humanitarian-icons-2026-BDU

OCHA Humanitarian Icons 2026

The official set of 389 humanitarian icons used across OCHA products, publications, and digital platforms. All icons are single-colour SVGs in OCHA blue (#009edb), designed to work at any size from 16px to print resolution.

Maintained by the OCHA Brand and Design Unit (BDU).

Using the Icons

Direct download

Browse the svg/ folder and download individual SVG files.

Load any icon directly via jsDelivr — no download needed:

<img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/UN-OCHA/humanitarian-icons-2026-BDU@main/svg/Shelter.svg" alt="Shelter" />

Pattern:

https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/gh/UN-OCHA/humanitarian-icons-2026-BDU@main/svg/{Icon-name}.svg

GitHub Pages

All icons are also served from GitHub Pages:

https://un-ocha.github.io/humanitarian-icons-2026-BDU/svg/{Icon-name}.svg

Pre-built exports

Ready-to-use packages in the output/ folder:

File Format Use case
Humanitarian_icons.xlsx Excel Reference sheets, internal catalogues
Humanitarian_icons.pptx PowerPoint Presentations, slide decks
Humanitarian_icons.csv CSV Data integrations, lookups
Humanitarian_icons_complete_library.svg SVG grid Visual overview of the full set
font/ Icon font Web and app interfaces

Metadata

metadata.json contains structured data for every icon — name, family, keywords, and wordmark eligibility:

{
  "icons": {
    "Agriculture": {
      "name": "Agriculture",
      "family": "Food security",
      "keywords": ["farming", "crops"],
      "wordmark": true,
      "wordmark_valign": 0
    }
  }
}

Colour

All SVGs use OCHA blue #009edb. To change colour, apply a CSS filter or edit the fill attribute.

Icon Library

389 icons across 19 categories.

Activities strategy (35)


Advocacy
Agile
Analysis
Assessment
Cash transfer
Civil military coordination

Community engagement
Coordinated assessment
Deployment
Financing
Fund
Gap analysis

Humanitarian programme cycle
Information management
Information technology
Innovation
Leadership
Learning

Meeting
Monitoring
Needs assessment
Partnership
Policy
Preparedness

Public information
Reporting
Response
Scale down operation
Scale up operation
Search and rescue

Services and tools
Sexual and reproductive health
Staff management
Top ranking
Training

Camp (6)


IDP refugee camp
Permanent camp
Registration
Spontaneous site
Temporary camp
Transition site

Clusters (11)


Camp coordination and camp management
Early recovery
Education
Emergency telecommunications
Food security
Health

Logistics
Nutrition
Protection
Shelter
Water sanitation and hygiene

Damage (30)


Airport affected
Airport destroyed
Airport not affected
Bridge affected
Bridge destroyed
Bridge not affected

Building facility affected
Building facility destroyed
Building facility not affected
Damaged affected
Destroyed
Health facility affected

Health facility destroyed
Health facility not affected
House affected
House destroyed
House not affected
Not affected

Port affected
Port destroyed
Port not affected
Power electricity affected
Power electricity not affected
Power outage

Road affected
Road destroyed
Road not affected
School affected
School destroyed
School not affected

Disasters, hazards and crises (32)


Anticipatory action
Cold wave
Conflict
Cyclone
Drought
Earthquake

Epidemic
Famine
Fire
Flash flood
Flood
Heatwave

Heavy rain
Humanitarian access
Insect infestation
Internally displaced
Landslide mudslide
Locust infestation

Population return
Poverty
Refugee
Resilience
Snow avalanche
Snowfall

Storm
Storm surge
Technological disaster
Tornado
Tsunami
Violent wind

Volcano
Worm infestation

Food and non-food items (25)


Blanket
Bottled water
Bucket
Clothing
Detergent
Flour

Food
Kitchen set
Mattress
Medical supply
Medicine
Mosquito net

Non food items
Non food items 2
Oil
Plastic sheeting
Relief goods
Rice

Salt
Soap
Stove
Sugar
Tarpaulin
Tent

Vaccine

General infrastructure (28)


Assembly point
Buddhist temple
Building
Church
Clinic
Community building

Country
Diplomatic mission
Distribution site
Food warehouse
Government office
Health facility

Health post
Hindu temple
Hospital
Hotel
House
Infrastructure

Market
Mobile clinic
Mosque
NGO office
Oil facility
Police station

Power electricity
School
UN compound office
University

Health (19)


Bacteria
COVID-19
Case management
Doctor
Handwashing
Health worker

Hospital bed
Infected
Infection control
Laboratory
Life saving
Mask

Not infected
Physical distancing
Respiratory
Sanitizer
Testing
Ventilator

Virus

Lockdown (10)


Airport closed
Border closed
Bridge closed
Building closed
House lockdown
Location lockdown

Market closed
Port closed
Road closed
School closed

Logistics (17)


Airport
Airport military
Boat
Bridge
Bus
Car

Ferry
Gas station
Helicopter
Helipad
Port
Road

Ship
Train
Truck
Tunnel
UN vehicle

Other sectors (11)


Agriculture
Child care child friendly
Child protection
Coordination
Environment
Fishery

Logistics and telecommunications
Multi-cluster sector
Rule of law and justice
Safety and security
Shelter, land and site coordination

People (27)


Affected population
Child combatant
Children
Dead
Drowned
Elderly

Gender
Indigenous people
Infant
Injured
Missing
National army

Peacekeeping force
People affected
People covered
People in need
People in need 2
People reached

People targeted
People targeted 2
People with physical impairments
Person 1
Person 2
Pregnant

Rebel
Resettlement
Sex

Physical barriers (8)


Border crossing
Checkpoint
Earthmound
Military gate
Observation tower
Physical closure

Road barrier
Roadblock

Product type (14)


API
Calendar
Chart
Data
Document
Film

Live geoservices
Location
Map
P-code
Photo
Report

Table
Video

Security and incident (16)


Abduction kidnapping
Arrest detention
Assault
Attack
Carjacking
Confined

Dangerous area
Forced entry
Forced recruitment
Gender based violence
Harassment intimidation
House burned

Mine
Murder
Robbery
Sexual violence

Socioeconomic and development (10)


Debris management
Livelihood
Livestock
Population growth
Reconstruction
Rural

Rural exodus
Trade and market
Urban
Urban rural

Telecommunications and technology (14)


Cell tower
Computer
E-mail
Fax
Internet
Laptop

Mobile phone
Monitor
Radio
Remote support
Satellite dish
Smartphone

Walkie talkie
Work from home

UX UI (63)


AI chat
About
Add
Add document
Alert
Apps

Blog
Bookmark
CSV file
Chat
Checked mail
Copy

DOCX file
Delete account
Down
Download
Edit
Exit cancel

Expand down
Expand left
Expand right
Expand up
Favourite
Filter

Folder
Go
Group
Help
Hidden
Link

Menu
More options
Next item
Not secured
Notification
Out of platform

PDF file
Password
Pause
Previous item
Print
Remove

Remove document
Return
Save
Search
Secured
Security

See
Selected
Settings
Share
Stop
Time

Trending
Up
Upload
User
Users
Validate account

Warning error
XLSX file
ZIP compressed

Water sanitation and hygiene (13)


Borehole
Communal latrine
Latrine cabin
Potable water
Potable water source
Sanitation

Shower
Solid waste
Spring water
Submersible pump
Toilet
Water source

Water trucking

License

The OCHA Humanitarian Icons are licensed under CC BY 4.0. You are free to share and adapt them with appropriate credit to OCHA.

Internal Tools

These tools are used by BDU to manage, generate, and distribute the icon collection. They are not intended for end users.

Wordmark Generator

A browser-based tool that allows OCHA staff to create branded wordmarks using Humanitarian Icons. All wordmarks require BDU approval before final download.

Live tool: https://un-ocha.github.io/humanitarian-icons-2026-BDU/word-mark-generator/

105 of the 389 icons are approved for use in wordmarks. The approval workflow is automated: BDU changes a status in a Google Sheet, and the requester receives an email with a direct download link.

File Purpose
word-mark-generator/index.html The generator (single-page app, no build step)
word-mark-generator/google-apps-script.js Backend code deployed as a Google Apps Script web app
word-mark-generator/APPROVAL_SETUP.md Setup and operations documentation

Icon Manager

A browser-based tool for adding new icons, editing tags, changing families, and managing wordmark approval. Open icon-manager/index.html in Chrome or Edge — drag-drop SVGs, edit tags as chips, save back to metadata.json.

File Purpose
icon-manager/index.html The icon manager interface

Build Scripts

Python utilities for generating the distributable exports. Requires Python 3.9+ with dependencies in .venv/.

Script What it does
scripts/populate_metadata.py Refreshes metadata.json from svg/: adds stubs for new icons, normalises display names, reassigns font codepoints alphabetically
scripts/generate-excel.py Generates the Excel export
scripts/generate-pptx.py Generates the PowerPoint export
scripts/generate-font.py Generates the icon font
scripts/generate-grid.py Generates the complete SVG grid
scripts/generate-wordmark.py Batch generates wordmarks from metadata
scripts/sync_to_frontify.py Syncs new SVGs + tag changes from metadata.json to the OCHA Frontify icon library

Adding a new icon

The full pipeline runs automatically on push via .github/workflows/sync-and-build.yml. The contributor’s job is just to drop the SVG and update metadata.json — the icon manager handles the second part visually.

  1. Open icon-manager/index.html in Chrome or Edge.
  2. Click + Add Icon, drag your SVG into the drop zone, pick a family, type a few tags.
  3. Click Add Icon → save the SVG into the repo’s svg/ folder when prompted.
  4. Click Export metadata.json → save it over the repo’s metadata.json.
  5. Commit and push: 
    git add svg/ metadata.json
git commit -m "add: <icon-name>"
git push

Manual alternative

If you’d rather edit JSON directly:

  1. Drop the SVG in svg/ using kebab-case-with-capital-first (e.g. Drone.svg). Single colour: OCHA blue #009edb.
  2. Add an entry to metadata.json["icons"]: 
    "Drone": {
  "name": "Drone",
  "family": "Logistics",
  "tags": ["uav", "aerial vehicle", "quadcopter"],
  "wordmark": false,
  "wordmark_valign": 0,
  "font_codepoint": "",
  "date_added": "2026-05-19"
}

    (font_codepoint is reassigned by CI on the next push — leave blank or use any value.)

  3. Commit and push.

What CI does automatically

If the Frontify step is ever skipped or fails, run it manually:

pip install -r requirements.txt
FRONTIFY_TOKEN="<your-token>" python scripts/sync_to_frontify.py --dry-run   # preview
FRONTIFY_TOKEN="<your-token>" python scripts/sync_to_frontify.py             # apply

The script is additive only — it never removes tags or deletes icons. Orphans (icons in Frontify but missing from svg/) are reported as warnings for manual investigation.

Setting up the Frontify automation (one-time)

For the GitHub Action’s Frontify sync step to work, the repo needs one secret:

  1. Go to Settings → Secrets and variables → Actions in this repo.
  2. Add a new repository secret named FRONTIFY_TOKEN containing a personal access token from brand.unocha.org with the brand + asset scopes.

Optional repo variables (defaults are correct for OCHA): FRONTIFY_DOMAIN (default brand.unocha.org), FRONTIFY_LIBRARY_ID (default 251023).

Project Owner

Javier Cueto, Head of Brand and Design Unit

Maintained by

OCHA Brand and Design Unit (BDU)