SVG Icon Licences Explained: MIT, ISC, Apache and CC BY

Every free icon set ships with a licence, and most developers never read it until something goes wrong: a client asks for proof, an app store review flags an asset, or a template sale raises the question of what was actually allowed. This guide explains the licences you will meet on IconVault in plain language. It is practical guidance, not legal advice, and for a high-stakes product you should still confirm the licence text in the set's own repository.

The licences you will meet

• MIT: the most common permissive licence. Use, modify and ship in paid products, keep the copyright notice in your records. No attribution screen required in the product itself.
• ISC: functionally the same as MIT, written more briefly. Lucide uses ISC. Free for commercial use without attribution.
• Apache-2.0: like MIT, plus an explicit patent grant. Material Symbols and Material Design Icons use it. Free for commercial use without attribution.
• CC BY 4.0: Creative Commons Attribution. Free to use, including commercially, but you must give visible credit to the creator. Solar uses CC BY 4.0.
• CC0: public domain dedication. Use however you like, no credit required. Some illustration and icon sets use it.

What free usually allows, and what it does not

Permissive licences allow the things most products need: using icons in a paid app, modifying them, recolouring them, and shipping them inside a product you sell. They do not allow everything. You generally may not redistribute the icons as if they were your own library, remove copyright notices where the licence requires keeping them, or use the set's name or logo to imply endorsement. The sharpest edge is redistribution: shipping icons inside an app is normal use, but selling a template or a UI kit whose main value is the icon collection itself is a different act, and some licences treat it differently. Read the text before you do it.

Attribution: when you must give credit, and how

Attribution is only mandatory for Creative Commons sets, but it is good practice everywhere. A credit can live on a credits page, in an about screen, in a LICENSE file shipped with the product, or in the documentation of an open-source project. It should name the set and link to its source. One line is enough: the set name, the licence, and a link. What does not count is a credit buried where no user or reviewer can find it, or a credit that names the wrong set after you switched libraries mid-project. When a set changes licence between versions, the version you downloaded is the one whose terms apply to your copy, so record the version too.

Brand icons are special

Brand glyphs, the logos of companies and products, follow an extra rule that no icon licence can waive: trademark law. A set like Simple Icons distributes brand SVGs so developers can show the services their product connects to, but the licence on the drawing does not grant the trademark. Do not use a brand icon in a way that suggests endorsement, partnership or ownership, and do not recolour a brand logo into your own brand colours. If the brand publishes usage guidelines, those guidelines win over whatever the icon set allows.

A practical checklist before you ship

• Record every set you use, with its licence and version, in one file in the repository.
• Keep a copy of each licence text with your project records.
• Flag every CC BY set and confirm its credit is visible somewhere real.
• Check redistribution separately if you sell templates, themes or UI kits containing icons.
• Treat brand icons under trademark rules, not just the icon licence.
• Recheck licences when you upgrade a set to a new major version.

How IconVault shows licences

Every library page on IconVault shows the set's licence next to its icon count, and the search results carry the same information, so you can filter out attribution-required sets before you fall in love with an icon. That does not replace reading the licence, but it stops the most common mistake: discovering the attribution requirement after the product has shipped. When in doubt, prefer a permissive set for functional UI icons and reserve attribution-required sets for places where the credit is natural, such as marketing pages and empty states.

SVG icon licences at a glance: which sets use which licence

The fastest way to understand SVG icon licences is to attach them to sets you already know. Most of the sets developers reach for daily are permissive, and only a minority require attribution. Lucide (2,144 icons) is ISC. Tabler (6,462), Phosphor (9,198), Heroicons (1,297) and Bootstrap Icons (2,090) are MIT. Material Symbols (24,569) and Material Design Icons (14,001) are Apache-2.0. Solar (8,682) is CC BY 4.0, the one in this list that requires a visible credit. That single paragraph covers most real decisions, because SVG icon licences stop being abstract once you see which licence sits on the set you are already using.

• ISC sets: Lucide, 2,144 icons. Permissive, no attribution required.
• MIT sets: Tabler (6,462), Phosphor (9,198), Heroicons (1,297), Bootstrap Icons (2,090). Permissive, no attribution required.
• Apache-2.0 sets: Material Symbols (24,569), Material Design Icons (14,001). Permissive, plus an explicit patent grant.
• CC BY 4.0 sets: Solar (8,682). Free including commercially, but a visible credit is required.
• A note on counts: these are the live IconVault index figures. Sets grow over time, so check the library page for the current count before quoting one.

Notice the pattern: permissive licences dominate the popular sets, and attribution is the exception, not the rule. That is why SVG icon licences rarely block a project outright; they usually just ask for a record in one file and, for CC BY sets, one visible credit. The risk is not that a licence forbids your use, but that nobody on the team recorded which licence applied to which set, and the question arrives months later when nobody remembers. Teams that learn SVG icon licences once, as a map of sets rather than a wall of legal text, stop treating licences as a blocker and start treating them as a checklist.

SVG icon licences for frameworks and formats

A licence follows the icon, not the format. Whether you download an SVG, copy a React component, export a PNG or bundle a sprite, the terms are the same, and that is a point SVG icon licences guides often leave unclear. Copying an icon as a component does not create a new licence, and optimizing it does not remove the old one. The practical consequence is simple: record the set and licence once, in the same place you record your dependencies, and every format you export from it inherits that record. Teams that treat icons as dependencies, with names and versions, never have to reconstruct the answer later, and that single habit makes SVG icon licences a solved problem instead of a recurring question.

The same rule covers frameworks. Using an icon in React, Vue or plain HTML changes nothing about the licence, because the licence governs the artwork, not the wrapper. What does change with frameworks is where the record lives: in a React project it belongs next to the dependency list, in a design tool it belongs in the shared library documentation, and in a static site it belongs in a licences file at the repository root. Wherever it lives, SVG icon licences should be findable by someone who was not in the room when the icon was chosen, because that person is usually the one who gets asked.

SVG icon licence for commercial use: what commercial use actually covers

Commercial use is the phrase everyone searches and nobody defines the same way, so here is the plain version. An SVG icon licence for commercial use means you may use the icon in something you charge for, without paying the icon author. That covers a paid SaaS product, a client website you billed for, an app with subscriptions, and a product you sell. It does not cover claiming you drew the icons, removing required notices, or using a brand glyph to imply endorsement. The rest of this section answers the question project by project, because an SVG icon licence for commercial use behaves slightly differently in a template than in an app.

SVG icon licence for commercial use, answered by project type

Each entry below answers the same question for one project type, because SVG icon licence for commercial use questions are always specific. Find your project type and you have your answer.

SaaS app

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a SaaS app is straightforward: permissive sets like MIT, ISC and Apache-2.0 allow it freely, and CC BY sets allow it with a visible credit. A SaaS app is the textbook case of commercial use, and SVG icon licences treat it as normal use, not redistribution. Keep the licence record with your dependencies and the question never comes up again.

Client website

SVG icon licence for commercial use on a client website is allowed under the same terms: you billed the client, the icons ship inside the site, and no royalty is owed. For client work, SVG icon licences matter most at handover, so hand over the licence record with the site, not just the code. The client inherits the same rights you had, and the record proves it.

Mobile app

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a mobile app covers both paid apps and free apps with subscriptions or ads. The app store does not change the licence, and shipping icons inside an app bundle is normal use. For mobile work, SVG icon licences are worth recording early, because app store reviewers occasionally ask what third-party assets an app contains.

Agency portfolio

SVG icon licence for commercial use in an agency portfolio is allowed, since a portfolio is commercial work that advertises paid services. The nuance is client logos: never present a brand glyph as a client, and never imply a brand endorsed you. For agency sites, SVG icon licences are simple, but trademark rules around brand glyphs are the part to watch.

Template or theme

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a template or theme is where the answer splits. Shipping icons inside a template you sell is redistribution, not just use, and some licences and marketplaces treat it differently. For templates, SVG icon licences must be read per set before sale, and the template's own documentation should list every set it contains. When in doubt, prefer permissive sets and keep the attribution sets out of the template entirely.

UI kit

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a UI kit follows the template rule: a kit whose value is partly the icons needs a closer licence read than an app. If the kit ships the icon files themselves, that is distribution of the icons, and SVG icon licences require you to keep notices intact and respect any no-resale reading of the text. Many kits solve this by depending on the icon package instead of bundling the files.

Slide deck and course

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a paid course or slide deck is allowed under permissive licences, and under CC BY with a credit slide. Courses are commercial products, and icons inside them are normal use. For course creators, SVG icon licences rarely cause trouble, because the icons are incidental to the product rather than the product itself.

Ebook

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a sold ebook works the same way: icons illustrate the content, they are not the content. Permissive sets allow it freely, CC BY sets need a credit page. For ebooks, SVG icon licences are a one-line credits page, not a negotiation.

Marketing landing page

SVG icon licence for commercial use on a marketing landing page is allowed, and landing pages are also the easiest place to give a CC BY credit, since a footer credit looks natural there. If your page uses an attribution-required set, put the credit in the footer rather than hunting for it later. For marketing pages, SVG icon licences and good design agree: the credit belongs somewhere visible.

Pitch deck

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a pitch deck is allowed, and decks are low-risk because they are not distributed as products. Still, keep the record: a deck that becomes a template for the whole company carries its icons with it. For decks, SVG icon licences are a habit worth starting early, not a problem worth solving late.

Internal dashboard

SVG icon licence for commercial use in an internal dashboard is allowed, and internal tools are the lowest-risk case of all, since nothing is distributed publicly. The record still matters, because internal tools have a habit of becoming customer-facing products. For internal work, SVG icon licences cost one line in a file and save a scramble if the tool ever ships externally.

Open-source project

SVG icon licence for commercial use in an open-source project is a different question, because the project itself is free but may be used commercially by others. Permissive icon licences fit open-source projects cleanly, since they allow downstream commercial use too. For open-source work, SVG icon licences should be listed in the project readme so downstream users inherit a clear answer.

Nonprofit site

SVG icon licence for commercial use on a nonprofit site is allowed, and nonprofits sometimes assume licences do not apply to them. They do, but permissive licences allow the use freely, and even CC BY sets only ask for a credit. For nonprofits, SVG icon licences are not a cost barrier, just a credit line on a thanks or credits page.

Government site

SVG icon licence for commercial use on a government site is allowed under permissive licences, though procurement rules may demand a written record of every third-party asset. Government projects should keep the licence file with the procurement paperwork, not just in the repository. For public sector work, SVG icon licences are mostly a documentation requirement, and documentation is the whole job.

Fintech app

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a fintech app is allowed, and fintech is where the audit habit pays off most. Regulators and enterprise clients may ask for asset provenance, and a licence file answers in seconds. For fintech, SVG icon licences belong in the same audit folder as dependency licences, because the question will be asked by someone with a checklist.

Healthcare app

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a healthcare app is allowed, with the same audit note as fintech. Healthcare products also face accessibility review, and icon clarity matters as much as legality there. For healthcare, SVG icon licences are one line in a compliance file, and the harder work is making sure every icon is legible and labelled for assistive technology.

Education platform

SVG icon licence for commercial use in an education platform is allowed, including in paid courses and subscriptions. Education platforms reuse icons across thousands of pages, so the record matters more than in a single site. For education, SVG icon licences should live in the platform documentation, where every course author can find them.

E-commerce store

SVG icon licence for commercial use in an e-commerce store is allowed, and stores are another case where brand glyphs need care: payment marks and marketplace logos must be used as the brands specify, not recoloured into store colours. For stores, SVG icon licences cover the interface icons, while brand guidelines cover the payment and social marks.

Blog

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a monetized blog is allowed, since ads, sponsorships and affiliate income all count as commercial use that permissive licences permit. A blog that sells a theme or template built from its posts crosses into redistribution, which is the separate question. For blogs, SVG icon licences are simple until the blog starts selling the design itself.

Portfolio

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a portfolio is allowed, and portfolios are low-risk because the icons support the work rather than constituting it. One caution: do not present another designer's icon work as your own portfolio piece. For portfolios, SVG icon licences are satisfied by normal use, and honesty about what you made is the real rule.

Game UI

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a sold game is allowed under permissive licences, and games are a case where modification is common: icons get recoloured, combined and restyled to fit the game's art. Modification is allowed under MIT, ISC, Apache-2.0 and CC BY, with CC BY still requiring credit. For games, SVG icon licences allow the art direction to do what it needs, as long as the credit survives.

Browser extension

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a paid browser extension is allowed, and extensions are small enough that the licence file can sit in the repository root without ceremony. Extension stores occasionally review assets, so a clean record helps there too. For extensions, SVG icon licences are a one-file habit, not a review risk.

Email newsletter

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a paid newsletter is allowed, though email itself limits the format: most newsletters use PNGs rather than inline SVG. The licence follows the artwork into the PNG, so the record still applies. For newsletters, SVG icon licences are satisfied by the same file you keep for the website.

Social media graphics

SVG icon licence for commercial use in branded social graphics is allowed, and social is where brand glyph misuse is most visible: a brand logo recoloured into your palette, or placed to imply endorsement, is a trademark problem even when the icon licence allows the drawing. For social graphics, SVG icon licences permit the use, but brand guidelines decide how the logo itself may appear.

Print merchandise

SVG icon licence for commercial use on print merchandise like shirts and posters is generally allowed under permissive licences, since the icon ships inside a product you sell. This is the edge case most worth double-checking, because merchandise makes the icon itself prominent rather than incidental. For merchandise, SVG icon licences should be read per set before printing, and brand glyphs should stay out of merch entirely.

Icon pack you sell

SVG icon licence for commercial use does not cover reselling other people's icons as your own icon pack. That is redistribution of the icons as the product itself, and it is the one commercial use that permissive licences do not bless. If your product is icons, draw them or licence them properly. For icon sellers, SVG icon licences draw a bright line: use icons in a product, do not sell the icons themselves.

Presentation template

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a presentation template you sell follows the template rule: read each set's licence before sale, list the sets in the documentation, and prefer permissive sets. A template buyer inherits the same terms you had, so the documentation is part of the product. For presentation templates, SVG icon licences are a documentation task, not a blocker.

Dashboard template

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a dashboard template you sell is the same story: permissive sets are safe, attribution sets need their credit carried into the template, and the set list belongs in the readme. Dashboard templates are sold to developers, who will check. For dashboard templates, SVG icon licences reward the sellers who document, because developers buy from sellers they trust.

Documentation site

SVG icon licence for commercial use in a documentation site is allowed, including docs for a paid product. Documentation is part of the product, and icons inside it are normal use. For docs sites, SVG icon licences are the easiest case: record the sets once in the docs repository and forget about them.

Startup pitch materials

SVG icon licence for commercial use in startup pitch materials is allowed, and pitch materials are low-risk because they are not sold as products. The habit still matters, because today's pitch deck becomes tomorrow's brand system. For startups, SVG icon licences are worth recording from the first deck, so the brand system inherits a clean record instead of a mystery.

If your project type is missing, apply two questions: does the licence allow commercial use, and does it require attribution? Permissive licences answer yes and no, CC BY answers yes and yes, and brand glyphs add trademark rules on top.

Attribution examples: good credits and bad credits

A good credit is specific and findable. Name the set, name the licence, link the source, and put it where a reviewer can actually find it. For example, a credits page line naming Solar, its CC BY 4.0 licence and a link to its source page satisfies the requirement completely. That is why SVG icon licences guides always return to attribution: the requirement is small, but it must be real. A credit that cannot be found is not a credit, and SVG icon licences are judged by what a reviewer can actually see.

A bad credit names the wrong set, hides in minified code, or credits vague sources without naming any. None of those satisfy a CC BY requirement, because SVG icon licences require the credit to identify the actual creator. Another bad pattern is crediting a set you stopped using two versions ago while the current icons come from somewhere else. Audit the credit when you audit the icons, or the credit will quietly become fiction.

The most common SVG icon licences mistakes

• Never recording which sets were used, then trying to reconstruct the answer at launch.
• Assuming every free set is attribution-free, and discovering a CC BY set after shipping.
• Recolouring a brand logo into your own brand colours, which trademark rules forbid.
• Selling a template whose icons were never checked for redistribution terms.
• Crediting the wrong set after switching libraries mid-project.
• Removing copyright notices from files where the licence requires keeping them.
• Assuming a licence upgrade carries backwards: the version you downloaded governs your copy.
• Using a brand glyph to imply endorsement, partnership or ownership.

Most of these mistakes share one root cause: nobody wrote the licence down at the moment of download. Fix that moment and SVG icon licences stop causing trouble. A one-line record per set, made when you first download it, prevents every item on the list above, and SVG icon licences become a background fact instead of a launch-week emergency.

Keeping a licence record

# Icon licences used in this project
# Format: set | licence | version on record | credit location
Lucide | ISC | version on record | not required
Tabler | MIT | version on record | not required
Solar | CC BY 4.0 | version on record | credits page, footer link

That file is the whole system. One file, updated when a set is added, is worth more than a licence audit the week before launch. Teams that keep it never argue about SVG icon licences in a release meeting, because the answer is already written down, and SVG icon licences stay boring, which is exactly what you want them to be.

When to get legal advice

Most icon decisions do not need a lawyer. Get one when money, redistribution or a dispute is involved. That means selling a product whose main value is the icons themselves, receiving a takedown or infringement notice, or building a product in a regulated industry where a client contract demands warranties about assets. A short review then costs far less than untangling a shipped product, and it also settles SVG icon licences questions your team has been debating for months.

SVG icon licences: questions teams actually ask

Do SVG icon licences change when a set updates? Yes, they can. SVG icon licences attach to the version you downloaded, so an update can change the terms for new downloads while your existing copy keeps its old terms. That is why SVG icon licences records include the version: without it, you cannot prove which terms applied. Check the licence again on every major upgrade, and update the record at the same time.

Do SVG icon licences matter for internal tools? Yes, but less urgently than for shipped products. Internal tools are not distributed, so the risk is low, yet internal tools have a habit of becoming customer-facing products. Teams that treat SVG icon licences as a one-line record from day one never face a scramble when the tool ships, and SVG icon licences stay a solved problem rather than a launch surprise.

Can one project mix licences? Absolutely, and most projects do. A typical product mixes MIT sets for the interface, an Apache-2.0 set for system icons, and perhaps one CC BY set for marketing pages. Mixing is fine as long as each set's terms are honoured: permissive sets need only a record, while CC BY sets need a visible credit. The way SVG icon licences get messy is not mixing, but forgetting which set came from where.

Do SVG icon licences cover PNG exports? Yes. The licence follows the artwork, not the file format, so a PNG exported from a CC BY icon still requires credit, and a PNG from a permissive set is still free to use. Teams sometimes assume that converting a format resets the terms, but SVG icon licences do not work that way: optimization, recolouring and format conversion all leave the original terms intact.

What happens if I ignore a CC BY credit? In practice, the most likely outcome is a polite request to add one, since the Creative Commons community generally prefers correction to conflict. But ignoring it is still a licence violation, and SVG icon licences are enforceable terms, not suggestions. Add the credit when you ship, and the question never arises.

Are SVG icon licences the same worldwide? Largely, yes. Permissive licences like MIT and ISC are used globally, and Creative Commons licences are designed to work internationally. Enforcement and trademark rules vary by country, but the icon licence itself does not change at a border. For most teams, SVG icon licences need no country-by-country analysis.

Do SVG icon licences apply to icons I redraw? If you draw an original icon inspired by another, the new drawing is yours. If you trace, copy or slightly modify an existing icon, the original licence still applies, and under CC BY you must credit the original and note the change. The honest test is whether someone could recognise the source: if they can, SVG icon licences still govern the result.

Should freelancers record licences for clients? Yes, and it is a selling point. Handing over a licence record with the finished site proves the client owns the right to use everything in it, and it answers the question before the client thinks to ask. Freelancers who include SVG icon licences in their handover look more professional than those who leave the client to wonder, and SVG icon licences records cost almost nothing to produce.

Do SVG icon licences affect app store approval? Rarely, but reviewers do occasionally ask about third-party assets. A clean licence file answers in seconds, while a missing one turns a routine review into a delay. Keep the file in the repository, and SVG icon licences will never be the reason a release slips.

Where do SVG icon licences live in a monorepo? In one file at the repository root, or one file per app if the apps use different sets. The worst answer is a licence note buried in a single package's readme that nobody else reads. Centralise the record, link it from the contributing guide, and SVG icon licences become findable by anyone on the team, including future hires.

The bottom line

The summary fits in one paragraph. Most popular sets are permissive, attribution is the exception, and brand glyphs carry trademark rules on top. Record each set's licence and version when you download it, give a visible credit for every CC BY set, and treat redistribution as a separate question from normal app use. Do those four things and SVG icon licences become a quiet background fact instead of a launch-week problem.

Frequently asked questions

Can I use MIT icons in a paid app?

Yes. MIT allows commercial use, modification and distribution without royalties. Keep the copyright notice in your project records.

Do I need attribution for Lucide icons?

No. Lucide is ISC, a permissive licence that does not require attribution. A credit is welcome but not required.

What if I modify an icon?

Modification is allowed under MIT, ISC, Apache-2.0 and CC BY. Under CC BY you must still credit the original creator and note that you changed it.

Can I sell a template that contains free icons?

Usually yes under permissive licences, but redistribution rules differ from normal app use. Read the licence text for every set in the template before selling it, and check the template marketplace's own rules too.

Can I use brand logos from an icon set?

You can display them to represent the brand, for example a login button for a service. You cannot use them to imply endorsement, and you should not recolour them. Trademark rules apply on top of the icon licence.