This issue of the Best Free Social Icons series is devoted to 3D icons. This time I had to use a different approach to selecting the best free icon sets. Since three-dimensional icons are unlikely to fit into many interfaces, I decided to forget about usability for a while and see them as a showcase of designers’ skills only. So, here is the list of the most beautiful free collections of 3D social icons.
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In the last 4 years or so the icons have become significantly bigger. This trend was introduced by MacOS 10, but now designers use large icons wherever they can.
But still sometimes you need a small icon, and being an icon designer myself I can say that small icons are very difficult to create. I mean, you need to work hard to make your icons recognizable, especially if they represent some not so common objects (not just another folder of magnifying glass).
But if small icons play subsidiary role in your interface, or if you work on a pilot version of some project and do not want to invest much time and money in the design at this stage, there are free sets of small icons at your disposal.
Below is the list of several such sets given in no particular order. As usual, I selected only the best sets that easily fit into various interfaces.
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This is my second post devoted to best free social networking icons. This time I collected links to square icons (hands down the most popular shape). As you see, most of these icon sets have a very similar iPhone style design – glossy, with rounded corners. There are many more set of square social icons, but again I selected here only the best, professionally designed icons that look good both on light and dark backgrounds.
Social Icons by Pink Moustache
License: You are free to use these icons for both your personal and commercial projects but may not modify, sell or redistribute them.
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There is definitely no dearth of free social icon sets on the Web. Creating a set of social icons is a good way to get links from blogs, so many designers grabbed this opportunity. The problem is, 90% of these designers stick to just two shapes: a square (in most cases with rounded corners, the iPhone-style) and a circle. There are some very good sets of square and round icons (and I will devote a separate post to them a bit later), but… the same shapes again and again… you know, it’s just boring. Besides, you may want to use something more original to draw the attention of visitors and make them follow you.
On this page you’ll find a list of 9 best social icon sets based on some less commonly used shapes. I didn’t purposely limit the number of sets, but selected only usable, professionally designed icons that look good both on light and dark backgrounds.
The sets are listed in no particular order, you decide yourself which you like better.
Starry Site by Evohosting
16 star-shaped icons with PSD sources.
License: Free, a link to the company website is required.
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Jun 262010
On the eve of Eclipse we have released a free set of Twilight Icons for all fans of the Twilight Saga. There are icons for desktop customization (including 256×256 icons for those with Windows 7 and huge screens) and images in BMP and PNG format which are good for blogs and message boards. This time we’ve skipped GIF altogether because Robert Pattinson looks just too dead in 256 colors 
Enjoy!
Feb 032010
Here is a new and completely free icon set in 48×48 pixels size.
48×48 Free Time Icons
Sep 292009
Free icon set with a variety of styles for a well-known Delicious symbol.
Large Delicious Icons
Sep 222009
Free Large Android Icons collection had been updated recently. Click on the image to see it!
32×32 Music Icon set had also been updated.
DeviantArt has arguably become one of the top sources for free graphics downloads. If you are looking for something contemporary and original DeviantArt is the first place you should look. And they have a lot to offer for iPhone users. Let’s see:
iPhone Style Toolbar Icons
The collection of iPhone icons contains images in sizes of 48×48, 32×32, 24×24, and 16×16 pixels, and supplies several iPhone-specific sizes such as shadowed version of 59×60 pixel images and 57×57 pixel without the shadow. All icons are supplied in 32-bit True Color, and come in normal, disabled, and highlighted states. A variety of file formats is provided, including ICO, PNG, and BMP formats.
BluePrint
This one is our favorite. The pencil-sketch, monochrome style makes this icon set stands out from all the other festive and glossy ones.
Aquaticus
Soft colors, nice gradients and clear analogies make this icon set a perfect example of a high-quality design.
ChokoMilk
A simple, yet very impressive icon set. Black background brings shine to all the bright colors.
iSweet 2.0
If you are looking for some bright colors this icon pack is for you! It has every color of the rainbow in it. In fact, even some colors that did not make it to the rainbow are present.
CMT iPhone Icons
Clean. Crisp. Stylish. What more can you ask?
Submedit
An adorable set of old-fashioned icons. We love the telephone receiver and square compass.
Lush
The girliest, the prettiest, the pinkest set of icons you can find for your iPhone.
Redux SummerBoard
Another stylish icon set. You cannot call it unique, but all the icons are neat and bright colored.
Brazilian
Want to add some spice to your iPhone? This icon set from a Brazilian artist will easily do the job.
Round Theme Icons
A rounded floppy disk can, certainly, look a little weird, but the overall impression is nice.
Your website is in for a complete makeover with these great free icons. Make sure you understand the licensing agreement before you use them, though.
Communication technology has definitely boomed over the last couple of years, and now there are lots of cool 3D icons you can use to keep up. For both commercial and personal use, the standard sizes and the 3D Max versions are on the web for free downloading.
Aha-Soft has brought out a whole line of free androids. Just about any space creature or robot is there. All you have to do is go find them.
Large, Free Icons for Business
No longer do you have to do all the hard work of providing icons for your business. These freebies are well-suited to any project and very professional.
Free Desktop Icons for Business
Anything you could possibly want to advertise I there in a number of formats and sizes.
Grungy Aesthetica Sets of Icons
Although it’s not the only one out there, this set of Aesthetica icons is a definite winner. These icons will really animate the right websites and blogs. Best of all, they’re all free, although you can buy commercial licenses, too.
Want some new faces around your website? Check out these four weirdly attractive squares. They come in ICO format in 128-pixel and 48-pixel sizes.
These 177 icons will help designers with a number of concepts. They’re available in 48 pixel size.
All kinds of things need icons- bar graphs, calendars, clocks, contacts, mail, etc. These icons come in PBG format and they have vector files for Firefox.
The delicious icon in every variation possible- that’s definitely something you might like to incorporate into your website.
These 79 256×256 pixel blogger icons are available in both GIF and PNG along with vector files.
A real estate agency website will look more interesting and garner more popularity with these impossibly realistic icons.
Lots of Muslim art and architecture for Windows, Linux and Mac operating systems are found here. Do not use these icons in a way that could be offensive, directly or indirectly.
Here are all those familiar web icons, except now they look earthy and textured. They are in PNG format at 320×320 pixel resolutions.
Here you’ll find other popular icons in a hand-drawn format- Gmail, Heart icon, Furl, Google, Flickr, Feedburner, FriendFeed, Facebook, Blinklist, Linked IN, Last FM, Newsvine, Magnolia, Paypal, Sphinn, Twitter, Skype, Yahoo, YouTube and Vimeo.
Bag and Box Tele-charger Icon Pack
In PNG and ICO formats, these bags and boxes can be very useful for your webpage.
All things city are available here, from hot dog stands to movie tickets. The city can now exist in cyberspace.
If you like Irish things, even if you aren’t Irish, these are the icons for your blog.
512×512 pixels in resolution, these stamp icons are attractively old-style.
Construction Icons Vista-Style
With these icons, you make a website that’s still being built look cool. Your visitors will return, even if it’s just to see these icons again.
Your website should reflect who you are, and if that’s a diehard fan of Vista aero styles then you should get some of these 135 Vista aero icons for your personal use.
All 135 of these elegant Japanese-style icons could be yours. “Yoritsuki” refers to a fictional Japanese inn.
All of the major services and applications available on the web are illustrated with these round icons.
If your website is more on the playful side, then you might want to look into these fairy-tale-like icons. Otherwise, you’ll just have to have them for fun.
Everything is no-nonsense and to the point with these icons, which are available in PNG format.
These are all the best-known social networking sites’ logos on leaves with both PNG format and vector sources.
Free Set of Web Applications Icons
These 20 icons are designed for web apps like profile, add, search and delete, and they can be used both for personal ancommercial uses.
Cold blue and semi-transparent, these nine icons are formatted in PNG and you can utilize them however you like.
Let the designer know how you decided to use them and you can use these twenty-three icons, posted in both PNG and ICO formats, wherever you like.
These metallic icons will illustrate the most common web apps. Their resolution is 256×256 pixels.
It’s time for a new Twitter bird, don’t you think? Everybody has the round one. You can step out of the mainstream with these four cubical birds in resolutions of up to 256×256 pixels.
