Stop Translating the Logo: India’s Multiscript Brands Need More Than Regional Versions

Stop Translating the Logo

India does not have a regional-language branding problem. It has a hierarchy problem. Too many identity systems are designed in English, approved in English and only then handed to a vendor for “regional versions.” The result may be technically legible, but it rarely feels authored. It tells audiences—quietly but unmistakably—which language was considered original and which arrived later.

That habit is no longer defensible. Brands now meet customers across packaging, storefronts, payment screens, streaming interfaces, transit media and voice-led search. In that environment, script is not a decorative skin placed over a fixed brand. Script changes rhythm, density, hierarchy, pronunciation and even the social temperature of a message.

A multiscript system is not a set of matching fonts

A typeface can solve character coverage. It cannot decide what the brand sounds like in Marathi, how much visual authority a Tamil headline should carry, when a Bengali word should remain untranslated, or whether an English product name should lead or follow. Those are brand decisions.

The best current evidence comes from type design itself. Google Design’s account of Anek describes a family created for nine Indian scripts plus Latin: Bangla, Devanagari, Gujarati, Gurmukhi, Kannada, Malayalam, Odia, Tamil, Telugu and Latin. The project involved 12 designers across eight cities and produced 40 styles for each script—400 named instances—using eight weights and five widths.

Source: https://design.google/library/anek-multiscript

Those numbers are not impressive merely because they are large. They reveal the real labour of parity. The designers did not perfect a Latin master and mechanically derive the rest. They developed the scripts concurrently, with regular cross-script review. That process should be a warning to brand teams who expect one approved English lock-up and a two-day translation round to produce cultural coherence.

The visual hierarchy becomes a cultural hierarchy

Every identity system contains signals about importance. The larger line is read first. The bolder script looks more authoritative. The better-spaced version feels more premium. The version with fewer awkward line breaks feels more intentional. When English consistently receives those advantages, the brand communicates status even if the copy says all languages are welcome.

This is why “same font size” is not parity. Different scripts have different proportions and textures. Optical equality may require different point sizes, line spacing or widths. Nor is a phonetic transliteration automatically the right answer. Sometimes the strongest move is a locally meaningful phrase; sometimes it is a stable product name with a native-script explanation; sometimes it is bilingual composition. The system needs rules, not reflexes.

India’s open type infrastructure has changed the excuse

Google Design has chronicled a new generation of Indian type designers and multiscript families, while Google Fonts states that its fonts are open source and available for commercial as well as non-commercial use. Access is therefore less of a constraint than it once was. The harder constraints are taste, process and the willingness to include language expertise early.

Context: https://design.google/library/new-wave-indian-type-design

Google Fonts licensing overview: https://developers.google.com/fonts

Open-source does not mean one-size-fits-all. A font may offer the required script but still be wrong for a financial service, a luxury label or a neighbourhood food brand. It may lack the needed weights for an interface or the warmth required for packaging. It may render well at display sizes and poorly in dense mobile text. The correct question is not “Does it support Hindi?” but “Does this family support the relationships our brand needs across languages and contexts?”

Four rules for brands that want genuine language parity

First, start with language scenarios before drawing the identity. List the markets, scripts, content types and moments in which customers will meet the brand. A storefront in Ahmedabad, an onboarding screen in Bengaluru and a festival offer in Kolkata do not create the same typographic demands.

Second, commission native reading, not translation alone. The reviewer should judge tone, idiom, cultural implication, line-breaking and visual authority. A grammatically correct sentence can still sound like a government circular when the brand is meant to feel intimate.

Third, design layouts from the hardest script combination. If the smallest mobile card must hold two scripts, solve that constraint at the beginning. Do not discover at launch that the regional version needs three lines where the English mock-up allowed one.

Fourth, define parity rules in the brand guidelines. Specify optical scale, spacing, numeral styles, punctuation, transliteration, code-switching, fallback fonts and decision rights. Show real bilingual and trilingual examples, not a token alphabet page.

What this means for culture and commerce

Language is often described as a way to “reach the next billion.” That phrase reduces people to an acquisition segment and encourages crude localisation. The deeper opportunity is trust. A brand that handles a script fluently can feel closer, more competent and more respectful. A brand that handles it clumsily makes the customer perform extra work.

For premium brands, regional scripts are not a concession to mass reach. They can carry refinement, wit and contemporary confidence. For technology brands, they are not simply a translation layer; they influence usability and comprehension. For institutions, they shape who feels that information was designed for them rather than merely made available to them.

The cultural shift is therefore not from English to regional languages. It is from a single original with several derivatives to a plural original: one idea designed to live natively in multiple scripts.

A better commissioning brief

A useful brief should name the audiences and reading environments, not just the list of languages. It should ask for script-specific typographic testing at display, interface and body-copy sizes. It should include native-language writers and reviewers, specify who approves terminology and require prototypes on real packaging, screens and signs.

It should also define what remains consistent. Parity does not require identical composition. Colour, motion, image behaviour, spacing logic or tone can hold the family together while each script receives the form it needs. Consistency is a relationship, not a clone.

The commercial question

If your brand plans to enter new Indian markets, launch multilingual packaging or rebuild a digital product, do not postpone script strategy until adaptation. The cost of fixing hierarchy after templates, signage and components are locked is far higher than the cost of designing parity at the start.

Afternoon works with Indian brands on identity, communication and experience systems. If your multilingual brand currently feels like one master and several compromises, start a conversation at https://www.afternoon.agency/

Frequently asked questions

What is multilingual brand design in India?

It is the coordinated design of verbal identity, typography, layout and governance across the Indian scripts a brand uses. It goes beyond translation by treating every language as part of the core system.

Should every script use the same typeface family?

Not necessarily. A multiscript family can provide cohesion, but optical character, readability and brand tone matter more than using one file. Different families can work together when their proportions, weight and voice are deliberately matched.

Are Google Fonts free for commercial branding?

Google states that all fonts in its catalogue are open source and can be used commercially or non-commercially. Teams should still review the individual font licence and test technical coverage before deployment.

When should language experts join a rebrand?

At the strategy and naming stage, before the visual system is fixed. Early involvement prevents awkward transliteration, weak hierarchy and expensive template rework.

Disclosure: This commentary represents Shubham Pandey’s independent opinion.