You can use the Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI) standard to add your organization’s logo to outgoing email messages sent from your organization. Email clients that support BIMI display the logo along with your organization’s messages in the recipient's mailbox. Logos used with BIMI are verified by a third party, so recipients can be sure logos in their inbox are legitimate.
On this page
- Before you begin
- Step 1: Create an SVG file of your logo
- Step 2: Get a VMC & associated PEM & certificate files
- Step 3: Upload the PEM file to your web server
- Step 4: Add a BIMI assertion TXT record at your domain
- Related topics
Before you begin
To use BIMI, your logo must be trademarked and your sending domain must use DMARC authentication.
Register your brand logo as a trademark
Logos used with BIMI must be trademarked with an intellectual property office that’s recognized by Verified Mark Certificate (VMC) issuers. You need to verify that your brand logo is trademarked. If not, we recommend that you work with your legal team or a lawyer to have your logo trademarked. The trademark process can take from 6 months to over a year.
The BIMI standard is being expanded to include logos that aren’t trademarked.
Verify your public web server supports BIMI
The web server that hosts your BIMI files must use the HTTPS protocol. We recommend that the server uses TLS version 1.2 or later to ensure secure connections with servers that use earlier versions of TLS. Secure TLS connections must use the protocol specified in your TLS certificate. Your TLS certificate must include a reference to the trusted server root Certificate Authority (CA) certificate.
For BIMI web server requirements, refer to Fetch and Validation of Verified Mark Certificates.
Set up DMARC to support BIMI
BIMI requires that messages be authenticated by DMARC. DMARC is an email standard that handles unauthenticated messages based on a policy that you determine.
To support BIMI, your domain's DMARC policy must use these DMARC record values:
- The policy option (p) must be set to quarantine or reject. BIMI doesn’t support DMARC policies that have the p option set to none.
- The percent option (pct) must be set to 100. This value applies the DMARC policy to all outgoing mail (100 percent) from your domain.
For the steps to create a DMARC policy, go to Define your DMARC record.
Step 1: Create an SVG file of your logo
Logos used with BIMI must be in Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) file format. SVG is an open-standard image format that can display your logo at different resolutions. When you apply for a VMC, you must submit your logo in SVG format and meet the requirements on this page.
You can use any available apps to create your logo SVG file, as long as the file meets the requirements in this section. To create an SVG file with Adobe Illustrator and a text editor, visit Create a BIMI SVG file.
Gmail requirements & recommendations for BIMI SVG files
These are Gmail requirements for BIMI SVG files that are in addition to BIMI standard requirements:
- The image size must be a minimum height and width of 96 pixels.
- The image size must be specified in absolute pixels. Example: width=”96” height=”96”
- Don't use relative dimensions to specify image size. Example: width=”100%” height=”100%”
In addition to the requirements, here are recommendations for SVG file compatibility with Gmail:
- The logo image should be centered in a square.
- The logo image should appear on a solid color background. Transparent backgrounds might not display as expected.
- The SVG file size should be 32 KB or smaller.
- The SVG file should include the <desc> element (description) for accessibility.
BIMI standard requirements for SVG files
This section summarizes BIMI standard requirements for SVG files. For the complete list of requirements, go to section 5.2 of the BIMI standard.
The SVG file should not include:
- External links or references (other than to the specified XML namespaces)
- Scripts
- Animations or other interactive elements
- The x= or y= attributes in the <svg> root element
| SVG file attribute | Value |
|---|---|
| File format | SVG Tiny Portable/Secure (SVG Tiny PS), a version of SVG. Learn more |
| baseProfile attribute | tiny-ps |
| version attribute | 1.2 |
| <title> element | There are no strict requirements, but we recommend using a value that reflects your organization’s name. |
Step 2: Get a VMC & associated PEM & certificate files
Submit your SVG file to get a VMC from a CA. A VMC comes with a Privacy Enhanced Mail (PEM) file (and other associated files) that you'll upload to your web server. Your SVG file (logo) is embedded in the PEM file. Gmail and other email clients support BIMI only with PEM files. Using a PEM file provides additional security for your logo because it was verified by the CA.
If you want to use a standalone SVG file for BIMI (not supported in Gmail and other email clients), skip the next steps and go to Upload the SVG file to your web server.
To get a VMC and associated files:
- Submit your trademarked logo in SVG format and request a VMC from one of these certificate authorities: DigiCert or Entrust.
- When your VMC is issued, you receive an entity certificate PEM file. Your SVG file (logo) and VMC are embedded in the PEM file.
- Get any intermediate CA certificates and root CA certificates from the CA and append them to the PEM file in the order issued. Typically, the order is: Entity certificate, any intermediate CA certificate, root CA certificate. You'll add this file to your public web server in the next step.
Step 3: Upload the PEM file to your web server
Upload the PEM file (including all appended files) to your domain’s public web server. Copy the PEM file URL because you'll include it in your BIMI assertion TXT record in the next step.
Example PEM file URL: https://images.solarmora.com/brand/certificate.pem
Upload the SVG file to your web server
If you’re using BIMI with an SVG file instead of a PEM file (not supported in Gmail and other email clients), upload the SVG file to your domain's public web server. The web server must be in the same domain as your outgoing email server. Copy the SVG file URL because you'll include it in your BIMI assertion TXT record in the next step.
Step 4: Add a BIMI assertion TXT record at your domain
To turn on BIMI for your domain, you need to add a BIMI assertion TXT record at your domain provider. After you add the record, it can take up to 48 hours for your logo to show in recipients’ mailboxes. For detailed steps for creating and adding a BIMI assertion TXT record, visit Add a BIMI TXT record to your domain.
Here are some BIMI assertion TXT record examples. Replace the domain and file names with your own.
- If you're using a PEM file that contains your logo, your TXT record will look similar to this example:
v=BIMI1;l=;a=https://images.solarmora.com/brand/certificate.pem
- If you're using an SVG file for your logo, your TXT record will look similar to this example:
v=BIMI1;l=https://images.solarmora.com/brand/bimi-logo.svg
For details about BIMI assertion TXT records, refer to section 4.2 in Brand Indicators for Message Identification (BIMI).
Related topics
Google, Google Workspace, and related marks and logos are trademarks of Google LLC. All other company and product names are trademarks of the companies with which they are associated.
