An invoice logo does one useful thing: it makes the document instantly recognisable in a stack of others. That is worth having, and it is worth ten minutes of getting right rather than dropping in whatever file is nearest.
Adding one here
Click the logo area on the sheet and choose an image from your device. It is read in your browser and embedded in the sheet, and like everything else here it is not uploaded anywhere.
Save the sheet afterwards and the logo travels with the file, so your template carries it and you never do this twice.
What to use
- PNG with a transparent background, for most logos. It prints cleanly on white and works on the screen.
- SVG, if you have one. It stays sharp at any size, including on paper.
- JPEG, only if that is genuinely all you have. It cannot have a transparent background, so a white box appears around the mark.
Aim for something around 600 pixels wide. Larger is wasted, since the printed logo is around 40mm; much smaller looks soft on paper because print resolution is several times screen resolution.
Why it prints grey or vanishes
Three causes, in order of how often they happen.
Background graphics are off. Most browsers default to not printing background images and colours. If your logo is a background rather than an image, or has a coloured panel behind it, it disappears. Turn on Background graphics in the print dialog. Printable invoices covers the other settings.
The logo is white or very light. Designed for a dark website, invisible on white paper. Keep a dark version for documents.
Greyscale printing. A coloured logo chosen for contrast on screen can turn into a flat grey block. Print one in black and white and look at it before you decide.
No logo yet
Leave it empty. The sheet prints nothing where the logo would be, so the document does not carry a placeholder or a gap that looks like a mistake.
A clean document with your business name set properly reads better than a logo made in a hurry. Type the name, address and contact details carefully and that does the job. What goes on an invoice covers what actually has to be there, and none of it is a logo.
Do not let it take over
The logo is identification, not the subject of the page. If it is larger than the document title, it is too big. The reader is looking for the amount and the due date, and everything competing with those costs you time later.
A quiet header and a clear total is what a well designed invoice looks like.
Use it everywhere
The same mark on your quote, invoice, receipt and delivery note is what makes a set of documents read as one business.
Save a blank for each document with the logo already placed. Organising your invoice files covers where those blanks live.
Check it on paper once
Print one invoice with the logo, in colour and in black and white, and look at it. Fifteen seconds of checking against months of sending something you have only ever seen on a screen.
Where the logo actually helps
Not on the invoice, particularly. The invoice is usually opened by someone who was expecting it.
It helps on the documents that arrive unannounced or get handled by people who did not commission the work: a delivery note reaching a warehouse, a quote sitting in a pile of three, a statement of account landing in an accounts inbox.
That is the argument for putting the same mark on all of them rather than only on the invoice.
Size it for paper, not for screen
Roughly 40mm wide on a printed page is right for most marks. Bigger competes with the document title; smaller stops being legible once it is on paper.
Because print resolution is several times screen resolution, a logo that looks crisp in the browser can look soft when printed. If you have an SVG, use it and the question disappears.
Text-heavy logos are the ones that fail
A wordmark with fine lettering, reduced to 40mm and printed on an office laser, turns to mush. A simple shape survives.
If your logo has a strapline, consider a version without it for documents. Nobody reads a strapline on an invoice, and removing it lets the mark be larger and clearer.
Check it in three places
Once, and then never again:
- On screen.
- Printed in colour.
- Printed in black and white, or in draft mode.
Most invoices are printed by the recipient, on whatever is nearest, with whatever settings were left on. The third one is the realistic case. Printable invoices covers the dialogue settings.
Signatures are not logos
A scanned signature dropped into the logo slot looks like what it is. If a document needs a signature, use the signature block, print it and sign it. How to write a job card covers documents where the signature is the point.
Set it once
Open the invoice maker, add the logo, fill in your details, and save the file. Every invoice after that already has it.