The Proliferation and Problem of the ✨ Sparkles ✨ Icon

This article features content from the book Digital Icons That Work: A Comprehensive Guide to Enhancing User Experience with Effective Iconography by Kate Kaplan (with a contributing chapter on icon design by Kelley Gordon).

The Rise of the Sparkles Icon

Have you noticed how sparkles icons seem to be popping up across a variety of user interfaces over the past year or so? Everything — from the word-editing software I use, to UX tools, to various mobile-shopping applications — seems to have adopted a sparkles icon. What that sparkles icon means, however, differs from interface to interface.

The sparkles icon likely originated in image- and video-editing software as an indicator of special editing effects. More recently, it has evolved to signify something “special” or new (e.g., deals, promotions, or recent listings) — much like how the sparkles emoji is used in texting to communicate something exciting or intriguing.

In fact, it’s possible that the proliferation of the sparkles icon is directly related to the prevalence and popularity of the sparkles emoji. (And we are likely to see the same pattern with more visual symbols from micro environments that eventually make their way into icon forms.)

At the time of publication, Dictionary.com had this to say about the meaning of the sparkles emoji:

This emoji can stand for actual stars in the sky, show excitement and admiration, express love and congratulations, or suggest forms of magic and cleanliness. It can also represent other, more literal sparkling things, such as jewelry, glitter, and fireworks. Sexters even occasionally use it to mean “orgasm.”

Special stuff, right? And that’s how the sparkles icon is generally used in digital interfaces today: It indicates something special (though, as we’ll see, what that something may be is not always clear).

Sparkles Are Ambiguous

The challenge with this icon is sparkle ambiguity: Participants in our recent research study generally agreed that it represented something a little special. But, what was that something? And why was it special? That was less obvious. We encountered widely and wildly varied interpretations.

For example:

What’s New Plane Finder

The Plane Finder mobile application (used for tracking live flights) used sparkles to represent a What’s New? feature. This icon suffered from issues with both recognition (misidentification of the shape) and interpretation (misunderstanding the intended meaning). One person recognized the shape as a plus sign and associated it with adding content. Another guessed it was a military-related symbol meant to contact traffic control. Other predictions included deals or discounts, favorites, and accessibility options.

Promotions Lyft

The Lyft mobile application used the sparkles icon in the main menu to represent promotions. In qualitative testing, its interpretations ranged from current location, accessibility options, notifications, ratings, and favorites. Said one user: “The star is maybe for the best drivers that you like, or maybe it’s to put a star for the places that you go to the most! But, then what’s the heart for? That’s confusing.”

Furthering the sparkle ambiguity is the fact that, in some visual-design implementations, the sparkle design looks very similar to a plain old star icon, which is usually associated with saving or bookmarking an item.

Star Icon	73% of users in our quantitative icon study associated the star icon with saving or “favoriting” an item.
Discover Ulta	The Ulta mobile application used a sparkle icon in the bottom navigation bar to represent a Discover feature, which led users to featured products. However, users predicted that clicking the icon would show them deals, their own saved items, recommended products, or new products. Said one user: “In the absence of a heart, I think the star would allow me to save items. Or maybe it’s a wishlist [because] you wish on a star.”
Offers Starbucks	In an interesting and indecisive crossover, the Starbucks mobile application used a 2-star icon to represent offers. This icon is neither clearly a star nor clearly sparkles, and therefore has a doubtful chance of being widely understood by users who have not learned the application.

Our quantitative study reinforced the ambiguousness of the sparkles icon. When we showed participants the sparkles icon in isolation and asked them to describe what it would indicate in an interface, many people were just plain unsure. Other responses ranged across a wide set of ideas:

Association Cited	Percent of Associations (n=107)
Favorite or save an item	16.82% (95% confidence interval: 10.82% to 25.12%)
Visual effects or optimization options	16.82% (95% confidence interval: 10.82% to 25.12%)
Important or special information (e.g., new content)	11.22% (95% confidence interval: 6.39% to 18.73%)
Rewards or affirmation of success	6.54% (95% confidence interval: 2.98% to 13.12%)
Ideas, tips, or help information	4.67% (95% confidence interval: 1.74% to 10.75%)

Sparkles as “All Things Artificial Intelligence”

As artificial-intelligence (AI) platforms and technologies have become more prolific and accessible to the public, the sparkles icon has become a primary way to represent AI-related features and actions.

Undoubtedly, the sparkles icon is having a moment. In the absence of a standardized way to visually capture the idea of “mysterious AI-driven process,” it has become the de facto symbol for everything AI.

Just think of the AI-driven features that exist across the digital tools that many UX professionals use regularly: automatic layout generation, design suggestions, sentiment analysis, and even theme identification. If you use these tools — or interact with any kind of generative AI — you’ve probably noticed that the sparkles icon is often used to indicate “something AI does.”

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The glitz of this icon seems to suggest that something magical is happening behind the scenes. It’s as if we’re throwing a little pixie dust on the problem to — poof! —fix it all up. While, indeed, AI is certainly a bit mysterious to most people, we might still pause to question whether this metaphor is apt or if it skips too lightly over the risks of AI (e.g., biases, limitations, sycophancy, hallucinations) by suggesting we simply enjoy the short-term outputs.

It’s also interesting that, in both our qualitative and quantitative research, no one attributed the concept of “artificial intelligence” to the icon. That is, not one participant mentioned “AI” or “artificial intelligence” in reference to sparkles icons, whether those icons were in or out of the context of a digital interface.

This is likely because sparkles are used frequently to represent not only AI features and capabilities but also completely unrelated features and content, such as visual effects, deals or rewards, personalized ads, and new content (as we saw in the earlier examples).

The Future of the Sparkles Icon

Even though the sparkles icon isn’t widely interpreted as “AI” yet, it may become a reliable standard in the future. AI features will continue to emerge in products and platforms that users encounter frequently. As they do, and as the general population comes to understand and expect AI-driven content and assistance in their everyday interactions, the sparkles icon could become a recognizable indicator.

However, it’s also possible that, after an initial moment in the spotlight, the association between the sparkles icon and AI will subsequently fade away. The sparkles capture the sentiment of something new and exciting, or even magical. And right now, AI can feel like magic: It’s novel, intriguing, and kind of mysterious. We don’t fully understand its potential and limitations. There’s also a lot of AI hype out there. Companies use the sparkles to highlight AI’s integration into their products, and therefore, communicate to their users that they’re innovative.

But as AI becomes more accepted and common across various platforms and tools, these features won’t feel as exciting. They will become common, familiar, routine — expected, even. They won’t be magic anymore. The sentiment of “special” that sparkles carry may not feel quite right for AI anymore.

It also won’t matter that AI is behind the output or feature. We won’t need to denote AI-driven elements with sparkles — or anything at all. What will matter is that the platform has AI capabilities and meets our expectations and needs in providing these features.

How to Use the Sparkles Icon Now

The sparkles icon is emergent and does not have a settled place in the world. However, in my opinion, it can be appropriate in three cases:

• Image or video editing
• Highlights
• AI features

Image or Video Editing

The sparkles are already widely used to indicate visual effects in related interfaces such as photo-editing applications and video-call platforms, so this is an appropriate continued use within those environments.

Highlights

You can use the sparkles when you do have something that really is just kind of special amidst other things. An example could be indicating new events on an event listings page. This is appropriate because users do associate the sparkles with general, ambiguous specialness. However, the icon should always be accompanied by a label (such as New! or Just In in this example) to add specificity and clarity to its meaning.

AI Features

Finally, I also predict that the icon’s association with AI-driven features will get stronger in the immediate future. So, for the time being, using it to indicate AI-driven features (or even simply new features) may be useful. Over time, as AI-driven features become more common or even expected across interfaces, there will be less of a need to call them out. It won’t matter that the features are AI-driven; it will matter only that they are present and meet user needs.

General Guidance for Using Emerging Icons

Like any language, icons are not stagnant. They are influenced by shifts in the world around us. Our devices, technologies, and even popular culture can shape the emergence or hasten the departure of emerging icons such as the sparkles. (Emerging icons are icons that do not yet have a standardized meaning across interactions and interfaces.)

New technologies such as AI introduce new interactions, and designers invent new icons (along with other UI patterns) to support them. There is room — and even a necessity for — innovation in icon design, especially as technologies emerge and cultural perspectives shift and evolve. Still, innovation comes with a tradeoff. Any new icon will incur a cost for users, because they will need to spend time learning it.

If you are considering innovating with a new icon, there is a somewhat simple equation to follow: If there is a standard (i.e., a widely recognized icon) that serves users well, use it. If not, test your ideas and iterate. Use labels and tooltip explanations to speed learning and comprehension.

Learn More in The Book: Digital Icons That Work

If you enjoyed this discussion and want to deepen your understanding of icon design, Digital Icons That Work offers a wealth of icon-design guidelines based on my recent icon research.

To explore more research insights and discover strategies to create effective iconography that enhances UX, get your copy here.