Why animate on the web?

Animations can improve perceived performance, illustrate state changes, and add delight without distracting users. When used thoughtfully, motion should be subtle, purposeful, and fast enough to feel responsive. For accessibility, ensure that essential information remains perceivable without motion and provide controls to reduce or disable animations when users prefer.

• Guides focus to important UI changes
• Conveys transitions and timing between states
• Enhances brand personality with consistent motion language

Learn more about motion design patterns at SVG motion patterns.

SVG animations: CSS, SMIL, and JavaScript

SVGs offer crisp, scalable graphics that can be animated in several ways. Each method has trade-offs:

• CSS animations are performant, wide-supported, and easy to compose with HTML elements.
• SMIL (SVG SMIL animations) can express complex motion directly inside SVG, but some browsers and accessibility considerations apply.
• JavaScript provides granular control, event hooks, and integration with framework state, but may require more boilerplate.

Below are compact examples you can adapt. The snippets are kept small to stay practical for real-world pages.

<svg width="120" height="120" viewBox="0 0 100 100" role="img" aria-label="Rotating gear">
  <g class="gear">
    <circle cx="50" cy="50" r="40" fill="none" stroke="#374151" stroke-width="6"/>
    <path d="M50 15 L50 0" stroke="#374151" stroke-width="6" stroke-linecap="round"/>
  </g>
</svg>

<style>
  @keyframes spin { 100% { transform: rotate(360deg); } }
  .gear { transform-origin: 50px 50px; animation: spin 4s linear infinite; }
</style>

        

<svg width="120" height="120" viewBox="0 0 100 100" >
  <circle cx="50" cy="50" r="20" fill="tomato">
    <animate attributeName="r" from="20" to="35" dur="1s" begin="0s" repeatCount="indefinite"/>
  </circle>
</svg>

        

Tip: Prefer CSS animations for UI motion and small decorative SVGs. Reserve SMIL for simple, self-contained motion where JavaScript would add unnecessary complexity. For deeper control and accessibility considerations, pair SVG with JavaScript state to synchronize with page interactions.

If you’re curious about more SVG animation techniques, visit SVG Genius tutorials.

GIFs vs. SVG animations: when to use which

GIFs are raster-based and excellent for simple, looping animations that don’t require user interaction. However, they come with drawbacks: larger file sizes for longer animations, no interactivity, and limited color optimization. SVG animations, on the other hand, are scalable, lightweight for small motion, and highly controllable via CSS/JS, with the added benefit of accessibility and styling consistency.

Practical guidelines:

• Use GIFs for quick, decorative motion that must be instantly viewable without scripting, such as hero background loops or brand loops on older browsers.
• Use CSS-animated SVGs for inline UI states, icons, loader spinners, and decorative micro-interactions that require accessibility and precise timing.
• Prefer vector-based motion for responsiveness and accessibility; reserve GIFs for world-breaking constraints or rapid prototyping where SVGs are impractical.

Example decision helper: if your animation encodes meaningful state or data, pick SVG+CSS/JS; if it’s purely aesthetic, a lightweight GIF or animated SVG (with CSS) may suffice. For a broader discussion, see examples on SVG color and motion examples.

Practical tips for frontend teams

Motion should feel intentional and fast. Here are concise, actionable tips you can apply today.

• Prefer transform and opacity for smooth compositing on the GPU. Avoid layout thrash by animating only transforms and opacity when possible.
• Respect reduced motion preferences. Use CSS media query: @media (prefers-reduced-motion: reduce) { ... } to disable or simplify animations.
• Keep SVGs small and modular. Extract reusable animation components into separate files or CSS modules for maintainability.
• Provide pause/stop controls for looping animations that are not purely decorative, improving accessibility and user control.
• Bundle animated SVGs with your design system. Document motion tokens (durations, easings, delays) to ensure consistency across projects.

For a design-system-centered approach to motion, explore how teams at SVG Genius structure their animation tokens and guidelines.

Implementation examples you can reuse

Here are compact, copy-paste-ready snippets to integrate into a typical React project or plain HTML page.

<svg width="40" height="40" viewBox="0 0 40 40" aria-label="Pulse">
  <circle cx="20" cy="20" r="6" fill="#2563eb">
  </circle>
</svg>

<style>
  @keyframes pulse { 0% { transform: scale(1); } 70% { transform: scale(1.25); } 100% { transform: scale(1); } }
  svg { display:inline-block; }
  circle { transform-origin: 20px 20px; animation: pulse 2s infinite; }
</style>

        

<svg width="64" height="64" role="img" aria-label="Loading" viewBox="0 0 50 50">
  <circle cx="25" cy="25" r="20" fill="none" stroke="#93c5fd" stroke-width="4" stroke-linecap="round" stroke-dasharray="90" stroke-dashoffset="0">
    <animateTransform attributeName="transform" type="rotate" from="0 25 25" to="360 25 25" dur="1s" repeatCount="indefinite"/>
  </circle>
</svg>

        

Conclusion: choose the right tool, ship fast

Animations on the web should enhance, not hinder. By leveraging SVG with CSS for most UI motion and reserving GIFs for specific scenarios, you can deliver performant, accessible, and scalable experiences. Keep motion tokens in your design system, respect user preferences, and validate animations across devices and browsers. If you want deeper inspiration and practical snippets, browse more examples at SVG Genius.