Google Keep gets a new logo, steers clear of the 4-color Google Workspace icon mess

We just talked this morning about a way to change your Google Workspace logos back to their old-school status if the uniformity of Google’s new icons is causing issues for you. After Google began debuting these new logos not long ago, I was a little worried that other core Google services might follow suit as well. After all, the 4-color logo theme isn’t really unique to these new Workspace logos. Google Wi-Fi, Google TV, and Google Home all share the same sort of 4-color design and don’t really fall under the Google Workspace umbrella.

In the past few days, we reported that the Google Keep Chrome app was on its way out as users are beginning to see a small notification in the current Chrome application alerting them that they need to move over to keep.google.com as the Chrome-specific version is shutting down. It is quite literally the exact same experience on the web version, so there’s little need for the Chrome app to hang around any longer. I’d really like Google to add the proper PWA bits in there so that I get prompted to install it when I navigate to the URL, though, so there’s still some work to be done before the transition is complete.

Speaking of that, Michael wrote a great piece just the other day about how to create windowed shortcuts for web services that don’t have the PWA setup in place for a quick install. You can check that out if you’d like a windowed version of the web-based Google Keep, but one thing I noticed quite quickly when I did this for Keep is the fact that the icon has completely changed.

It seems Google is all about updating icons these days, so I’m not surprised by the move. If you are a long-time Keep users like myself, however, you may be in for a small shock when you add the new keep.google.com as a shortcut on your device. While not a radical departure, this is definitely a new look for Google Keep. For now, the Android app still retains the old logo, but I’d imagine that will be on the way out soon, too.

Nothing in the app itself looks to be changed, so no worries there. I’m mainly glad to see Google rolling out a new icon and logo for something without falling into this new, 4-color scheme that they’ve been so fond of lately. Whereas we think Google may have to dial those Workspace icons back a tad, this new Keep icon looks great, feels at home in the current icon lineup, and maintains its distinction both in new tabs and in the app launcher. This is more like it, Google.