Bioicons vs Sciicons

Bioicons and Sciicons are both free libraries of scientific SVG icons. Bioicons is an open-source, community-contributed collection hosted on GitHub; Sciicons is a searchable library of 5,127 icons (3,635 free and 1,492 Pro) with a page per icon. Many researchers use both.

How do Bioicons and Sciicons compare?

Bioicons figures counted from the duerrsimon/bioicons repository tree (SVGs grouped by licence folder) and bioicons.com on October 11, 2026. Sciicons figures from its database on the same date.

Which should you use?

• Use Bioicons if you want a community-driven, open-source collection and like contributing icons via GitHub.
• Use Sciicons if you want per-icon pages with credit lines, recolouring, broader subject coverage and figure tools.
• Use both: check the licence of each icon and credit CC BY icons.

Which illustrations are original to Sciicons?

Sciicons’ own illustrations are released under CC BY 4.0; each page shows the licence and credit line.

• 96-well microplate (8 × 12, rows A–H, columns 1–12) in perspective, with coloured samples in some wells
• Action potential trace: resting potential, depolarisation, repolarisation and hyperpolarisation, simple
• Adipocyte (white fat cell): large lipid droplet pushing a flattened nucleus to the edge, simple
• Human serum albumin (HSA) protein: heart-shaped, all-α-helical plasma protein with three homologous domains (I, II, III) that carries fatty acids, drugs and hormones in blood
• Alzheimer’s disease brain: healthy versus Alzheimer’s coronal sections (cortical atrophy, enlarged ventricles, shrunken hippocampus) with amyloid-β plaques and neurofibrillary tau tangles
• Analytical balance with glass draft shield and weighing pan, simple
• Aphid, top (dorsal) view
• Aphid silhouette, top view

Last updated October 15, 2026.