Free Icon Fonts
Many website designers are now starting to open themselves up to the idea of icon fonts. This is in part down to the fact that they are far quicker to load than traditional image sprites (remember, the more images you have on your site, the slower the loading speed!) in addition to that you are able to control their color and size on a whim. This means that you really are able to control what your website looks like. Now, there are plenty of websites out there offering free icon fonts, here are a few of my favorites though.
Font Awesome
When it comes to free icon fonts there is no site that comes close to Font Awesome in terms of ease and use and selection. Here you have over 370 icons at your disposal, with more being added every single day. All it takes is the addition of a single line of code to your website and you can use whatever you wish without any trouble. A number of icons are available here, many of them designed especially for web applications (this means things such as calendar icons, certificate icons, books etc. etc.) you also have a couple of other ‘industry specific’ icons thrown in for good measure. This includes medical icons, social media icons, and text editor icons. If you are looking for something for your web application then you will probably find it here.
Batch
Batch boasts slightly more detailed free icon fonts that Font Awesome, although pretty much the same selection otherwise. One of the wonderful things about Batch is that every single font can be downloaded in a variety of different formats. This means that you can easily incorporate them into your projects away from your web applications. Many people have used the fonts here to create pretty decent logos for their business.
Entypo
The selection here is not quite as big as the other offerings, however the picture icons here are beautiful. You can instantly tell that this suite has been created mainly for those who are creating ‘large scale’ web applications. If there is a specific type of font you are after then you are likely to find it here. This includes a number of icons which can’t be found in other packs: a battery charge level indicator for instance.
Ten by Twenty Sosa
I absolutely love this pack, in part because it does something different to the other free icon fonts on this page. First and foremost, you have social media icons, but the logos are also included (i.e. it actually says Twitter as opposed to just the common T) this is perfect for making your site look a tad better. For those who are running an ecommerce operation you will also be pleased to know that there are a couple of fonts for all of the top payment processors out there. This is fantastic when you are looking to create some nifty graphics for your site.
