M&M’s New Logo: Comparing the Redesign with Its Predecessor
Compare the current M&M’s wordmark with its predecessor: letterforms, outline, color, spacing, and what those changes mean for vector use.
What the current M&M’s logo is
The mark in question is the M&M’s wordmark: a custom logotype that reads “m&m’s.” It is the primary brand identifier on packaging, advertising, and digital applications. The redesign is a redraw of that same name, kept in lowercase, with the same letter sequence as the predecessor rather than a new symbol or monogram.
Keep three related assets in a separate pile so the comparison stays clean. The single lowercase “m” on each candy shell is a product imprint. The candy characters are illustration, sometimes locked up with the wordmark. Full packaging lockups combine the logotype with a color field, flavor name, or legal line. Files circulating as a “new logo” may be any of those, or a reconstruction. This guide compares the official “m&m’s” logotype with the official wordmark it replaced.
How the wordmark developed
The predecessor is an all-lowercase custom face: two “m” letters, a central ampersand, and a compact “’s.” For a long stretch of packaging it appeared as light lettering, usually white or cream, with a dark, relatively heavy outline, sitting on a brown or product-colored field. The “m” forms are rounded and slightly inflated, with soft shoulders and bowls. The ampersand fills the gap between the two “m”s and is the most distinctive single glyph in the lockup.
A precise launch date, lead designer, and studio credit for the latest redraw were not available in the records supplied for this article. Treat circulating dates and designer names as unverified until they appear in attributable brand or design-studio material. Official, clause-by-clause motivation for each contour change is likewise a gap here. Observable simplification — flatter color, more even stroke, less dimensional highlight — can be described from the artwork. It is editorial interpretation, not a published brief, to assign those changes a meaning such as friendliness, chocolate, or sharing.
The sequence is a refinement of a known mark. The redesign keeps the name construction, the lowercase setting, and the light-letter-plus-dark-outline recipe. Older and current versions can still appear across markets and SKUs, so a pack on a shelf is the specimen to match when the job is current packaging.
Where the two versions differ
The notes below assume comparable specimens: the same crop, a similar size, and the same background. Geometry, typography, spacing, and color are visual readings from that kind of side-by-side. Claims about small-size performance and file editability follow from how the paths are built; they were not measured in a reproduction test for this article.
| Criterion | Predecessor | Redesign |
| Geometry | Softer, more inflated “m” shoulders and bowls; a more irregular outer contour; a visible bevel or highlight on some applications. | Tighter silhouette, more even outer path, reduced dimensional edge. The two “m”s sit closer to a shared construction. |
| Typography | Custom logotype with small weight and curve shifts from stem to stem; the ampersand is the visual hinge. | Still a custom logotype, with more consistent “m” pair and a regularized “’s.” Neither version is a retail font you can type. |
| Spacing | Compact lockup; the ampersand occupies the interior gap; the apostrophe sits tight to the final “s.” | Sidebearings and the apostrophe gap are tuned so counters feel more even when the mark shrinks. Exact kerning values are unpublished here. |
| Color | Light letters, dark outline, chocolate-brown as the supporting color; extra highlight stops on some packs. | The same color roles, applied more flatly, with a more uniform outline. Contrast still depends on the background behind the mark. |
| Scalability | Heavier, more irregular outline; counters can clog when the mark is reduced or when a weak raster is traced. Untested numerically here. | Flatter, more even outline, which usually holds up better at small packaging sizes and in pixels. Untested numerically here. |
| Editability | Older outlines are often expanded, merged, or mixed with bevel highlights, which makes clean recoloring slower. | Simpler fills and outlines are easier to separate in a vector file when the artwork is official. A filename such as .svg or .ai does not, by itself, prove live path geometry. |
Tradeoffs follow the job. The predecessor’s softer contour and any leftover bevel read as more tactile at large pack size. The redesign’s even stroke and flatter color make alignment, recoloring, and small-size use more predictable. If the work must match today’s shelf and screen look, use the current official wordmark in the outline-and-fill construction the brand specifies. If the work reconstructs a past pack or an archive comparison, keep the predecessor’s heavier outline and highlight rather than smoothing it toward the new paths. For candy-shell or character work, use those assets on their own terms; the wordmark does not stand in for the imprint “m,” and the imprint does not stand in for the logotype.
Reuse still requires permission from the trademark owner, however the file was obtained. When choosing a file to edit, prefer artwork in which the outline is a true stroke or a clean offset path, the two “m”s are separate shapes, and the apostrophe is independent of the “s” unless the official lockup merges them. Confirm that file against a current pack photograph under similar lighting. Screenshots and unofficial vectors often distort outline weight, which is the first place the two versions stop matching.
Wordmark file check
1. Confirm the asset: “m&m’s” logotype, shell “m”, or character lockup
2. Compare at the same size on the same background
3. Inspect whether the outline is a stroke, an offset path, or a traced raster
4. Check that both “m”s and the apostrophe are editable shapes
5. Match outline weight and brown/white roles to a current pack photo
6. Treat unofficial files as reference until the paths match official artwork