Onboarding Illustrations
Onboarding illustrations are unusual because they are consumed in sequence. Users swipe through three to five of them in fifteen seconds, so the set has to feel like one story told in chapters. Style drift between step two and step three is instantly visible in a way it never is on separate pages.
Generate the whole sequence in one run with the step list in your prompt — "welcome, connect your data, invite your team, you are ready" — so composition, character, and palette carry across all four. Keep a consistent focal position between frames; when the subject jumps around, the carousel feels jittery even at correct alignment. Export SVG for crisp rendering across every device pixel ratio your mobile app will meet.
Sequence notes
| Frames | 3–5 steps; past five, completion rates fall regardless of art quality |
|---|---|
| Aspect | 1:1 or 3:4 for mobile carousels, 4:3 for desktop modals |
| Consistency | Same character, same camera distance, same horizon line across every frame |
| Motion | SVG onboarding art can carry CSS animation baked into the file — no JS player needed |
Styles that fit
Each of these presets is tuned for full-scene illustration, not icon glyphs. Pick one to open the generator with it already selected — suggested canvas for this job is 3:4.
Example prompts
Describe the whole set in one prompt — generating the scenes together is what keeps them looking like one family.
How the illustration flow works
- 1
Pick the job
Open the Illustrations tab in the generator and choose the use case — onboarding illustrations maps to a tuned prompt template rather than a blank box.
- 2
Describe the scene
Give the product context and, optionally, the specific scene. Suggestions appear as you type, and you can attach up to three of your own illustrations as style references.
- 3
Review before you commit
Generation returns a preview first. Keep the ones that work, generate more into the same batch, and only then import — credits are spent on generation, not on browsing.
- 4
Vectorize and refine
Accepted scenes are traced to real SVG paths and land in a project. Open any one in the studio to clean nodes, recolor fills, or simplify paths.
- 5
Expand later, still matching
When you need scene number nine, expand the same project. Your existing illustrations become the style reference, so the new ones match instead of drifting.
Frequently asked questions
How do I keep onboarding illustrations consistent across steps?+
Generate them in one batch rather than one at a time. When the model produces the whole sequence in a single pass with your step list in the prompt, character design and palette carry across frames. For later additions, expand the same project so the existing frames act as the style reference.
Should onboarding illustrations be animated?+
A light entrance animation helps; anything longer than about 400ms fights the user trying to advance. Icora can bake CSS animation into the exported SVG with prefers-reduced-motion handling included, so there is no runtime library to load.
Related illustration guides
Keep reading
Make your onboarding illustrations
Describe the scenes, pick a style, and get a matched set as editable SVG. Free to start, no credit card required.
Open the illustration generator