Insignia is taken to include rank markings/badges/pins as well as other emblems such as the United Earth logo, individual ship's insignia and the emblem adopted by all Starfleet from 2270 based on that of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701. However, rank markings are mainly discussed in the relevant subsections demarcated by year/time period as regards Starfleet uniforms e.g. the rank markings/pips for uniforms of the 2151 era are on the page that describes the uniforms of that period. Details at the Index.
From the founding of Starfleet, it was felt important that the Starfleet uniform be clearly distinguishable to everyone and also to establish a strong team identity amongst the Starfleet personnel. Practical considerations were also important, such as the need for personnel to be able quickly to identify an individual's rank and department. Insignia plays an important role in achieving this, and any insignia worn by Starfleet crews and other personnel have always followed those criteria.
UNITED EARTH EMBLEM c.2150's
Worn by Enterprise NX-01 Starfleet crew in the deep space mission launched in April 2151, the vessel's mission badge or emblem is worn mounted on the upper left sleeve of the uniforms. The wearing of a vessel or mission badge is a tradition continued from the early missions of space exploration undertaken by NASA and the practice dates back to the 20th century. The crew of the Enterprise therefore wear the stylised image of their vessel. This patch shows backward-conformity as regards image content and styling by the show's producers as it is established in the first pilot for [TOS] called [The Cage] (see emblem below) that United Earth is the world's united government authority under which the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 operates, and a United Earth patch (a variant on the one in [Enterprise]) is worn by certain crewmembers in that pilot including Dr Boyce, a main character. United Earth should not be confused with Starfleet, the arm charged with, among other things, exploration and scientific investigation.
UNITED EARTH EMBLEM c.2250's
United Earth insignia with the starship name beneath, which features on the coverall that is the standard uniform of Starfleet medical personal and certain professions such as that of transporter chief. This insignia was certainly in use in 2254.
[The Cage]/[TOS: The Menagerie] doctor's coverall
[The Cage]/[TOS: The Menagerie] the insignia can just about be seen on the coverall's left breast
STARFLEET EMBLEM c.2260's
This emblem of Starfleet Command is seen worn by personnel attached to Starbase 11: in [TOS: The Menagerie] Commodore Mendez (wearing a gold shirt) and Miss Piper wear it, and in [TOS: Court Martial] various personnel assigned to Starbase 11 wear it including Commodore Stone (wearing a red shirt).
[TOS: The Menagerie] Commodore Mendez
[TOS: Court Martial] Commodore Stone
[TOS: Court Martial] Areel Shaw, prosecutor at the court martial
STARFLEET EMBLEM, c.2150's
This Starfleet Command logo is shown in the form of a patch (shown on black background) worn by personnel. The design of this motif, although it develops over the next few centuries, will stay basically the same as regards general colour scheme, the circle, its wide border, stars being included in the design, and the arrowhead. Like the starship's patch, the Starfleet Command patch was designed with backward-conformity in line with later Starfleet Command logos.
STARFLEET EMBLEM, from 2270
In 2270, Starfleet Command honoured the historic role of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 in the exploration of space by adopting the Enterprise insignia for the entire Starfleet. (However, in ST TNG Tech 2277 is given as the date when the USS Enterprise's ship emblem was adopted by Starfleet, so we must decide that the change-over was gradual and that 2277 was the year in which the change-over was fully completed.) This new fleet-wide symbol featured a slightly modified version of the Enterprise command emblem with the addition of a background circle on a graphic device. The arrowhead was placed on a circle. The show's writers decided on the modification for [Star Trek: The Motion Picture] whose events occur in 2271 which means that the 2270 refit of the Enterprise would have included putting the new symbol on the relevant surfaces. The producers decided the modification long before [Enterprise] was conceived, which has a starting date for the action of 2151, but it would fit the chronology of the Star Trek universe if Starfleet's decision also encompassed the historic contribution to space exploration made by the Enterprise NX-01. The adoption of the new emblem was accompanied by a re-design of Starfleet's service uniforms. This was the first of several uniform systems that abandoned the use of differing tunic colours to identify different service divisions. Embroidered patches featured the basic Starfleet arrowhead, but used different colours in the background circle to denote different service divisions. These colours were (see also the next subsection):
White - Command
Orange - Science
Red - Engineering
Yellow/Gold - Operations (illustrated above)
Grey - Security
Green - Medical
These changes, introduced in 2271 (to 2277) (2271 being the year in which is set the first Star Trek movie [Star Trek: The Motion Picture]), was the first of a series of changes to the arrowhead symbol and an expansion (and sometimes variation) on the principle of colour-coding departments. The latter principle was occasionally abandoned by Starfleet but by 2369 and into the [Voyager] era that principle has been re-established and looks set to continue in future. The change to the Starfleet Enterprise emblem was driven by a desire to show an evolution in Starfleet. It was not stated explicitly that Starfleet had adopted a single uniform symbol, but this was implied by the fact that everyone in the Starfteet Command scenes in [Star Trek: The Motion Picture], [Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home] and [Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country] wore this symbol - they could not all have been Enterprise personnel. However, in [TOS: Court Martial], Kirk is implicitly criticised by two men in the recreation room at Starbase 11 who are clearly not from the USS Enterprise but who wear the same insignia - screenshot. The feature film insignia was designed by [Star Trek: The Motion Picture] costume designer Bob Fletcher. It is also seen in [Star Trek VII: Generations] in the flashback scenes of Picard's days at Starfleet Academy.
Additionally, two hypothetical future versions of the insignia are seen. One, designed by Michael Okuda, appears in [TNG: Future Imperfect] and [TNG: Parallels]. Another, designed by John Eaves, is seen in [TNG: All Good Things] and [DS9: The Visitor].
A later iteration of the Starfleet uniform featured a more ornate version of the Starfteet emblem. Unlike the embroidered insignia used in the 2260's and up to and including 2271 (i.e. during [TOS] and the first Star Trek film [Star Trek: The Motion Picture]), the officer's emblem for the period mid-2270's to 2340's (i.e. from [Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan]) was cast bronze, giving the movie uniforms a more military feel. This officer's pin remained in use through the remaining movies that featured the cast from [TOS] i.e. up to [Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country] and for Captain Kirk in [Star Trek VII: Generations] - i.e. during the years up to 2371.
STARFLEET COMMAND SEAL
(The picture shows the seal on a black background.) Unless Starfleet was using the arrowhead symbol for its seal before or at the same time as USS Enterprise NCC-1701, the arrowhead on the seal presumably dates from 2270 when Starfleet decided to adopt the ship insignia of USS Enterprise NCC-1701 as its emblem (with the addition of a background circle; see above Starfleet Emblem). The Starfleet Command seal was first seen in [DS9: Homefront] and in [#98 In The Flesh], both of these episodes being fractionally over a century later. Starfleet's function, not explained in [Voyager], is that of the operating authority for the interstellar scientific, exploratory, and defensive agency of the United Federation of Planets, a role established in the story [TOS: Court Martial] when the name "Starfleet" is first mentioned in Star Trek. The early operating authority for USS Enterprise NCC-1701 was United Earth Space Probe Agency, first mentioned in [TOS: Charlie X], with the acronym UESPA pronounced YOU-SPAH, and is also mentioned in [TOS: Tomorrow Is Yesterday]. The term United Earth Space Probe Agency was devised by story editor John D. F. Black early during [TOS]'s first season. Later [TOS] episodes suggested that Starfleet existed even before the first pilot episode [The Cage], and it was always assumed that Starfleet existed as far back as 2161, when the United Federation of Planets was founded. The series [Enterprise] establishes that Starfleet existed well before 2151, the year in which the organisation's Admiral Forrest gave permission for Captain Jonathan Archer to take the starship Enterprise NX-01 on its first deep space mission.
STARFLEET CADET PIN
Cadets of the Starfleet Academy wore a distinctive bronze pin that indicated their trainee status. Nevertheless, the junior status of cadets belied the fact that they had already completed extensive training to qualify them for service aboard a Federation starship. Designed by Bob Fletcher, this emblem was also seen throughout the original series-era movies
beginning with [Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan], i.e. from about 2270.
This should not be confused with the rank pins for cadets.
STARFLEET EMBLEM/SHIP PENNANT VERSION
This was another variation on the basic Starfleet arrowhead. This one was painted on the exterior hull surfaces of Federation starships during the late 23rd century, to indicate the fact that they were operating under the authority of Starfleet Command.
STARFLEET EMBLEM COMMUNICATOR
Starting in 2347, Starfleet adopted a modified version of the fleet arrowhead incorporating a sleeker elliptical background graphic. This updated insignia, made of metallic gold alloys, incorporated a voice communications device. The [TNG]-style communicator was designed by William Ware Theiss. It was first seen in the first [TNG] episode, [TNG: Encounter at Farpoint] whose events occur in 2364, and it was used throughout all seven years of [TNG] as well as for the first two years of [DS9], i.e. from 2364 to 2370. This version of the Starfleet emblem communicator (known in common parlance as a "combadge") was replaced by Starfleet in 2371 with the version described below.
Kathryn Janeway was with Tuvok when he purchased his meditation lamp six years previous to [#70 The Gift], i.e. in 2368, from a Vulcan master, who doubled the price when he saw their Starfleet insignia. No explanation is given on tv for the Vulcan master's action but it can be supposed that Starfleet insignia logically implies prestige and affluence. (As Federation citizens do not use money, we do not know with what Tuvok made the purchase.) The Starfleet emblem worn by Janeway and Tuvok in 2368 would have been this version i.e. not the one seen in [Voyager].
STARFLEET EMBLEM COMMUNICATOR
This version of the Starfleet communicator was introduced in 2371. Like its predecessor, this latest Starfleet insignia incorporates a tiny subspace transponder device, allowing short-range voice communications with other Starfleet personnel and spacecraft. It remains in use until at least sometime in 2378, as it is in use throughout the [Voyager] series which finishes at the end of 2377 and is seen in [Star Trek X: Nemesis] which takes place in 2378. For details of the combadge used throughout the [Voyager] series, beam here: SHIP USS VOYAGER: Communications Index: Personal Communicator.
The communicator was designed by illustrator John Eaves and costume designer Bob Blackman. It was first used in Star Trek VII: Generations] before being seen in [DS9], first episode [DS9: The Search], and throughout [Voyager]. One source says it was designed for [Star Trek VII: Generations] as if it did not actually end up being seen in it, so I shall check when I next watch that film. It is a Star Trek convention that new innovations or new design versions are first showcased in a Star Trek movie before being seen in a Star Trek tv series. Another example is that the white dress uniforms seen in [DS9: Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges], an episode that was held back so that they are first seen in [Star Trek IX: Insurrection].
From the information in the above two subsections (the Starfleet emblem communicator/"combadge"), one realises that in [#34 Death Wish], when William Riker informs Captain Janeway that he knows of Voyager's disappearance, thus indicating that he has been abstracted from a time after Voyager's "loss" in the Badlands in 2371, it looks like a blooper as he should be wearing the same style of combadge as Voyager's crew but is actually wearing the old-style one.
[#34 Death Wish] Riker: incorrect uniform, incorrect combadge
As USS Voyager's crew wear the new-style combadges from the start of the opening story [#1 and #2 Caretaker], Riker should be wearing one too, and he should also be wearing the uniform introduced in 2369 i.e. the same command uniform as Janeway. It is assumed that he has been abstracted from the same time period that Voyager is in, i.e. 2372, but from the Alpha Quadrant. Taken together, however, Riker is wearing the correct combadge style for the uniform style, and it should not be forgotten that occasionally an old uniform style is seen being worn alongside personnel wearing a new one, and ST:M or TOSTFF (but not both) even mentions that some personnel preferred to wear a different combadge to the one that 'should' have been worn with a particular uniform or uniform variant, and it is therefore not a blooper strictly speaking, but it was done in [#34 Death Wish], I believe, to point the difference in time periods, whereas it instead it unfortunately makes the tv viewer think it is a blooper.
STARFLEET EMBLEM COMMUNICATOR 2395-2404
This emblem is not seen in a current timeline, nor one which ends up as being the current timeline. Instead it is seen in three stories, [TNG: All Good Things...], [DS9: The Visitor] and [#171 and #172 Endgame], and each time the emblem is worn by Starfleet personnel in timelines that eventually do not occur, or rather, it is implied visually and implied textually by TOSTFF that the different uniforms and the different Starfleet emblem seen in those timelines do get introduced, but that individual elements become unrealised e.g. Troi's premature death. In other words, whether Troi dies or not in that future timeline does not affect whether or not Starfleet introduces new uniforms and new emblem. More discussion at Why 2394 is the last servie date for the uniforms introduced in 2373.
This Starfleet emblem is seen being worn by Starfleet personnel in the eventually unrealised timeline of 2404 that is depicted in [#171 and #172 Endgame], particularly during the scenes set at Starfleet Academy.
Worn by Enterprise NX-01 Starfleet crew in the deep space mission launched in April 2151, the vessel's mission badge or emblem is worn mounted on the upper left sleeve of the uniforms. The wearing of a vessel or mission badge is a tradition continued from the early missions of space exploration undertaken by NASA and the practice dates back to the 20th century. The crew of the Enterprise therefore wear the stylised image of their vessel. This patch shows backward-conformity as regards image content and styling by the show's producers as it is established in the first pilot for [TOS] called [The Cage] (see emblem below) that United Earth is the world's united government authority under which the USS Enterprise NCC-1701 operates, and a United Earth patch (a variant on the one in [Enterprise]) is worn by certain crewmembers in that pilot including Dr Boyce, a main character. United Earth should not be confused with Starfleet, the arm charged with, among other things, exploration and scientific investigation.
