Open, cut, delete, and print are just a few of the many actions we associate with a humble sketched image. In this article we’ll explore the history and benefits of icons in a graphical user interface (GUI).

Icons All Around Us

Pictograms have been in use since the early days of human history. They are often seen as the first expressions of a written language. In modern society icons are still used to communicate. There are places where icons are vital — for example, in multi-cultural environments like an airport where native written languages would not suffice.

It’s no surprise that icons are so popular in user interface design. Since computers are visual machines, icons are an essential part of many user interfaces.

The Role of Icons in Graphical User Interfaces

While icons may seem like a little thing in the grand scheme of design, they play an important role in improving human-computer interaction:

Save Screen Real Estate

The primary reason a designer might choose icons over text is simple: icons take up less space. This has risen to the top of the priority list for many designers due to the growing number of mobile devices with limited screen space.

Processed Much Faster Than Text

People can process the meaning of icons much quicker than they can read text. Visuals are processed 60,000 times faster than text (source)! One of the reasons that text takes longer to process than pictures is that the brain sees letters in words as lots of tiny pictures. When we read copy, most of us try to visualize what the text is telling us. During this process we essentially create ‘icons’ inside our brains.

Represent an Action, Status or an App Itself

Icons serve a metaphorical representation of an action, a status, or an app. Icons can be simplified images of familiar objects or operations. For example, the icon of a printer represents “print”, the scissors represent “cut”, the trash can-like object represents “delete.” Printers, scissors and trash bins are visually characteristic and, as each object has one specific purpose, the intended action is made clear.

Icons must first and foremost communicate meaning. If an object, action, or idea is not immediately clear to users, the icon becomes visual noise that hinders people from completing a task. To quote Aurora Bedford, “To help overcome the ambiguity that almost all icons face, a text label must be present alongside an icon to clarify its meaning in that particular context.”

Evoke Emotions

Well-designed icons enhance aesthetic appeal and bring visual delight to the user experience. Due to the fact that humans are both rational and emotional beings, functional and emotional designs are equally important. As Don Norman said in his book, The Design of Everyday Things, “It is not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and, yes, beauty to people’s lives.”

The Evolution of Icon Design

With roots as far back as the 1980’s, the UI icon has come a long way. We’re going to take a look at a small collection of icons throughout history, all of which have made an impact on the look of icons today.

Icon Ancestors (Xerox Star)

Icons have been used in graphical user interfaces since the early days of computer graphics. The popularization of iconic representation in the interface dates to the work of David Smith who invented the desktop metaphor and the concept of icons: icons are used in the GUI because they are presumed to facilitate the human-computer interaction.

The first icons were flat black and white pictograms — they were presented in a square grid, and had a simple look and consistent style.

Drag & Drop Feature and Artist Designed Icons (Apple Macintosh 1.0)

Released in 1984, Apple Macintosh was the first commercially successful product to use a mouse and a GUI. Macintosh’s GUI was inspired by the Xerox Star GUI principles, but Apple significantly improved interactions by making windows and icons easier to use with a mouse. For the first time, files and folders could be copied by dragging and dropping them into the desired location.

The icons for Macintosh were designed by the now legendary Susan Kare who developed a basic iconography and visual language. Susan has a clear vision on icon design.

“I believe that good icons are more akin to road signs rather than illustrations, and ideally should present an idea in a clear, concise, and memorable way. I try to optimize for clarity and simplicity even as palette and resolution options have increased. I rely on common sense.”

This philosophy had a massive impact on the future of icon design, and as you can see, Folder and Trash bin icons haven’t significantly changed in more than 30 years.

First Signs of Skeuomorphic Icons (NeXTSTEP 0.8)

NeXTSTEP was founded by Steve Jobs. Steve’s intentions were to bring computers to masses and make them friendly and easy to use. One of the ways of doing so was to create an interface that was somehow familiar to users, and this was when the concept of skeuomorphism came to be quite handy.

Skeuomorphic designs are intended to help users understand how to use a new interface by allowing them to apply some knowledge from a real-world objects. NeXTSTEP icons were the first to be considered skeuomorphic — shaded and highly detailed icons, they mimic a real-world precedents and reinforce the metaphor behind the icon.

Colors and Three Dimensions (Microsoft Windows 3.0)

Released in 1990, Windows 3.0 was the first version to connect with a large audience. Microsoft employed Susan Kare (who first made icons for the Macintosh 1.0) who greatly improved the designs. Functionally, Windows 3.0 wasn’t too different from Windows 2.0 but it had significantly improved its user interface with a much fancier look and feel, featuring system support for 16 colors and new icons with a pseudo 3D look.

This 3D look was a very practical thing — it gave the illusion of depth to an interface, which can help users interpret visual hierarchy and understand which elements are interactive. You may notice that the icons are now slightly raised to appear “clickable”.

Realistic Icons (Apple Mac OS X)

In January 2000, Apple announced a new look for their operating system called Aqua. The GUI was redesigned to reflect Apple’s brand new colourful iMacs which looked great with Aqua’s bright buttons and colourful window controls.

The icons in OS X are also a huge leap forward in design from the previous OS 9’s photo-illustrative icon style, which became a trend, and made icons more than just symbols. These icons showed complex reflections, highlights and textures, and had alpha channels, and 8-bit transparency masks.

Skeuomorphic Revolution (Apple iOS)

Apple brought many innovations to the market when they introduced the original iPhone in 2007. The iPhone redefined the word smartphone and brought powerful computers into the hands of a billion people. A large touch screen, multi-touch capability, a gesture based user interface and many other brand new features came with its introduction. But there was one more thing. iOS heavily popularized a skeuomorphism design principle. Skeuomorphism, which was previously going into visual design, headed into interaction design. Now it wasn’t just an arbitrary design trend, it played an important role in usability.

When touch screen devices were fairly new to many users, designers had to make sure users would understand how apps worked. Design cues were taken directly from the physical word. That’s why all apps and their icons used to look like physical objects. Let’s take a skeuomorphic bookshelf icon for the Newsstand app as an example. The bookshelf metaphor was intended to help users transfer previous knowledge about bookshelves (as a place to store and organize paper books and magazines) to the digital environment.

Flat Design (Microsoft Metro)

The release of Microsoft’s Metro design language and Windows 8 in 2011 was particularly influential in popularizing new design trend. “Do more with less” and “content over chrome” were the key design principles of the new design language that started the trend of so-called “flat design.” Unlike skeuomorphic design, flat design was seen as a way to explore the digital medium without trying to reproduce the appearance of the physical world.

The icons in the interface became flat, each icon reduced to its minimal form, with every idea edited to its essence. The designs ensure readability and clarity even at small sizes.

“Flat 2.0” (Google Material Design)

The evolution of flat design, called “Flat 2.0” is a current trend in a design world. This design style is mostly flat, but makes use of subtle shadows, highlights, and layers to create some depth in the UI in order to help users interpret visual hierarchies in content (especially clickability/tapability). Both Material Design by Google and Human interface guidelines by Apple are heavily based on this trend.

Conclusion

Icon design has come a long way from its humble beginnings. However, the more you look into the early history of computer icons, the more you find that things haven’t changed all that much. The user interface designers of each computer era strove for the same goal for the user interface: clarity. And well-designed icons help achieve this goal by helping users do what they need to do without requiring additional effort.

Learn more about using icons as part of a great user experience.