Software Alternatives, Accelerators & Startups

Material Icons VS Heroicons

Compare Material Icons VS Heroicons and see what are their differences

Material Icons logo Material Icons

Google Fonts now supports icons

Heroicons logo Heroicons

Beautiful, free SVG icons from the makers of Tailwind CSS.
  • Material Icons Landing page
    Landing page //
    2024-05-22
  • Heroicons Landing page
    Landing page //
    2023-02-25

Material Icons features and specs

  • Extensive Collection
    Material Icons offer a comprehensive set of over 2,000 icons, covering a wide range of use cases and design needs.
  • Consistency
    The icons are designed following Google's Material Design guidelines, ensuring visual and functional consistency across different platforms and applications.
  • Scalability
    Being vector-based, these icons can be scaled to any size without losing quality, making them versatile for various screen resolutions.
  • Ease of Integration
    Material Icons are easy to integrate into projects through the use of the Google Fonts API, CSS, or direct downloading and inclusion in codebases.
  • Customizability
    Icons can be customized in terms of color, size, and other styles to fit the specific needs of a project.
  • Free and Open Source
    Material Icons are free to use under the Apache License 2.0, making them accessible for both personal and commercial projects.

Possible disadvantages of Material Icons

  • Steep Learning Curve
    For designers not familiar with Material Design, there may be a learning curve to understanding and effectively implementing the design principles.
  • Design Limitations
    While Material Icons are highly versatile, their design is rooted in Material Design principles, which may not fit every brand or aesthetic.
  • Performance Overhead
    Including a large number of icons through the Google Fonts API can result in additional HTTP requests, potentially affecting page load times.
  • Less Unique
    Given their popularity, Material Icons are widely used, which may lead to a lack of uniqueness in the design of applications using them.
  • Inconsistent Updates
    While Google does update the icon set, updates can be infrequent or may not include all needed icons for newer features or design trends.

Heroicons features and specs

  • Open Source
    Heroicons is an open-source project, which means it is free to use, modify, and distribute without licensing concerns.
  • Comprehensive Collection
    Heroicons offers a broad range of icons that cover many common use cases, providing designers and developers with a versatile set of tools.
  • High Quality
    The icons are meticulously designed, ensuring they are visually appealing and consistent. This enhances the overall aesthetic of any project they are used in.
  • Easy Integration
    Heroicons can be easily integrated into projects via SVG or as a React component, making it user-friendly for different development environments.
  • Regular Updates
    The project is actively maintained with regular updates and new icon additions, ensuring that users have access to the latest design trends and functionality.
  • Variety of Styles
    Heroicons comes in both outline and solid styles, giving users flexibility to choose the best fit for their design needs.

Possible disadvantages of Heroicons

  • Limited Customization
    While Heroicons provides high-quality icons, the customization options are limited compared to some premium icon libraries that offer extensive customization capabilities.
  • Performance Impact
    Depending on how they are implemented, using a large number of SVGs can have a performance impact on page load times, especially for resource-constrained devices.
  • Dependency on React
    For users who prefer using the icons as React components, there is a dependency on the React library, which might not be ideal for projects using other frameworks.
  • No Enterprise Support
    As an open-source project, Heroicons does not come with enterprise-level support, which may be a concern for larger organizations needing guaranteed assistance.
  • Icon Coverage Gaps
    Although Heroicons covers many common use cases, it might lack specific icons needed for niche industries or specialized applications.

Material Icons videos

NOU - Icon Pack Review Material Icons Best Icon Pack

Heroicons videos

The Perfect Icons for Tailwind CSS: Heroicons

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Material Icons and Heroicons)
Design Tools
44 44%
56% 56
Web Icons
31 31%
69% 69
Vector Icons
0 0%
100% 100
Photos & Graphics
100 100%
0% 0

User comments

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Reviews

These are some of the external sources and on-site user reviews we've used to compare Material Icons and Heroicons

Material Icons Reviews

10 Best Fontello Alternatives 2021
Fontello doesn’t have this capability so this makes Material Icons the more superior tool. Also, the Material Icons font catalog supports over 135 languages—a feature most of its rivals including Fontello cannot do.
Top FontAwesome alternatives to use on your websites
If you are familiar with Google Fonts already, then you will be familiar with Google's Material Icons. You can include Material Icons in the exact same way that you would include a Google Font family on your webpage.

Social recommendations and mentions

Heroicons might be a bit more popular than Material Icons. We know about 72 links to it since March 2021 and only 67 links to Material Icons. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Material Icons mentions (67)

  • Best Icon Font Libraries for Developers
    By adding Material Design Icons to your project, you can have a clean and professional look that is in line with current design standards. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • Best Flutter Icon Libraries in 2025
    It is a collection of icons provided by Google Fonts, available on their website. This set is the go-to for developers who want to maintain consistency with Google’s Material Design principles. With a wide range of icons, this library is perfect for creating a polished, cohesive app interface. - Source: dev.to / 2 months ago
  • The Best 100 Free UI/UX Resources for Every Designer & Developer
    Material Icons Fonts.google.com/icons Google’s open-source icon set for Material Design. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
  • ✨10 Stunning Icon Libraries to Check Out (That Are Free and Open-Source) 🚀
    Website: Material Symbols GitHub Repo: GitHub Repo. - Source: dev.to / 3 months ago
  • Ask HN: Which SVG icon library are you using and why?
    Https://fonts.google.com/icons My preference for new projects is currently swaying towards Google's Material library as its just so easy and fast to use. Nevertheless Fontawesome has been a staple for me for the last several years! - Source: Hacker News / 4 months ago
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Heroicons mentions (72)

  • 2024 Nuxt3 Annual Ecosystem Summary🚀
    Document Address: Heroicons Official Document. - Source: dev.to / 5 months ago
  • Day 11: There's a Hero! 🦸
    Today I'd like to share with you a beautiful icon library: Heroicons. - Source: dev.to / 6 months ago
  • 10 game-changing tools that level up Svelte developers in 2025 💪
    Svelte Heros is a collection of free, open-source SVG icons built specifically for Svelte. It’s based on Heroicons and is incredibly easy to integrate into your Svelte projects. With over 200 icons, Svelte Heros offers easy access to a wide range of icons while keeping your app lightweight and performant. Github repository →. - Source: dev.to / 7 months ago
  • Marrying Tailwind with Jekyll
    Surprisingly, in many projects, I don't really need more than what Jekyll can offer. So, I remain a loyal user. Until recently, I didn't have much to complain about, not until I decided to rebuild poshtui.com with Tailwind CSS. The only way to add Tailwind and Heroicons was through a JavaScript bundler, and I'm no longer used to that approach. - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
  • Icons gem for Phlex
    When it comes to building sleek, interactive UIs, having access to a robust set of icons is essential. Over the last few weeks, I've been migrating one of my projects from ERBs to Phlex. During this process, I found myself frequently reaching for SVG icons from popular libraries like Heroicons, Bootstrap icons, and Flag icons. After some frustration with manual integration into a Shared::Icon Phlex component, I... - Source: dev.to / 8 months ago
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What are some alternatives?

When comparing Material Icons and Heroicons, you can also consider the following products

Feather Icons - Simply beautiful open source icons

Font Awesome - Font Awesome makes it easy to add vector icons and social logos to your website. And version 5 is redesigned and built from the ground up!

Tabler Icons - 550+ free fully customizable SVG icons

Bootstrap Icons - Official open source SVG icon library for Bootstrap

IconStore - Free icon packs by first-class designers

The Noun Project - Creating, Sharing and Celebrating the World's Visual Language