If a designer hands you one JPG and calls the project finished, you did not buy a logo. You bought a picture of one. Here is what a complete handover looks like, whether you are the designer preparing it or the client checking it.

Vector masters

AI or EPS. The editable original. Vector means it scales from a business card to a building without losing quality. Every serious printer, sign maker and embroiderer will ask for this first.

PDF (vector). The universally openable version of the same thing. Useful for anyone who does not own Adobe software.

SVG. For the website. Sharp on every screen, tiny file size.

Raster versions

PNG with transparency, in several sizes — something around 500px, 1000px and 2000px wide covers most needs. Transparency matters so the logo can sit on any background.

JPG, because somebody will insist on a JPG. Give them one and save an email.

Favicon and app icon sizes, square, cropped properly rather than the full lockup shrunk into a box.

Colour variants

Full colour, pure black, pure white (reversed), and a one-colour version. Each in vector and PNG. The white version is the one people forget and then need urgently the first time they put the logo over a photo.

Layout variants

Horizontal lockup, stacked lockup, and icon only. Real life has wide spaces and tall spaces, and stretching a logo to fit is how identities get ruined.

The guideline sheet

It does not need to be forty pages. One or two pages covering: clear space around the mark, minimum size, the colour values (CMYK, RGB or HEX, Pantone), the fonts used, and a short do-not list — do not stretch, do not recolour, do not add effects, do not put the colour version on a busy photo.

Fonts

The logo text should be converted to outlines so it never depends on a font being installed. Separately, tell the client which typefaces the brand uses and where to license them. Handing over font files you paid for is usually a licence violation — point them to the source instead.

How it should be organised

Folders by use: Print, Web, Social. Sensible filenames. A short readme. This costs the designer twenty minutes and saves the client months of asking questions.

If you are a client and you only have a JPG, go back and ask for the vector. You already paid for it.