Adobe XD vs IconJar

Adobe XD is Adobe's UI/UX design and prototyping tool, built to fit naturally into workflows already using Photoshop and Illustrator. It supports vector-based screen design, auto-animate transitions for prototypes, and voice prototyping for testing voice-driven interfaces. XD integrates with Creative Cloud Libraries, allowing shared colors, character styles, and assets to flow between XD and other Adobe apps, which is useful for teams with an existing Adobe-centric design pipeline. While Adobe has shifted investment toward Figma-style collaborative tools industry-wide, XD remains actively used by teams already standardized on Creative Cloud.

IconJar is an icon management application built exclusively for macOS that helps designers, illustrators, and developers keep large collections of icons organized in one searchable library. Icons can be dragged in from Finder or icon packs, tagged, and searched instantly, then dragged back out into whatever design tool happens to be open. The app is aimed at creative professionals who accumulate hundreds or thousands of icon assets across projects and want a fast, native way to browse and reuse them instead of digging through nested folders. IconJar is sold as an annual subscription or one-time license, with a 14-day free trial available before purchase, and it is also distributed through the Setapp macOS app bundle.

• Tight integration with Adobe Creative Cloud
• Fast, lightweight vector engine
• Good auto-animate prototyping
• Familiar to Adobe users

• Fast local search across large icon collections
• Native macOS performance and feel
• Simple drag-and-drop workflow for designers
• Works offline once icons are imported

• Smaller plugin ecosystem than Figma
• Real-time collaboration less mature
• Adobe has slowed new feature investment

• macOS only, no Windows or web version
• Requires manually importing icon sets rather than syncing automatically
• Another paid tool to add to a design stack