react-icons vs font-awesome vs material-icons vs react-fontawesome vs heroicons vs remixicon-react
Icon Libraries for Web Development Comparison
1 Year
react-iconsfont-awesomematerial-iconsreact-fontawesomeheroiconsremixicon-reactSimilar Packages:
What's Icon Libraries for Web Development?

Icon libraries provide a collection of scalable vector icons that can be easily integrated into web applications. They enhance user interfaces by offering visually appealing graphics that represent actions, objects, or ideas. These libraries often come with various styles and sizes, allowing developers to customize icons to fit their design needs. Using an icon library can significantly speed up development time and ensure consistency across the application by using a standardized set of icons.

Package Weekly Downloads Trend
Github Stars Ranking
Stat Detail
Package
Downloads
Stars
Size
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Publish
License
react-icons4,216,03612,18386.2 MB2144 months agoMIT
font-awesome993,21875,401-4,1329 years ago(OFL-1.1 AND MIT)
material-icons214,8763442.23 MB125 months agoApache-2.0
react-fontawesome71,852668-96 years agoMIT
heroicons40,49822,597700 kB47 months agoMIT
remixicon-react11,236164.58 MB11-(MIT AND OFL-1.1)
Feature Comparison: react-icons vs font-awesome vs material-icons vs react-fontawesome vs heroicons vs remixicon-react

Icon Variety

  • react-icons:

    React Icons aggregates icons from multiple libraries, providing access to thousands of icons from various sources like Font Awesome, Material Icons, and more, all in one package for easy integration.

  • font-awesome:

    Font Awesome boasts a vast collection of over 7,000 icons, covering a wide range of categories and styles. It includes both free and premium icons, allowing for extensive customization and flexibility in design.

  • material-icons:

    Material Icons includes a comprehensive set of over 1,000 icons that adhere to Material Design principles. The icons are designed to be simple and recognizable, making them suitable for various applications.

  • react-fontawesome:

    React Font Awesome allows you to use the extensive Font Awesome library directly in your React projects, giving you access to thousands of icons while maintaining optimal performance and ease of use.

  • heroicons:

    Heroicons provides a curated selection of 225 icons, designed specifically for modern web applications. It offers both outline and solid styles, ensuring that developers can find the right icon for their needs without overwhelming choices.

  • remixicon-react:

    Remixicon React offers a set of over 200 icons designed for modern web applications, focusing on simplicity and clarity, making it a great choice for developers seeking a minimalistic approach.

Integration

  • react-icons:

    React Icons simplifies the process of using multiple icon libraries in React projects, allowing developers to import only the icons they need without unnecessary bloat.

  • font-awesome:

    Font Awesome can be integrated easily via CDN or npm, and it supports various frameworks and libraries, making it a versatile choice for developers across different platforms.

  • material-icons:

    Material Icons can be included via CDN or npm, and they work well with Material Design components, making them ideal for applications that follow Google's design guidelines.

  • react-fontawesome:

    React Font Awesome provides a straightforward way to use Font Awesome icons as React components, allowing for easy integration and customization within React applications.

  • heroicons:

    Heroicons can be seamlessly integrated into Tailwind CSS projects, enhancing the development experience for those using this utility-first CSS framework.

  • remixicon-react:

    Remixicon React is designed specifically for React applications, ensuring smooth integration and easy usage of the icons as components.

Customization

  • react-icons:

    React Icons supports customization through CSS and inline styles, giving developers flexibility in how they present icons in their applications.

  • font-awesome:

    Font Awesome offers extensive customization options, including size, color, and animation effects, allowing developers to tailor icons to fit their design requirements.

  • material-icons:

    Material Icons can be customized using CSS, allowing developers to change size, color, and other properties to match their application's design.

  • react-fontawesome:

    React Font Awesome allows for customization through props, enabling developers to easily adjust size, color, and other attributes of icons directly in their React components.

  • heroicons:

    Heroicons allows for easy styling through Tailwind CSS classes, enabling developers to customize the appearance of icons directly in their markup.

  • remixicon-react:

    Remixicon React icons can be styled using CSS, allowing for easy customization of size, color, and other visual properties.

Performance

  • react-icons:

    React Icons is designed to minimize bundle size by allowing selective imports, ensuring that only the necessary icons are included in the final build.

  • font-awesome:

    Font Awesome provides optimized SVG icons that load quickly and perform well across devices, ensuring a smooth user experience.

  • material-icons:

    Material Icons are optimized for fast loading and rendering, ensuring that applications using them maintain high performance standards.

  • react-fontawesome:

    React Font Awesome is optimized for React, allowing for tree-shaking and reducing bundle size by only including the icons that are used in the application.

  • heroicons:

    Heroicons are lightweight and designed for performance, making them ideal for modern web applications that prioritize speed and efficiency.

  • remixicon-react:

    Remixicon React focuses on performance, providing a lightweight icon set that does not compromise on quality or usability.

Community and Support

  • react-icons:

    React Icons has a growing community and offers documentation that helps developers navigate the various icon libraries it aggregates.

  • font-awesome:

    Font Awesome has a large and active community, providing extensive documentation, tutorials, and support resources for developers.

  • material-icons:

    Material Icons benefits from Google's extensive documentation and community support, making it easy for developers to find help and resources.

  • react-fontawesome:

    React Font Awesome has a strong community and is well-documented, providing developers with the resources needed to implement and troubleshoot the library effectively.

  • heroicons:

    Heroicons is backed by the Tailwind CSS community, offering support and resources for developers using this popular CSS framework.

  • remixicon-react:

    Remixicon React is supported by a dedicated community, providing documentation and resources for developers looking to implement the icon set in their projects.

How to Choose: react-icons vs font-awesome vs material-icons vs react-fontawesome vs heroicons vs remixicon-react
  • react-icons:

    Choose React Icons if you want a lightweight solution that provides a wide range of icon libraries in one package. It allows you to import icons from various sources, making it versatile for different design needs without the overhead of multiple libraries.

  • font-awesome:

    Choose Font Awesome if you need a comprehensive icon set with a wide variety of icons and styles, including solid, regular, and light options. It is well-documented and widely used, making it easy to find support and resources.

  • material-icons:

    Opt for Material Icons if you are developing applications that follow Google's Material Design guidelines. This library offers a vast collection of icons that are designed to be simple and intuitive, ensuring a cohesive user experience across platforms.

  • react-fontawesome:

    Use React Font Awesome if you are building a React application and want to leverage the power of Font Awesome with optimized performance and easy integration. This package allows you to use Font Awesome icons as React components, enhancing reusability and maintainability.

  • heroicons:

    Select Heroicons if you are looking for a modern and clean set of icons specifically designed for Tailwind CSS. It provides both outline and solid styles, making it ideal for contemporary web applications that prioritize aesthetics and usability.

  • remixicon-react:

    Select Remixicon React if you prefer a simple and elegant icon set that focuses on usability and design consistency. This package is tailored for React applications and offers a clean aesthetic that fits well with modern web designs.

README for react-icons
React Icons

React Icons

npm

Include popular icons in your React projects easily with react-icons, which utilizes ES6 imports that allows you to include only the icons that your project is using.

Installation (for standard modern project)

yarn add react-icons
# or
npm install react-icons --save

example usage

import { FaBeer } from "react-icons/fa";

function Question() {
  return (
    <h3>
      Lets go for a <FaBeer />?
    </h3>
  );
}

View the documentation for further usage examples and how to use icons from other packages. NOTE: each Icon package has it's own subfolder under react-icons you import from.

For example, to use an icon from Material Design, your import would be: import { ICON_NAME } from 'react-icons/md';

Installation (for meteorjs, gatsbyjs, etc)

Note This option has not had a new release for some time. More info https://github.com/react-icons/react-icons/issues/593

If your project grows in size, this option is available. This method has the trade-off that it takes a long time to install the package.

yarn add @react-icons/all-files
# or
npm install @react-icons/all-files --save

example usage

import { FaBeer } from "@react-icons/all-files/fa/FaBeer";

function Question() {
  return (
    <h3>
      Lets go for a <FaBeer />?
    </h3>
  );
}

Icons

| Icon Library | License | Version | Count | | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | ----: | | Circum Icons | MPL-2.0 license | 1.0.0 | 288 | | Font Awesome 5 | CC BY 4.0 License | 5.15.4-3-gafecf2a | 1612 | | Font Awesome 6 | CC BY 4.0 License | 6.5.2 | 2045 | | Ionicons 4 | MIT | 4.6.3 | 696 | | Ionicons 5 | MIT | 5.5.4 | 1332 | | Material Design icons | Apache License Version 2.0 | 4.0.0-98-g9beae745bb | 4341 | | Typicons | CC BY-SA 3.0 | 2.1.2 | 336 | | Github Octicons icons | MIT | 18.3.0 | 264 | | Feather | MIT | 4.29.1 | 287 | | Lucide | ISC | v5.1.0-6-g438f572e | 1215 | | Game Icons | CC BY 3.0 | 12920d6565588f0512542a3cb0cdfd36a497f910 | 4040 | | Weather Icons | SIL OFL 1.1 | 2.0.12 | 219 | | Devicons | MIT | 1.8.0 | 192 | | Ant Design Icons | MIT | 4.4.2 | 831 | | Bootstrap Icons | MIT | 1.11.3 | 2716 | | Remix Icon | Apache License Version 2.0 | 4.2.0 | 2860 | | Flat Color Icons | MIT | 1.0.2 | 329 | | Grommet-Icons | Apache License Version 2.0 | 4.12.1 | 635 | | Heroicons | MIT | 1.0.6 | 460 | | Heroicons 2 | MIT | 2.1.3 | 888 | | Simple Icons | CC0 1.0 Universal | 12.14.0 | 3209 | | Simple Line Icons | MIT | 2.5.5 | 189 | | IcoMoon Free | CC BY 4.0 License | d006795ede82361e1bac1ee76f215cf1dc51e4ca | 491 | | BoxIcons | MIT | 2.1.4 | 1634 | | css.gg | MIT | 2.1.1 | 704 | | VS Code Icons | CC BY 4.0 | 0.0.35 | 461 | | Tabler Icons | MIT | 3.2.0 | 5237 | | Themify Icons | MIT | v0.1.2-2-g9600186 | 352 | | Radix Icons | MIT | @radix-ui/react-icons@1.3.0-1-g94b3fcf | 318 | | Phosphor Icons | MIT | 2.1.1 | 9072 | | Icons8 Line Awesome | MIT | 1.3.1 | 1544 |

You can add more icons by submitting pull requests or creating issues.

Configuration

You can configure react-icons props using React Context API.

Requires React 16.3 or higher.

import { IconContext } from "react-icons";

<IconContext.Provider value={{ color: "blue", className: "global-class-name" }}>
  <div>
    <FaFolder />
  </div>
</IconContext.Provider>;

| Key | Default | Notes | | ----------- | --------------------- | ---------------------------------- | | color | undefined (inherit) | | | size | 1em | | | className | undefined | | | style | undefined | Can overwrite size and color | | attr | undefined | Overwritten by other attributes | | title | undefined | Icon description for accessibility |

Migrating from version 2 -> 3

Change import style

Import path has changed. You need to rewrite from the old style.

// OLD IMPORT STYLE
import FaBeer from "react-icons/lib/fa/beer";

function Question() {
  return (
    <h3>
      Lets go for a <FaBeer />?
    </h3>
  );
}
// NEW IMPORT STYLE
import { FaBeer } from "react-icons/fa";

function Question() {
  return (
    <h3>
      Lets go for a <FaBeer />?
    </h3>
  );
}

Ending up with a large JS bundle? Check out this issue.

Adjustment CSS

From version 3, vertical-align: middle is not automatically given. Please use IconContext to specify className or specify an inline style.

Global Inline Styling

<IconContext.Provider value={{ style: { verticalAlign: 'middle' } }}>

Global className Styling

Component

<IconContext.Provider value={{ className: 'react-icons' }}>

CSS

.react-icons {
  vertical-align: middle;
}

TypeScript native support

Dependencies on @types/react-icons can be deleted.

Yarn

yarn remove @types/react-icons

NPM

npm remove @types/react-icons

Contributing

./build-script.sh will build the whole project. See also CI scripts for more information.

Development

yarn
cd packages/react-icons
yarn fetch  # fetch icon sources
yarn build

Add/Update icon set

First, check the discussion to see if anyone would like to add an icon set.

https://github.com/react-icons/react-icons/discussions/categories/new-icon-set

The SVG files to be fetched are managed in this file. Edit this file and run yarn fetch && yarn check && yarn build.

https://github.com/react-icons/react-icons/blob/master/packages/react-icons/src/icons/index.ts

Preview

Note The project is not actively accepting PR for the preview site at this time.

The preview site is the react-icons website, built in Astro+React.

cd packages/react-icons
yarn fetch
yarn build

cd ../preview-astro
yarn start

Demo

The demo is a Create React App boilerplate with react-icons added as a dependency for easy testing.

cd packages/react-icons
yarn fetch
yarn build

cd ../demo
yarn start

Why React SVG components instead of fonts?

SVG is supported by all major browsers. With react-icons, you can serve only the needed icons instead of one big font file to the users, helping you to recognize which icons are used in your project.

Related Projects

Licence

MIT

  • Icons are taken from the other projects so please check each project licences accordingly.