Rangers Logo PNG
As they enter the field, the players take possession of the ball and fight like lions. They are always ready to play. The Rangers logo symbolizes the winning club. The team’s ability to reach the top ten has made it a central figure in world sport.
In March 1872, brothers Moses McNeil and Peter McNeil, with Peter Campbell and William McBeath, founded Rangers FC in Glasgow. The first match in May ended 0:0 against Callander F.C., and blue shirts became the defining color.
In 1890, Rangers joined the founding group of the Scottish League and shared the first title with Dumbarton FC. In 1894, it won the Scottish Cup against Celtic FC, shaping the Old Firm rivalry that defined Glasgow football.
Under Bill Struth from 1920 to 1954, the club secured 18 league titles and 10 cups. Earlier, in 1898–99, Rangers had won all 18 league matches. In 1939, 118,567 attended a derby at Ibrox.
On January 2, 1971, a crush at Ibrox caused 66 deaths. In 1972, Rangers won the Cup Winners’ Cup, defeating Dynamo Moscow 3:2 after earlier final defeats to ACF Fiorentina and FC Bayern Munich.
In 1986, Graeme Souness became manager and led the club to nine consecutive league titles from 1989 to 1997, with Walter Smith continuing the run.
Financial issues escalated in the 2000s. In 2012, over £130 million in debt led to liquidation and relegation to the fourth tier. The club returned to the Premiership by 2016–17.
In 2021, under Steven Gerrard, Rangers won their 55th title unbeaten with 102 points, ending Celtic FC’s run. In 2022, it reached the Europa League final, losing to Eintracht Frankfurt on penalties.
Meaning and History
The Rangers are unique because they use two logos. The first, corporate, appears in the media, on official documents, and on souvenir goods. The second, the main one, decorates the players’ equipment. Both versions exist in parallel and are not interchangeable. They evolved before adopting a modern look.
What is Rangers?
Rangers is a professional Scottish football team from Glasgow. They participate in the Premiership and have an unusual founding history. The club was founded by four teenagers who came together to play football. They came up with the idea in 1872 while walking through Kelvingrove Park (West End Park).
Corporate logos
1959 – 1968
The Rangers’ name came to soccer from an English rugby annual. After seeing it in the publication, Moses McNeil suggested it for the club, founded in Glasgow in March 1872. His brother Peter McNeil, Peter Campbell, and William McBeath joined him as founders. They added the words “Football Club” to identify the sport.
Rangers introduced its first corporate emblem in 1959. It became known as the Ready crest after its READY motto. Shaped like a circular seal, it featured THE RANGERS FOOTBALL CLUB in gold uppercase letters around a red ring. The club’s full name surrounded a white inner field containing a blue shield. Gold outlines separated the ring, field, and shield.
A gold lion stood on its hind legs on the blue shield, facing the viewer’s left. The READY motto appeared below the lion, while a small soccer ball with visible seams sat above the shield. Both the club’s name and its motto used sans-serif lettering.
1968 – 1991
The updated 1968 Rangers emblem combined soccer imagery with Scotland’s royal symbolism. An enlarged light blue ball replaced the shield at the circle’s center. A red lion standing on its hind legs appeared over the ball. In heraldry, this pose is called a “lion rampant.” A red lion appears on Scotland’s royal coat of arms, connecting the club emblem to the country.
White lines divided the blue ball into elongated panels modeled on older leather balls. The READY motto sat below it, within the inner circle. The monogram was removed, and “THE” was dropped from RANGERS FOOTBALL CLUB, leaving the club’s name and motto. The name ran around the white outer ring in black uppercase sans-serif letters. Black circular outlines replaced the gold borders, separating the lettering ring from the inner field and defining the emblem’s outer edge.
1991 – 2020
The 1991 update to the Rangers emblem changed the lettering while preserving the arrangement of the ball, lion, and motto. Rangers Football Club continued around the circle, with READY beneath the ball on a white background. Uppercase serif letters replaced the previous typeface, alternating thin and thick strokes.
The emblem’s colors were reduced to white, dark blue, and red, completing the move away from gold. The light blue ball became dark blue. The circular borders, club name, and motto adopted the same shade. The red lion remained over the ball, but its outline was reworked. More detailed rendering of the mane, paws, and tail gave the animal a more intricate silhouette.
2020 – today
Preparations for Rangers’ 150th anniversary in 2022 prompted an identity update suited to digital formats and an international audience. The new identity and the fourth version of the corporate emblem were unveiled on July 8, 2020. See Saw Creative developed the project with designer Greg McIntyre. The team consulted fans, employees, and partners throughout the process. The day before the unveiling, the updated logo appeared in light projections around Glasgow, including at Ibrox Stadium and Kelvingrove Park.
The name within the circular frame was split into 2 sections to make it easier to read. RANGERS occupied the upper arc, with FOOTBALL CLUB along the bottom. The ball was enlarged, and the gaps between its panels were made uniform. READY moved onto a blue panel at the bottom of the ball and appeared in white letters. The identity introduced bright red and blue shades, including True Rangers Blue.
The red lion retained its pose, but its figure was redrawn to look fiercer. The designers refined its face, mane, claws, and curled tail. Alongside the version inside the circle, they created a separate, detailed lion illustration with highlights and shadows. A rampant lioness was developed for the Rangers women’s team.
Ibrox’s history informed the custom Rangers Display typeface. It was developed in collaboration with typographer Craig Black, a longtime supporter of the club. The letterforms emerged from a study of archival stationery and stadium details. Their shapes referenced the mosaic at the entrance, while the serif terminals echoed the bluebell motifs on the famous gates.
Rangers Club crests
1968-1990
The intertwined RFC initials appeared in Rangers materials long before they were added to the playing uniform. By 1881, they appeared on season ticket covers when the team played at Kinning Park. They also decorated early club caps. The emblem became known as the Scroll Crest, with its 3 letters taken from the full name Rangers Football Club.
Brothers Moses and Peter McNeil, Peter Campbell, and William McBeath founded the club in Glasgow in March 1872. Moses proposed the name Rangers after reading about an English rugby team of that name in a sports annual. Adding “Football Club” identified the sport. The monogram combined the first letters of the 3 words into an interwoven calligraphic design. Long vertical strokes intertwined with rounded arcs, flared terminals, and small flourishes, turning the abbreviation into a single decorative pattern.
The Scroll Crest appeared on the Rangers’ home jersey in 1968. White embroidery was placed against the blue fabric, with open space around it. The crest consisted entirely of the monogram. The broad curve of the “C” wrapped around the vertical strokes of the “F” and “R.” The lower leg of the “R” extended to the right and ended in a curl. Gaps at the intersections helped distinguish the 3 initials, while the white thread stood out against the blue fabric. The monogram was also added to the team’s shorts in the 1978/79 season.
1990-1994
In 1990, a ribbon bearing Rangers’ full club name was added around the RFC monogram. An early known depiction of the intertwined initials dates to 1881. The blue ribbon, edged in white, curved around both sides of the blue letters and joined above them. FOOTBALL occupied the top section, while RANGERS and CLUB appeared along the sides. Red accents decorated the folded ends.
The READY motto appeared below the monogram. Its full Scots form, “Aye Ready,” means “Always Ready.” The white ribbon lettering and the motto used heavy uppercase sans-serif letters. Their restrained shapes differed from the flowing curves and flourishes of the calligraphic RFC monogram. The ribbon crest appeared on Admiral and Adidas uniforms until 1994.
1994-2003
The white RFC monogram returned to Rangers’ home uniform in 1994. The ribbon and motto were removed, leaving the intertwined letters against blue. On the Adidas jerseys for the 1994/95 and 1995/96 seasons, the crest sat at the center of the chest. Repeated images of the monogram and the club’s name also formed part of the fabric pattern.
The framing around the monogram changed in subsequent years. On Nike’s home uniforms for the 1997/98 and 1998/99 seasons, the initials were placed inside a shield. The familiar intertwined lettering remained.
2003-2005
To celebrate Rangers’ 50th league championship, won under Alex McLeish, the club added a row of five five-pointed stars above the RFC monogram ahead of the 2003/04 season. Each star represented 10 Scottish league titles.
The intertwined initials remained unchanged. The row of stars widened the crest, and white united the stars and letters against the blue jersey. The embroidery color could vary, while the 5 stars continued to represent Rangers’ 50 league championships.
2005-2010
Umbro added red stars above the Rangers monogram for the 2005/06 season. The letter color varied by uniform. The initials remained white on the home jersey, while the white away jersey featured a dark blue version. On the away uniform, the red stars differed in color from the lettering.
The 5 stars formed an arc above the monogram. The top star was the largest, with the others decreasing in size toward the ends. The color combination changed, while the crest’s components and the stars’ meaning as symbols of league titles remained.
2010-2012
For Rangers’ 2010/11 home uniform, Umbro drew inspiration from the team’s uniforms during manager Bill Struth’s tenure. The white collar and embroidered club crest recalled that period. The RFC monogram and the arc of stars above it returned in white embroidery against the jersey’s blue fabric.
The 2011/12 home uniform retained the white embroidery and the same arrangement of initials and stars against blue.
2012-today
Rangers’ 2012/13 uniform celebrated 2 anniversaries. Umbro released it to mark the club’s 140th anniversary and the 40th anniversary of its 1972 European Cup Winners’ Cup victory. The uniform worn by the team that won the final in Barcelona served as the model. A larger, standalone white RFC monogram returned to the chest. The 5 championship stars moved to the side of the jersey, arranged vertically. Sandy Jardine, who played in the victorious final, and young player Rhys McCabe took part in the unveiling.
For the next anniversary, a ribbon inspired by early club memorabilia was added to the monogram. In 2021, it was placed beneath the initials for Rangers’ 150th-anniversary celebrations, accompanied by the dates 1872 and 2022 and the inscription 150 YEARS. Decorative ribbons from early membership booklets and crests on the Bill Struth Main Stand at Ibrox inspired its shape.
On Castore’s 2021/22 home uniform, the RFC letters and anniversary decoration appeared in gold. The chest monogram was enlarged, and the 5 stars moved to the back to make room for the larger crest.
Font and Colors
Rangers is one of the few football clubs with two logos. Documents and marketing use a round sign featuring a red heraldic lion, a blue ball, and lettering. It connects the team to its location because the same lion appears on Scotland’s coat of arms.
The second emblem is dedicated solely to the Rangers: it features the club’s intertwined initials and reflects the number of Scottish League titles won. The five-star monogram has adorned T-shirts since 2003.
The corporate logo lettering is bold, short, and serif. The monogrammed letters on the players’ uniforms were created from scratch and stylized.
The corporate logo uses the same colors as the official club palette: red, white, and royal blue. The monogrammed version uses only blue and white because it has no heraldic lion, which must be red.