Microsoft Office is a family of productivity applications that includes Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, OneNote, Teams, and other tools. The suite’s visual identity consists of a set of application icons that were redesigned in late 2018 and rolled out beginning in early 2019, replacing the previous icons that had been in use since 2013.
Design and History
Microsoft announced the redesigned Office 365 application icons on November 29, 2018, marking the first update to the Office icons in five years. The new icons were designed to reflect significant product changes, including new AI features, collaborative tools, and the suite’s availability across Windows, Mac, iOS, and Android platforms. The rollout began with mobile and web versions, with desktop versions following in early 2019. [1] [2]
The redesign was led by Microsoft’s internal design team, with Jon Friedman, partner director of design at Microsoft, explaining the design philosophy behind the new icons. The previous icons, introduced in 2013, had emphasized the application letter (such as “W” for Word) which occupied two-thirds of the icon space, with a document or spreadsheet symbol taking up the remaining third. The new design reversed this emphasis, making the symbol the dominant element. [1] [3]
A key structural change was the decoupling of the letter and the symbol into two separate panels that could be paired or separated. This flexible system was designed to maintain familiarity while allowing the icons to work across different platforms, devices, and contexts, including 3D environments. [1] [2]
The redesign also removed the traditional document outlines that had appeared in earlier icons. Instead of showing a document outline for Word or a spreadsheet outline for Excel, the new icons display lines of text for Word and individual cells for Excel, focusing on the content users create rather than the formatting tool itself. [1] [2]
Meaning and Symbolism
Microsoft’s design team stated that strong colors have always been central to the Office brand, and the new icons were an opportunity to evolve the palette. The colors chosen for the new icons were described as “bolder, lighter and friendlier,” reflecting how Office had evolved as a product. Color serves to differentiate the individual applications and create personality for each one. [1]
The design team also applied gestalt principles to emphasize product changes, using simplicity and harmony as visual elements to reflect the connectivity and intuitiveness of the Office apps. While each icon retains a unique and identifiable symbol, the design creates visual connections between each app’s symbol and the collective suite. [1]
The shift in emphasis from the letter to the symbol was intentional: while the letter represents the tool itself, the symbol speaks more to what people create with the application. This change was meant to embody the collaborative nature of the apps. [1]
Typography and Design
The redesigned Office icons were part of Microsoft’s broader implementation of its Fluent Design system, which the company had been integrating into Windows 10 since 2017. The icon redesign accompanied other visual changes to Office, including a simplified ribbon interface and subtle color changes designed to modernize the look and feel of the applications across Windows, Mac, mobile, and the web. [2] [4]
According to Jon Friedman, the new icons were designed to be “bolder, lighter and friendlier” than their predecessors. The decoupling of letter and symbol into two panels added depth to the icons and created opportunities for use in 3D contexts. [1] [5]
While some individual applications such as OneDrive and Skype retained their distinctive visual motifs (a cloud for OneDrive, and a simplified call-button style for Skype), they were updated to fit the new, more modern visual language. [2]
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