Overlay vs Painting vs Debadging
Three ways to change the colour of a BMW roundel. One of them means booking a bodyshop, one of them is a decision you make once, and one of them sits on top of the badge you already own. This page is the comparison, not the sales pitch.
Compatible with BMW — Not Genuine BMW Parts. BMW is a registered trademark of BMW AG, referenced here for compatibility only.
Should I overlay the badge, get it painted, or take it off altogether
Start with what you are actually asking. The three options are rarely compared on the same terms, so here they are on the same terms.
| What you are actually asking | Overlay | Painted badge | Debadged |
|---|---|---|---|
| Can I change my mind in a month? | Yes. It is designed to be removed cleanly. | Not without repainting or buying another badge. | Only if you kept the badge in a drawer. |
| Does the original badge survive? | Yes. The overlay sits on top of it. | The original finish does not. | The badge survives. The panel keeps the mounting. |
| Do I need to book anything? | No. It is a home job, printed instructions in the envelope. | Bodyshop, and their diary decides. | No, but you own the outcome. |
| What am I spending before anything is on the car? | From £9.98 for a half kit, £17.00 for a full V1 kit. | Whatever the bodyshop quotes. That number is theirs, not ours. | Nothing, until you want the roundel back. |
| Can I match the wheel centres and the steering wheel? | Yes. The same kit covers bonnet, boot, wheels and steering. | Four separate jobs, and one of them is inside the car. | Nobody debadges a steering wheel. |
| What if I measure wrong? | Add the Fitment Promise and we re-cut to your measurement. | You find out after the paint has cured. | Not applicable. There is nothing left to measure. |
Painting the badge
Painting is the option that sounds cheapest until the badge is off the bonnet and sitting on a bench under a strip light. Done properly, the roundel comes off, gets keyed, gets primed, gets colour, gets lacquer, and then gets left alone while it cures. Done improperly, somebody masks it on the car in a unit with the shutter half down and calls the overspray character.
The honest case for paint: if you want a colour nobody sells and you are certain about it, paint is the only route that gets you there. The honest case against: it is a one-way decision on a part that reads from six feet away, and reversing it means another respray or another badge.
If what you actually want is a uniform, low-key roundel rather than a bespoke colour, a full-face tint gets you there without the bench, the strip light or the curing schedule. Black Gloss Tint, 2-piece covers the front and rear pair. Dark Smoke Tint and Light Smoke Tint do the same at two lighter densities, and the 9-piece set takes the look round the car.
Debadging
Debadging is the purist option and it is genuinely free, which is most of its appeal. On most BMWs the roundel is a separate part sitting in the panel, so taking it out leaves you with the mounting it sat in and a disc of paint that has spent its entire life in the dark. How that disc reads against the rest of the bonnet depends on the car, the age, and how many summers it has had.
It is also the hardest of the three to explain to somebody in a car park at half eight on a Sunday. Keep the badge. The people who regret debadging are, without exception, the people who binned the badge.
Overlaying
An overlay is pre-cut vinyl that sits on top of the badge you already have. It is not a replacement badge and it is not a plastic press-fit. It comes in two shapes:
- Quadrant kits — four quarter-cuts sized to the coloured quarters of the roundel, so the silver divider lines stay silver. Full Black Gloss covers all four quadrants. Half Black Gloss covers two and leaves the other pair as they came.
- Full-face tints — one piece across the whole roundel face. This is the option for a badge that is faded, marked or de-laminating rather than simply the wrong colour.
Kits are cut to order from premium 3M cast vinyl, UK-made and precision-cut in Birmingham, with printed fitting instructions in the envelope and a video walkthrough on the installation page. Every walkthrough sits on Install Guides, and the step-by-step is on Fitting Instructions.
The one thing that decides which kit you buy
Not the year on the V5C. The chassis code.
| Version | Chassis families | The trap |
|---|---|---|
| V1 | E series and F series | Seventeen V1 chassis were still being built after 2017. An X2 F39 built in 2023 takes V1. |
| V2 | G series and U series, plus the F40 | The G30 arrived in 2016 and the G11 in 2015. Both are V2, despite the dates. |
Sizing is by the quadrant, measured from the badge centre outward to the edge of the coloured field, excluding the silver divider lines. That is a radius, not a diameter. The 82mm and 74mm figures people quote at each other in forum threads are outer roundel diameters — context only, and never the fitment measurement.
| Position | V1 quadrant | V2 quadrant |
|---|---|---|
| Bonnet | 23mm (size 2: 20mm) | 22.5mm |
| Boot | 23mm (size 2: 18mm) | 20.5mm |
| Wheel centres | 19mm | 16mm |
| Steering wheel | 11–12mm | 12mm |
Your chassis code and its quadrant sizes are listed in full on the BMW Badge Overlay Fitment Guide. If the car has had a respray, a collision repair, or a previous owner with opinions about aftermarket badges, those numbers move — which is exactly what the Fitment Promise at £8.00 exists to cover.
What it costs to get it on the car
| Delivery | Price |
|---|---|
| UK Royal Mail 1st Class | Free, no minimum |
| 2nd Class Signed | £0.88 |
| 1st Class Signed | £1.70 |
| Next Day by 1pm | £9.88 |
| Next Day by 10am | £11.88 |
| International Tracked and Signed | £10.88 |
Everything is cut to order, so dispatch is 1–3 working days. The detail is on Shipping and Returns. Code LAUNCH8 takes 8% off, first 280 orders.
Pick the one you were going to buy anyway
60+ colours and finishes across 107 published products. The shortlist below is where people actually land. Match it to your chassis first, not your registration year.
| If you want | V1 (E and F series) | V2 (G and U series, plus F40) |
|---|---|---|
| Blacked out, gloss | Full Black Gloss | Full Black Gloss V2 |
| Blacked out, carbon | Full Black Carbon | Full Black Carbon V2 |
| Two quadrants only | Half Black Carbon | Half Black Gloss V2 |
| Keeps the two-tone | Black and White Gloss | Black and White Gloss V2 |
| Subtle, not shouty | Black and Dark Grey Matte | Black and Dark Grey Carbon V2 |
| Noticed from the next row of the car park | Black and Red Carbon | Black and Red Carbon V2 |
Also worth a look: Chrome Silver Mirror, Black and Silver Gloss, White and Black Carbon, Full White Gloss and Full Red Fluorescent. Stuck on finish rather than colour, the Colour Finder was built for exactly that.
While the kettle is on
The badge is the part people photograph. The rest of the car is the part they see first. Key Wrap at £12.95 deals with the fob that has been quietly embarrassing you since 2019. Reflective V-Brace overlays and 0.5cm reflective pin stripes do the same job after dark.
The verdict
Paint if you want a colour that does not exist and you are certain. Debadge if you want nothing there and you have somewhere safe to keep the roundel. Overlay if you want the look on your own badge, in a decision that is designed to be removed cleanly if you change your mind.
53,000+ sold. 10,565 eBay feedbacks. 4.3 stars across 568 Amazon ratings. Trading since 17 May 2011. Confirm your chassis on the Fitment Guide, then take the Identity Kit at £24.95 for a badge overlay and a Dark Smoke tint in one delivery — or go straight to Full Black Gloss V1 or Full Black Gloss V2 and be done with it.
Anything this page has not answered goes to Support.