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It has become common practice to use CDNs for caching javascript, css, font's and more... however this does not appear to extend to icons to the same extent (possibly because each site prefers to have a unique look and feel?)

Are there widely used icon sets hosted by CDNs that are common enough to provide significant speed improvement from the CDN hosting and possibly already being pre-cached from another site using that CDN.

One example is: http://cdnjs.cloudflare.com whose contents are browse-able at https://github.com/cdnjs/cdnjs/tree/master

some icon sets it hosts are at:

/ajax/libs/twitter-bootstrap/2.3.2/img/glyphicons-halflings.png
/ajax/libs/fatcow-icons/...
/ajax/libs/foundicons/3.0.0/svgs/...
/ajax/libs/aui/5.4.0/aui/css/icons/...
/ajax/libs/topcoat-icons/0.2.0/svg/...
/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.10.3/css/base/images/...
*jqueryui is also hosted on ajax.googleapis.com and others but is a limited set

as is the bootstrap halflings icon set:

http://netdna.bootstrapcdn.com/bootswatch/2.3.2/img/glyphicons-halflings.png
http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/bootstrap/2.3.2/img/glyphicons-halflings.png
http://www.bootstrapcdn.com/twitter-bootstrap/2.3.1/img/glyphicons-halflings.png
technosaurus
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MechanisM
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    http://www.stdicon.com/ for file icons. This was a fine question that should not have been closed. I need cdn'd icons (specifically tree bullets) for something I am putting together on jsFiddle. – Adam Tolley Sep 21 '12 at 18:45
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    Too bad that this question was closed because now I can't post a normal answer. There are icons like that and you don't have to build your own CDN just to post a nice fiddle as someone suggested. See for example [webicons](https://cdnjs.com/libraries/webicons), [ionicons](https://cdnjs.com/libraries/ionicons), [topcoat-icons](https://cdnjs.com/libraries/topcoat-icons) and many more on [cdnjs](https://cdnjs.com/). You can also use [RawGit](https://rawgit.com/) for anything on GitHub. @AdamTolley I hope those links will help. – rsp Mar 27 '15 at 01:16
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    I also realized I could just base64 encode icons straight into the css or html when needed, which is nice if a little complex. – Adam Tolley Apr 04 '15 at 06:01

3 Answers3

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IconFinder hosts a CDN which has Fugue, Silk, Silk2, FatCow (Farm-Fresh) and other icon sets.

And here's confirmation from IconFinder's creator & MD that it's okay to hotlink to their CDN.

Nicholas Shanks
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  • Thanks for the resource! One can filter by licence-type, as well. Although, if one is relying on these for commercial use, self-hosting them would be wise, before launching. – Alastair Dec 26 '12 at 12:21
5

http://www.dustball.com/icons

"Fam3 Icon Search and free CDN hosting for everyone by Brian Klug"

Todd Menier
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1

How about hosting them yourself on Amazon CloudFront? It should only cost pennies a month depending on your traffic.

Though first of all, make sure you've optimised the icons you're using by turning them into a single sprite file. That may resolve the need to use a CDN at all.

Ashley Williams
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