10 Types of Motion Graphics (With Examples)

“Motion graphics” is a single phrase covering a dozen very different crafts, and briefing a studio without knowing which one you mean is how projects go wrong. A kinetic typography ad and a photoreal 3D product film are both motion graphics, and the team that nails one may be the wrong hire for the other. I run a creative studio, so this is the working taxonomy we use, with a studio that exemplifies each type so you can point at the exact style you want.

Before the list, one thing worth internalising: motion graphics is a real discipline with its own craft, not a filter you apply to a video. School of Motion’s overview is the clearest short explanation of what the field actually is.

The 10 types of motion graphics

1. Explainer animation

The workhorse of the category: 2D animation that walks a viewer through a product, service, or idea in a minute or two. It trades realism for clarity, using simple characters and clean visual metaphors to make something complicated feel obvious. It is the format most businesses mean when they say “we need a motion graphics video.”

Kurzgesagt sets the bar for the form, turning dense science into something effortless to follow:

2. Kinetic typography

Motion graphics where the words are the visual: text that animates in time with a voiceover or music, emphasising meaning through movement, weight, and rhythm. It is powerful for quotes, lyric-style ads, and any message where the language itself is the star. Done badly it is cheesy; done well it is hypnotic. A modern lyric video is kinetic typography at scale, letting the words carry the whole frame in time with the music:

3. Logo animation and brand idents

The short, punchy animation of a logo, a stinger, or a brand ident that tops and tails videos. It is a small piece of work with outsized brand value, because it is often the most-repeated few seconds a brand owns. This is where the high-end motion studios show off.

This is where high-end motion work shows off, treating a few seconds of brand motion as a miniature film:

4. 3D motion and CGI

Motion graphics rendered in three dimensions: product visualisation, abstract brand films, material and geometry studies. It is the most technical and expensive lane, capable of photoreal product shots or stylised worlds, and it is a very different craft from 2D.

Maxon’s Cinema 4D reel is a fast tour of what the 3D lane looks like at its best:

5. Character animation

Motion graphics built around animated characters with personality and performance, closer to a cartoon than a diagram. It is the right choice when you want warmth, humour, or emotional storytelling rather than a clean explanation.

Jacob Frey’s “The Present” is a masterclass in story-first character work, telling a full emotional story through a boy and a three-legged puppy with almost no dialogue:

6. Illustration-led motion

Motion graphics driven by a strong, distinctive illustration style, where the art direction is the whole appeal. It gives a brand an ownable, recognisable look that competitors cannot easily copy, and it sits between graphic design and animation.

The whole appeal is a signature aesthetic. James Curran’s “Tokyo Gifathon”, a fresh loop a day for a month, shows how far a single strong illustration style can carry:

7. UI and UX animation

The small, functional animations inside apps and websites: transitions, loading states, micro-interactions, and product-tour motion. It is less about spectacle and more about making software feel alive and understandable, and it is increasingly its own specialism. Google’s Material Design motion work is the reference for how interface animation should feel:

8. Infographic and data-in-motion

Motion graphics that bring numbers to life: animated charts, statistics, and data stories that make dry figures land. It is the format for annual reports, research findings, and any pitch where the data is the point but a static graph would be ignored. Hans Rosling’s famous data film is the benchmark for making numbers move and mean something:

9. Technical and product motion

Animation built to explain truly complex products, common in industrial, medical, and engineering sectors, where the job is making something intricate understandable. It rewards accuracy and clarity over flash.

Branch Education’s hardware breakdowns are technical animation at its clearest, making silicon understandable:

10. Looping graphics and GIFs

Short, seamless loops made for social feeds, banners, and reactions: stickers, animated posts, and endlessly repeating micro-animations. It is the most disposable format and the most native to how people actually scroll, so it is built for volume rather than depth. Markus Magnusson’s seamless character loops are the format at its most charming, endlessly watchable in a few frames:

How to use this list

The reason to know the types is to brief better. Before you approach a studio, name which of these ten you actually need, because it tells you which kind of team to hire and lets you judge a reel on the right thing. A studio’s reel will make it obvious which lanes they live in, and the best in each rarely overlap.

• Match the type to the job. An explainer needs clarity, a brand ident needs craft, a data story needs restraint. Pick the type that serves your message, not the flashiest one.
• Judge the reel on your type. A gorgeous 3D showreel says little about whether a studio can carry your kinetic typography ad. Ask to see the closest thing to what you need.
• Do not mix cost tiers and lanes. A photoreal 3D film and a batch of looping social GIFs are worlds apart in cost and craft. Know which one your project actually is.

At Moonb we produce most of these types as part of an embedded creative team, with a senior Creative Director keeping the style consistent across everything you make. If you want motion that stays on-brand across formats, see how Moonb works, and our roundup of motion graphics companies covers the specialist studios in each lane.