SVG animation

SVG animation elements were developed in collaboration with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Synchronized Multimedia Working Group, developers of the Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language, the first version of which was published in 1999. SVG 1.0 became a W3C Recommendation on 4 September 2001. Certain web browsers added support for SVG animation during the 2000s, including Amaya as early as 2003, but SVG animation was only supported by widely used browsers beginning in the 2010s, notably by Firefox 4 (2011). Internet Explorer supports ECMAScript animation, and its successor Microsoft Edge supports ECMAScript and CSS animations as of version 42.17134.

The SYMM Working Group, in collaboration with the SVG Working Group, has authored the SMIL Animation specification, which represents a general-purpose XML animation feature set. SVG incorporates the animation features defined in the SMIL Animation specification and provides some SVG-specific extensions.

The following code snippets demonstrate three techniques to create animated SVG images on compatible browsers. The relevant parts are highlighted in yellow. Click the images' thumbnails to see their animated versions.

SVG animation using SMIL

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN" "http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd">
<svg version="1.1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"
 width="100%" height="100%" viewBox="-4 -4 8 8">
 <title>SVG animation using SMIL</title>
 <circle cx="0" cy="1" r="2" stroke="red" fill="none">
  <animateTransform
   attributeName="transform"
   attributeType="XML"
   type="rotate"
   from="0"
   to="360"
   begin="0s"
   dur="1s"
   repeatCount="indefinite"/>
 </circle>
</svg>

SVG animation using CSS

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN" "http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd">
<svg version="1.1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"
 width="100%" height="100%" viewBox="-4 -4 8 8">
 <title>SVG animation using CSS</title>
 <style type="text/css">
  @keyframes rot_kf { from { transform: rotate(0deg);   }
                      to   { transform: rotate(360deg); } }
  .rot { animation: rot_kf 1s linear infinite; }
 </style>
 <circle class="rot" 
  cx="0" cy="1" r="2" stroke="blue" fill="none"/>
</svg>

SVG animation using ECMAScript

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN" "http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd">
<svg version="1.1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" width="100%" height="100%" viewBox="-4 -4 8 8" 
 onload="rotate(evt)">
 <title>SVG animation using ECMAScript</title>
 <script type="text/ecmascript">
  function rotate(evt) {
   var object = evt.target.ownerDocument.getElementById('rot');
   setInterval(function () {
     var now          = new Date();
     var milliseconds = now.getTime() % 1000;
     var degrees      = milliseconds * 0.36; // 360 degrees in 1000 ms
     object.setAttribute('transform', 'rotate(' + degrees + ')');
    }, 20);
  }
 </script>
 <circle id="rot" 
  cx="0" cy="1" r="2" stroke="green" fill="none"/>
</svg>

Though the example above works, it is not the optimal implementation, the animation is limited to 50 frames per second (FPS). Using requestAnimationFrame provides better performance and can reach 60 FPS:

<!DOCTYPE svg PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD SVG 1.1//EN" "http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/1.1/DTD/svg11.dtd">
<svg version="1.1" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink" width="100%" height="100%" viewBox="-4 -4 8 8" 
 onload="init()">
  <title>SVG animation using requestAnimationFrame()</title>
  <script>
    var object;
   
    function init() {
      object = document.getElementById('rot');     
      window.requestAnimationFrame(rotate);
    }
   
    function rotate(timestamp) {
      var milliseconds = timestamp % 1000;
      var degrees      = milliseconds * 0.36; // 360 degrees in 1000 ms
      object.setAttribute('transform', 'rotate(' + degrees + ')');
      window.requestAnimationFrame(rotate);
    }
  </script>
  <circle id="rot" cx="0" cy="1" r="2" stroke="green" fill="none"/>
</svg>

The following are the animation attribute which identify the target attribute for the given target element whose value changes over time. attributeName = "<attributeName>" specifies the name of the target attribute. An XMLNS prefix may be used to indicate the XML namespace for the attribute. The prefix will be interpreted in the scope of the current animation element.

attributeType = "CSS | XML | auto" specifies the namespace in which the target attribute and its associated values are defined. CSS specifies that the value of ‘attributeName’ is the name of a CSS property defined as animatable in this specification. XML specifies that the value of ‘attributeName’ is the name of an XML attribute defined in the default XML namespace for the target element. The attribute must be defined as animatable in this specification. auto The default value is 'auto'. The implementation should match the ‘attribute Name’ to an attribute for the target element. The implementation must first search through the list of CSS properties for a matching property name, and if none is found, search the default XML namespace for the element.

• 
  SMIL animation demonstrating change in transformation (scale) and CSS attributes (opacity and dash offset)
• 
  SMIL animation demonstrating motion along a path and simulation of 3D
• 
  SMIL animation demonstrating morphing of shapes (paths)
• 
  CSS3 animation demonstrating changes in transformation (rotation, scale and translation) and simulation of 3D

The MediaWiki wiki software automatically generates static, non-animated thumbnails of SVG images. Viewing the actual .svg image from each respective description page will show its animation in a compatible browser.

There are several JavaScript libraries for working with SVG animation. An advantage to the use of such libraries is that these libraries often solve incompatibility issues in browsers through abstraction. Examples of libraries include Raphaël and Velocity.js

Wikimedia Commons has media related to SVG animation.

• CSS animations
• D3.js
• Flash animation
• GIF animation

• SVG 1.1 Specification – Animation
• SVG Animation and other SVG Tutorials
• SMIL animations embedded in SVG – Chapter from SVG Primer (W3C)
• SVG Animation Examples
• SVG Animation Tool