Logo?
The Rosneft logo is a cluster of black and yellow upright strokes set above the name ROSNEFT. Its black and yellow colours have defined the company's look since before 2006, when a design agency began refreshing the brand for Rosneft's filling stations. The logo belongs to Rosneft, the Russian oil company headquartered in Moscow, which was set up as a state enterprise in April 1993.
It became an open joint-stock company in September 1995. At the pump the symbol is paired with a curved orange line, a secondary device added during the station redesign. The symbol with the name is available as the Rosneft logo SVG.
Rosneft Logo Facts
| Introduced | In use by 2006; colours refreshed from 2006 |
| Symbol | Black and yellow upright strokes |
| Logo type | Combination mark: symbol and wordmark |
| Owner | Rosneft Oil Company |
What the Rosneft Logo Means
The name is a contraction of the Russian words for Russian oil, Rossiyskaya neft. The name spells out what the company does, so the symbol is left to do the work of colour.
- Yellow: the brand's signature. Minale Tattersfield studied the brand and set out to make the colours communicate more warmth and vitality.
- The upright strokes: we found no official explanation of them, and no designer for the original symbol is on record in the sources we checked.
Rosneft Logo History
By 2006 the symbol was already well established, even though Rosneft was a young company. That year the agency Minale Tattersfield began work to reposition Rosneft as a modern brand for drivers from the mass market up to premium. Research had turned up a blunt question from customers: how could a brand whose identity was yellow look so dull?
The agency kept the symbol and changed what surrounded it:
- Yellow: made more saturated, so it looked warmer and fresher.
- Silver: replaced white, which looked more modern and stayed cleaner on site.
- Black: used more sparingly, because it can carry negative associations in the energy sector.
- An orange swoosh: added as a secondary branding device, where the old stations used straight lines.
Rosneft rolled the designs out at more than 1,000 filling stations. The work ran up to the stations built for the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics. The same look was applied to stationery, the website, tanker livery and business communications.
Later events also touched the mark:
- 2012: Rosneft took action against a Siberian filling station chain based in Novokuznetsk. Police described the chain's logo as so similar to the oil company's trademark that the two were almost identical.
- 25 March 2022: Rosneft filed a new logo with Rospatent, the Russian patent office. According to the newspaper Vedomosti, it swapped the black and yellow pairing for green and yellow and was drawn by a young designer from the Russian Far East.
The company said it was not dropping its traditional trademark. It had no plans for a full rebrand of its station network at that stage.
For more brands like Rosneft, browse our energy logos.
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Rosneft mean?
It is short for Rossiyskaya neft, Russian for Russian oil.
What colours is the Rosneft logo?
Black and yellow. The refresh Minale Tattersfield began in 2006 made the yellow more saturated, swapped white for silver and limited the use of black.
Did Rosneft change its logo in 2022?
It filed a green and yellow version with Rospatent in March 2022, but said it was keeping its traditional trademark and not planning a full rebrand of its stations.
When was Rosneft founded?
As a state enterprise in April 1993. It became an open joint-stock company on 29 September 1995.