In today’s post I am sharing with you this collection of websites where you can search for and access a wide variety of free clip art icons and illustrations. Browse through millions of free static and animated clipart icons available for download in various formats including PNG and SVG.
As a teacher, you can use these design resources and clipart materials to create a visual language that supports and illustrates textual content. Clip art and vector icons can be used to spice up your lessons and presentations and can be integrated in different multimedia projects. You can also use these digital art makers to design and edit your clip arts and illustrations.
Each of the clip art icon resources shared below offer a specific license type. I have covered these licenses in my review but digital content is not stable and what is licensed today under a creative commons or provided for public domain might be copyrighted tomorrow. Therefore, you need to always double check licenses before you use any of the materials you find online.
For teachers keen on learning more about the different types of Common Licenses, I have this illustrative poster that I shared in a previous post here in Educational Technology and Mobile Learning explaining what each CCL type means and when and how you can use them.
Flaticon offers a huge library of free icons and stickers in a wide variety of formats including PNG, SVG, EPS, PSD, and BASE64. However, icons are provided for free only in PNG format, for other formats you need to have a premium subscription.
Also, with a premium subscription you do not need to add attribution to illustrations and you can even use them for commercial purposes without crediting the author (read more about Flaticon licenses here).
Flaticon provides you with numerous accessories to help you organize your designs. For instance, you can arrange your icons into different collections for easy access and download. Flaticon’s editor enables you to customize your icons the way you want.
You can can edit their colours and change their sizes before downloading them in the format of your choice. Flaticon is integrated with Google Workspace allowing a seamless integration of icons into Slides and Docs.
Iconscout offers a growing library of design assets that include vector icons, illustrations, 3D assets, and Lottie animations. While the majority of these design resources are only available for premium subscribers, you can still find tons of free icons, illustrations, 3D designs, and Lottie.
However, only paid users of Iconscout get access to the awesome features it provides including no attribution, unlimited downloads, advanced colour editor, Lottie editor, file converter, , and full access to multiple plugins and apps. Some of the tools Iconscout is integrated with include Google Docs, Google Slides, Figma, Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop, and many more.
UXWING is another great website that provides free clipart icons that you can use in your multimedia projects. Icons can be used for both personal and commercial projects without any attribution (read more about UXWing licenses here).
Icons are available in three main formats: scalable vector SVG, transparent background PNG, and web font. In case you wonder which ones to use in your large projects SVG or PNG format, UXWing explained that ” you go with SVG Icons, Because PNG files would increase your overall file size. SVG is a vector format, that works well in high-resolution retina display. even SVG file size is low compared to PNG”.
There are two ways to find icons on UXWing: you can either conduct a regular search using the integrated search box or you can browse through over 150 icon categories. And yes there is a category for education where you can access various beautifully crafted icons to use in your educational projects.
Icons8 offers tons of free professionally designed clipart icons, vector illustrations, photos, music and design tools. A free plan on Icons8 allows you limited access to the site’s resources and you are also required to add attribution links each time you use an asset from the site (learn more about Icons8 free license here).
Paid plan offers unlimited access and no attribution. Icons8 features PNG and SVG icons in different styles including: Emoji icons, animated icons, fluent icons, iOS icons and many more.The same with illustrations, the are organized into numerous categories including will 404 error illustrations, education illustrations, business illustrations, welcome illustrations, animated illustrations and more.
You can also use Icons8 Mega Creator to create your own designs and clipart.You simply choose a template, customize it and when you are done export it in different formats. Besides stock photos, Icons8 offers several photo editing tools to help you remove image backgrounds, enhance image resolutions, protect your identity with generative media, and many more.
The Noun Project offers more than 3 million icons available for free in both PNG and SVG formats. Photos from the Noun Project are licensed under Creative Common License (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0) which means that you can use them for non commercial purposes provided you add attribution to the source.
No attribution is required for premium subscribers (learn more about Noun Project licenses here). Noun Project has plugins for several platforms including Adobe add-ins (Illustrator and Photoshop) Microsoft add-ins (Word and PowerPoint), Google Add-ons (Google Slides and Google Docs), and many more.
This integration allows you to easily drag and drop icons right into the software of your choice and access vector icons, PNG and PDF formats without leaving your workflow. Features provided for premium users include: unlimited icon licenses, ad-free site, share icons across team, multiple custom favorite boards, the ability to edit color and background, , among others.
Iconfinder is a search engine for icons and illustrations. You can search through millions of icons and you can further hone in your search by enabling the ‘Free’ filter to only search for free icons. Depending on the icon you choose, some of these free icons require attribution to the designer and others are limited to personal use only (learn about Iconfinder’s ToS here).
Iconfinder also offers an online icon editor which lets you customize icons you find online. You can change their colors, add text, and export them in SVG or PNG format. Again, for the difference between the two formats, Iconfinder states that “the SVG format is perfect for the web since it’s widely supported by modern browsers. It’s also an ideal format for print since it’s vector based. PNG is great in many cases and works with most software including Powerpoint.”
