What changed: this page now prices the rebrand only, and website costs have their own guide. Every studio price below was re-checked on the studio's own site on 27 October 2026.

A startup rebrand in 2026 costs from $249 for a logo contest to $250,000 and up for a multi-market overhaul. In between, an experienced freelancer charges $5,000 to $20,000 for an identity system, a boutique brand studio $15,000 to $50,000, and Focus Lab about $75,000 to $350,000 for a structural rebrand. Ours is a $15,000 brand sprint, a fixed-price rebrand that runs two to four weeks.

What separates the tiers is research depth, naming, and how many people have to sign off. Not the deliverable list.

This page is for a funded B2B founder putting a number next to "brand" in a use-of-funds plan. It prices the rebrand: positioning, messaging, visual identity, and the system that keeps them consistent. The website is a separate line with its own cost guide.

TL;DR: the PIXELUP LABS Stage Map for rebrand budgets

The row founders get wrong is the fourth one. Stage doesn't move you down the table. A committee, a new name, or a second product does.

What does the market say a rebrand costs, and why do we disagree?

Search what a rebrand costs and the serious answers start at $60,000. We and the Color's 2026 breakdown puts a full strategic rebrand at $60,000 to $150,000. Focus Lab, one of the few B2B brand studios that prints its prices, puts a structural rebrand at about $75,000 to $350,000.

Now read what's inside those numbers. We and the Color's tier includes a website. Focus Lab's Structural Rebrand lists web redesign, M&A integration, brand architecture and stakeholder alignment in its scope.

The $150,000 rebrand is usually three projects on one invoice: the brand, the website, and the committee.

Price the brand on its own and the number drops. Metabrand starts brand identity at $15,000. So do we. The useful question is what the other $60,000 to $335,000 buys:

• Research depth: twenty stakeholder interviews and a segmentation study, not four founder conversations.
• A name: legal search, linguistic screening and trademark clearance. Real work, priced for good reason.
• Committee governance: a process built so six stakeholders each feel heard.
• Brand architecture: several products, sub-brands, or an acquisition folded into one system.
• Insurance: at Series C, a botched rebrand costs far more than the fee.

Here's what it doesn't buy: better taste. A prestige firm and a good boutique draw from the same talent pool, often the same people at different points in their careers.

So the honest version: if you have a committee, a naming problem, or several products to unify, the big number is right and you should pay it. If you're a founder-led Series A or B company that needs enterprise buyers to stop hesitating before a deadline, $75,000 is the price of a process you don't need yet.

What branding studios actually publish (checked 27 October 2026)

Most branding studios don't print a price. We checked the specialists that do, on their own sites. We also noted two things their quotes rarely spell out: whether a website sits inside the number, and whether they'll name your company.

We put ourselves first because it's our page; the rest run by entry price. Sources: Metabrand's FAQ and services, Focus Lab's FAQ and services, and C42D's services page.

Two of the three other studios that print a price list web work inside it. That's how Metabrand's $15,000 and C42D's $45,000 can both be honest quotes for a Series A rebrand.

Landor and Koto publish no price. Motto's only public figure we could find is the $100,000+ minimum project on its Clutch profile, which is the directory's number, not Motto's.

Rebrand cost by stage, in detail

Pre-seed and pre-PMF: $0 to $1,000

Don't hire anybody. A brand amplifies a position, and if the position is still moving, you're paying to personify something that will change.

Use a clean wordmark and a type pair. If you want options, a 99designs logo contest runs $249 to $1,050 across its four packages. Spend real money on a writer who can make your homepage say what you do.

You'll hear that rebranding cheaply now saves rebranding expensively later. That's true only if your positioning survives to the next round. Most pre-PMF positioning doesn't.

Seed under $2M raised: $1,000 to $10,000

A freelancer is the right buy here. On general freelance marketplaces, design work clusters around $15 to $35 an hour. An experienced freelancer charges $5,000 to $20,000 for a full identity system.

At this stage you're buying execution, not opinion. That's the correct trade. For how a freelancer compares with a studio, a subscription or a hire, see agency vs freelancer vs subscription vs in-house.

Seed with $2M+ raised: $10,000 to $25,000

At $2M+ raised, positioning starts paying for itself. We and the Color puts an identity system at $10,000 to $50,000 from an agency and $5,000 to $20,000 from a solo freelancer. The gap is the team: a strategist and a senior art director on top of the person drawing.

At seed you're choosing which of those people to pay for. If the founders already hold a sharp opinion about the market, pay for the art director. If they don't, pay for the strategist.

Series A to B, founder-led: $15,000 to $50,000

This is our stage, so read the next few sentences with that in mind.

A founder-led Series A or B company selling to enterprise has a specific problem. The product wins on capability, then the deal goes quiet while a buying committee decides whether you'll still exist at renewal. That's a perception problem with a deadline attached: a pipeline review, a launch, or the next round.

At least 6 of our first 35 projects were timed to a funding announcement or a raise. Whether to rebrand before or after the round is its own question.

What this stage needs is a brand that argues something and a system so it doesn't decay. What it doesn't need is a five-month process.

Our Brand Sprint is $15,000 over two to four weeks, and FuseAI's brand was ready for its August launch 17 days after kickoff. For where the weeks go at every tier, see how long a startup rebrand takes.

Your team's part is a kickoff call and a branding workshop, where we learn the marketing goal and the message the brand has to carry. If that's the job you're budgeting for, book a call and we'll tell you whether a sprint fits.

Series B and up, with a committee, a new name or several products: $75,000 to $350,000

Now the market number is correct. Focus Lab's Structural Rebrand starts at $25,000 a month and typically runs three to five months, about $75,000 to $350,000. It's built for brands "navigating major change", meaning "mergers, acquisitions, or a full rebrand with complex stakeholder needs."

C42D's top tier starts at $95,000, runs 16+ weeks, and adds in-depth strategy and brand architecture. At this point you likely have a stakeholder group, more than one product line, and a claim that has to hold up for years. The research phase stops being a luxury.

Series C and beyond: $250,000 and up

We and the Color puts enterprise and multi-market rebrands above $250,000, and past $1 million when every region and product line changes.

This is Landor and Koto territory, and neither publishes a price. You're buying process, governance, and rollout capacity from a firm that won't fall over when your board changes its mind in month four.

What moves the price of a rebrand up or down?

Five things move a rebrand's price: a new name, research depth, the number of products, the number of people who sign off, and whether you get a system or a folder of files. Speed costs extra only at studios that aren't built for it.

A new name is the most expensive thing you can add, because it drags legal and linguistic work with it. Some branding studios don't name companies at all: Focus Lab's FAQ says "we don't provide company naming". C42D runs naming "from strategy to screening."

Research depth is most of the gap between a $30,000 and a $150,000 engagement. Four founder conversations cost a fraction of twenty stakeholder interviews.

Brand architecture multiplies the work. One product needs one system. Three products and an acquired company need rules for how they relate.

Sign-off time is billed time when a studio charges by the month. At Focus Lab's published $25,000 a month for a structural rebrand, one extra month of committee review is another $25,000. A fixed-price sprint puts that risk on the studio, and a fixed price doesn't mean templated work.

A system costs more than files, and it's the line item founders cut first. A brand handoff is a folder.

A design system is components, documentation and templates your engineers build against. For Greptile's 2025 rebrand and design system, that meant 200+ components with dev-first documentation.

AI doesn't make the brand itself cheaper. In our sprints, a designer creates the base of every brand. AI then helps us extend it and try variations when we hit a creative block.

What are the ways to buy a rebrand?

A startup can buy a rebrand five ways: a logo contest or AI tool, a freelancer, a boutique brand studio, an established brand firm, or a network consultancy. Most of the price gap between them is strategy.

Sources: 99designs' contest packages, We and the Color's 2026 rates, and the studio prices above, all checked 27 October 2026.

The costs a rebrand quote doesn't include

Five costs sit outside almost every rebrand quote. Nobody in this category prints them, so here they are.

• Trademark filing. The USPTO charges $350 per class for a base application. Missing information adds $100 per class, and a free-form description adds $200 per class. A trademark lawyer's search and filing fee comes on top.
• The rollout. Bynder's survey of 1,002 marketers found a typical rebrand updates 215 assets and runs seven months from first talks to rollout (2023). Your website is usually the biggest of those assets: here's what a website redesign costs.
• Months of review. Monthly billing turns indecision into fees. Fixed-price work doesn't.
• Brand entropy. A rebrand with no system decays after launch. You pay twice: once for the rebrand and once for the next one.
• Keeping it consistent. Focus Lab's retainers start at $5,000 a month for design execution and $10,000 for a brand team. C42D's start at $2,500. Ours start at $6,000.

Our actual prices, and why we publish them

PIXELUP LABS publishes three prices:

• Brand Sprint: $15,000. Two to four weeks.
• Brand plus website: $25,000 to $40,000. Six to eight weeks. The website half is priced in our website redesign cost guide.
• Retainer: from $6,000 a month. The same team that shipped the sprint. Optional, with no minimum term.

How we know what a rebrand needs: we've run 38 projects as a ten-person studio, and every public review is 5.0: eight on Contra and one on Clutch. Across 18 projects where we tracked what changed first, positioning or messaging came first in 6, visual identity in 8, and the website in only 4. About 10 of our first 35 continued on a retainer.

Greptile says demo bookings doubled after the 2025 rebrand and website went live. Greptile's Daksh Gupta wrote on Contra in May 2025: "Daksh is a tier-1 designer, with great taste, attention-to-detail, and strong product intuition. I highly recommend working with him."

Jerry Liu of Dayflow (YC S24) wrote on Contra in August 2025: "Daksh has top tier design sense. Would recommend working with him on branding."

On Streamline, an AI legal-ops company at Series A, our first three directions pushed colour, gradients and conceptual imagery. We realised we had pushed too far: they were not lawyer-like. The brief became "legal-tech serious, modern flavour."

That call is what the money in a rebrand buys. The logo comes after it.

We publish our prices for one reason: the number is the filter. Roughly half the people who read this page will now correctly rule us out, and that saves everyone a call. Our Brand Sprint is listed on Contra at $15,000.

It also means we can't quietly quote you differently than the next founder. When an agency won't publish a range, the usual reason is that the range depends on what they think you can pay. If the number didn't rule us out, book a call.

When the cheaper option is genuinely right

A cheaper option beats a PIXELUP LABS sprint in eight situations. We lose these, and we should.

You're pre-PMF. Use a template and Claude Code. Come back after the pivot settles.

You've raised under $2M. $15,000 is a headcount decision at that size. A freelancer plus a good writer gets you most of the outcome for a fraction of the number.

Your strategy is locked and the Figma is done. You need hands, not opinions. A freelancer is cheaper and faster.

You need a new name. We don't name companies. C42D runs naming from strategy to screening, and Metabrand lists naming in its strategy work.

Your rebrand needs a committee or folds in an acquisition. Focus Lab's Structural Rebrand is built for exactly that. Across several markets, look at Landor or Koto.

You want our price from a studio with offices in your time zone. Metabrand starts brand identity at $15,000 and works from New York, Berlin and Limassol.

Your problem is pipeline volume. Design makes every impression land harder. It doesn't create impressions. Hire a growth agency.

You need steady production, not an argument. A design subscription is a better instrument than a sprint.

If none of those is you, book a call.

FAQ

How much does a rebrand cost?

A startup rebrand costs $5,000 to $20,000 from an experienced freelancer, $15,000 to $50,000 from a boutique brand studio, and about $75,000 to $350,000 for a structural rebrand at Focus Lab. Multi-market rebrands clear $250,000. Research depth, naming and sign-off move the number more than the deliverable list does.

How much does branding cost for a startup?

Most funded startups should spend $10,000 to $50,000 on branding, depending on stage. Under $2M raised, $1,000 to $10,000 with a freelancer is enough. Metabrand and PIXELUP LABS both start brand identity at $15,000, and Focus Lab's Focused Branding runs about $15,000 to $50,000.

How much does a brand identity cost?

A brand identity system costs $10,000 to $50,000 from an agency and $5,000 to $20,000 from a solo freelancer, per We and the Color's 2026 rates. A logo contest alone runs $249 to $1,050 on 99designs. Our $15,000 Brand Sprint adds positioning and messaging to the identity.

How much should a funded startup invest in brand?

A founder-led Series A or B startup should invest $15,000 to $50,000 and a few weeks. Under $2M raised, close to nothing. With a committee, a new name or several products, $75,000 and up is defensible. The real filter is whether your positioning is settled enough to be worth amplifying.

What does a rebrand cost at Series A?

A Series A rebrand costs $15,000 to $50,000 from a boutique brand studio. Our Brand Sprint is $15,000 over two to four weeks, Metabrand starts at $15,000, and C42D's Series A package starts at $45,000 with a website. Pay more only if you need a name or have a brand committee.

What does a rebrand cost at Series B?

A founder-led Series B company can still rebrand for $15,000 to $50,000. Once a committee, an acquisition or several product lines are involved, budget about $75,000 to $350,000, the range Focus Lab publishes for its Structural Rebrand. The number tracks who signs off, not the round.

How much does a full rebrand cost for a SaaS startup with a boutique studio?

A boutique studio charges a SaaS startup $15,000 to $50,000 for a full rebrand without a website, and from $25,000 to $45,000 with one. Our brand plus website is $25,000 to $40,000. Metabrand prices identity plus website from $25,000, and C42D's $45,000 package includes a site.

What does a brand cost to maintain after the rebrand?

Keeping a brand consistent after launch takes either a design system your team can run or a retainer. Focus Lab's retainers start at $5,000 a month for execution and $10,000 for a brand team. Ours start at $6,000 with no minimum term, and about 10 of our first 35 projects continued on one.

Does a rebrand include the website?

Usually not, and it's the first thing to check on any quote. Metabrand and PIXELUP LABS price the brand alone at $15,000, and brand plus website from $25,000. C42D and Focus Lab list web work inside their packages, which is why their totals look higher.

Why do most design agencies not publish their prices?

Because the range often depends on what the agency thinks you can pay. Publishing a number removes that flexibility and rules buyers out before a sales call. Of the branding studios we checked on 27 October 2026, Landor and Koto publish no price at all, and Motto's only public figure is a Clutch minimum.

What is brand entropy, and why does it cost money?

Brand entropy is what happens when a rebrand decays after launch because nobody left a system behind. Roughly eight months in, the deck stops matching the site and engineers invent components. It costs money twice: once for the original work and once for the rebrand that follows.

The bottom line

If you're pre-PMF, spend nothing. If you've raised under $2M, hire a freelancer.

If you're a founder-led Series A or B company and enterprise buyers are hesitating, $15,000 to $50,000 and a few weeks is the right shape. If you have a committee, a new name to find, or several products to unify, pay the bigger number, because then it's correct.

Our numbers are above. If they rule us out, that was the point of printing them.

If they don't, book a call or see the Brand Sprint on Contra. We also keep lists of the studios we lose to, among B2B tech branding agencies and AI design agencies.

A rebrand isn't expensive. Bundles are.

Studio prices checked 27 October 2026 on each studio's own site, with Clutch, 99designs and the USPTO fee schedule where noted. We re-check this page monthly. If a number has moved, tell us and we'll fix it.

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