The small eyes version is freaky for such a logo. With Big eyes it looks friendlier, but still not cute...

For something neutral and scalable, having a side perspective could perhaps work better ? Like this one for instance, with very few lines yet looks good.

https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRMINEP...

I feel bad to be this critical but it fails in direct, context free recognizability.

It fails to evoke "penguin".

I wouldn't have recognized it as a penguin without context, and I doubt others would without priming.

This is great. I made a download button a while ago. The Apple and Windows logos scale down, look great, and are easily identifiable. Tux is great, but just doesn't scale down. Tried about 10 variants to get one that is recognizable, but also works at smaller sizes.

Many attempts at this from many people: https://www.svgrepo.com/vectors/linux/

I thought this would be about the other Linux logo, that preceeded the penguin:

https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/logos/platypus/llogo.gif

I was always partial to the Linux logo with the red triangle (from 1994): <https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/logos/raytraced/linux-povl...>.

(More old Linux logos here: <https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/logos/!INDEX.html>)

It looks like a haunted platypus.

BTW Tux is the linux mascot, not logo

The other logo is a fox: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/xenia-linuxfox

Kinda wish that one had won, foxes are cooler looking and more marketable.

It's a nice minimalist design, but I think it still doesn't scale down as well as the Apple and Windows logos. The logo needs to be simple yet more expressive somehow, perhaps only focusing on Tux's head?

I thought this was going to be a post about Tuz, the tasmanian devil wit a penguin mask: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tux_(mascot)#Tuz_2009

I thought this was going to be about the pre-Tux platypus: https://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/logos/platypus/!INDEX.html

Don’t fix it if it ain’t broken!

On the topic of Linux logos, about 20 years ago there was a popular Ethernet <-> USB storage bridge called an NSLU2 aka the “Slug”. It was of a similar pedigree to the classic WRT54g but instead of routing, this device turned cheap USB disks into a NAS device:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/NSLU2

There was quite an active group of hackers bringing Linux to the platform. This was their utterly heartwarming and adorable logo:

https://www.socallinuxexpo.org/scale8x/sites/socallinuxexpo....

Love the direction. But small eyes looks spooky and big eyes looks terrified.

Reminds me a little bit of Shamshel's head from NGE

And whoever is behind this site, also has idea for "Universal Bitcoin Logo Alternative": https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5451084

It looks like he's wearing a mask

Comparing this logo to the original reminds me the whole discussion about skeuomorphism (that's when GUI icons imitate closely things from the real world).

Icons that strongly resemble things from real life are, quite often, problematic at representation, especially in smaller sizes. They take more time to understand and decode, they're prone to confusion.

But anti-skeuomorphic icons also have a problem of their own: they become so abstract that quite often we don't know what they represent. They become cold and soulless, like corporation logos. An example: I look at this new icon and what I see is Darth Vader with an open big mouth.

It is like comparing IKEA furniture and Bauhaus or Scandinavian design against Art-Noveau or Antonio Gaudí's architecture. The first are (as Nietzsche would say) apolinean, elegant, subdued and functional. The second are dionisiac, fun, a feast for the senses.

Reminds me of the Groke from Moomin

The beady eyes & shape feel a bit too Android-y to me

Meh, not for me. It's like someone saw the iconic Linux logo and said "what if this was done by an overfunded pre-revenue Silicon Valley startup instead".

To me it looks a bit creepy enlarged, but it works really well in small size, (which was the point)!

Thought this was about Xenia for a moment... :)

It looks like a Hollow Knight character.

I am sorry to say this, but this one looks soulless to me.

Totoro Ghost

Nobody says anything about the tasmanin one. :)

This is absurd. I literally spent 30 seconds with the image on GIMP, making just few warps and it's markedly better. I don't mean to make a pull request or anything and I still don't exactly like/love it, but my point is, the original clearly was built on solid artistic basis and yet they published the alien head. What was the author thinking?

1: http://numpad0.com/imgs/2025-09-28%20002632.png

e: I think by far the biggest problem is completely circular eyes. Just replacing it with ovals solve minimum half of the problem. Then the head can be enlarged for better feeling of attachment. The beak can be sharper too. But those are less problematic than the eyes. Even just removing them altogether helps.

It looks appropriate for Halloween.

I do not support this logo.

I've also made "The Other Ecogex Logo", looking something like this: https://www.istockphoto.com/photos/poo-emoji

Free to use as you please.

Meh. Looks like a boring robot (pretty much a clone of the Android logo), the cute penguin is much better even when it looks old school by now.

Does Linux really have a logo, or just a mascot? Does Linux even need a logo if every distro has one? Do logos even make sense anymore?

Looks too much like another emoji.

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