So you’ve spent months (or even years) working on your app – you’ve come up with a cool idea, got your app designed and did a lot of programming. And now is the time to name your app and create an icon that will appear on the App Store. Newbie developers think that this is the easiest part of the iOS app development process, but experienced developers know that choosing an icon for your app and coming up with a catchy name is not all that easy.
Great app names and icons often seem like brilliant inspirations that came out of nowhere. But in most cases a lot of hard work is involved. We’ve already posted an article about naming your app, so now we are going to tell you the DOs and DON’Ts of creating an icon for your app.
DO:
– keep your icon simple. Remember that you have limited space, so adding too much to the icon will clutter it and make it look bad.
– use the same color palette that you use in your app’s interface. Just like with the elements, try to stick to 2-3 key colors.
– test your icon to see how it looks on different backgrounds. Check it against different colors and textures to make sure your app icon is always clearly visible.
DON’T:
– use a scaled-down photo. A downsized photo doesn’t work well as an icon and looks terrible compared to professionally designed icons for other apps on the App Store.
– use text on your icon. Your app icon is not the app’s title, so avoid using any text if you don’t want to put off prospective users.
– copy design elements from iOS. Yes, you should design your icon in the same style so that it looks good, but don’t steal anything. Set your app apart from the default icons in iOS.
