Favicon Design Best Practices - Create Recognizable Icons (2025)
Learn favicon design best practices: simplicity, contrast, brand consistency, and safe areas. Design favicons that work at 16×16 and look great on all browsers.
Designing a favicon is harder than it looks. At 16×16 or 32×32 pixels, your logo's fine details disappear, gradients turn muddy, and text becomes unreadable. A good favicon isn't just a shrunken logo—it's a simplified, high-contrast icon designed specifically for tiny sizes.
This guide shows you practical design principles for creating favicons that are readable, recognizable, and consistent across browsers and devices. Whether you're designing from scratch or adapting an existing logo, these tips will help you create a favicon that works at any size.
Rule 1: Keep it simple (really simple)
Favicons are displayed at 16×16 pixels in browser tabs—that's smaller than your fingernail. At that size, fine details disappear, gradients turn into blobs, and text becomes unreadable. Start with a simple shape: a single letter, a geometric icon, or a bold symbol. Don't try to fit your entire logo into 16×16 pixels—it won't work.
Remove everything that's not essential. Gradients? Gone. Drop shadows? Gone. Thin lines? Gone. Text smaller than 3-4 pixels? Gone. If your logo has multiple elements (icon + text, or multiple shapes), pick the strongest one and use only that. For example, Twitter uses just the bird, not the bird + wordmark. Facebook uses just the "f", not the full logo.
Test your design at actual size. Don't design at 512×512 and assume it'll look good at 16×16. Zoom out in your design tool (Figma, Illustrator, Photoshop) to see how it looks at 16×16, 32×32, and 48×48. If you can't recognize the icon at 16×16, simplify it more. Use our Image Converter to preview your favicon at all sizes before deploying.
Rule 2: Express your brand with one strong idea
Your favicon should be instantly recognizable as your brand, even at 16×16 pixels. Use one strong element that people already associate with your product: a letter (like "G" for Google), a symbol (like the Nike swoosh), or a simple shape (like Spotify's circle with sound waves). Don't try to tell your whole brand story in a tiny icon—just give users a visual anchor to recognize your tab.
Align colors with your brand palette. If your brand is blue, make your favicon blue. If your brand is red, make it red. Consistency helps users recognize your site in a sea of browser tabs. But don't use too many brand colors—pick the primary color and stick with it. For example, Slack uses their purple + teal + yellow + green logo everywhere, but their favicon is just the simplified hash symbol in one color.
Avoid duplicating your full logo. Your logo might have text, multiple icons, or complex shapes—that's fine for headers and marketing, but it's too much for a favicon. Create a simplified "favicon version" of your logo. Think of it as your logo's nickname: shorter, simpler, but still recognizably you.
Rule 3: Maximize contrast and shape recognition
Your favicon needs to work on both light and dark browser themes. Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and Edge all support dark mode, and your favicon needs to be visible in both. Use high contrast: a light icon on a dark background, or a dark icon on a light background. Avoid mid-tone colors (like gray on white or dark blue on black)—they disappear in certain themes.
Test your favicon on different backgrounds. Open your site in Chrome with light theme, then switch to dark theme (Settings → Appearance → Dark). Does your favicon still stand out? If it disappears or becomes hard to see, increase the contrast. You can also provide separate favicons for light/dark mode using media queries: <link rel="icon" href="/favicon-light.png" media="(prefers-color-scheme: light)"> and <link rel="icon" href="/favicon-dark.png" media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)">.
Favor bold silhouettes over subtle details. At 16×16 pixels, thin lines (1-2 pixels wide) often disappear or look broken. Use thick shapes (at least 3-4 pixels wide) and clear negative space. Think of your favicon as a rubber stamp—if you can't recognize the shape from the silhouette alone, it's too complex.
Rule 4: Respect safe areas and platform constraints
Different platforms apply different treatments to your favicon. iOS adds rounded corners to Apple Touch Icons. Android can mask icons into circles, squircles, or teardrops (adaptive icons). Windows might add shadows. If your icon has important details near the edges, they might get cropped. Keep important shapes at least 10% away from the edges (safe area padding).
Design on a square canvas that matches the sizes you'll generate. Start with a 512×512 or 1024×1024 master file (PNG or SVG), then export to all required sizes (16×16, 32×32, 48×48, 180×180, 192×192, 512×512). Don't design at 16×16 and scale up—you'll lose quality. Design at high resolution and scale down. Our Image Converter handles this automatically—upload your 512×512 master and we'll generate all sizes.
Export to multiple sizes from the same source file. Don't create separate designs for each size—you'll end up with inconsistent proportions and colors. Use one master file and export to all sizes. This ensures your 16×16 favicon looks like a smaller version of your 512×512 icon, not a completely different design.
Ready to design your favicon?
Now that you know the design principles, create your favicon in your favorite design tool (Figma, Illustrator, Photoshop, Sketch). Export a high-resolution master file (512×512 or 1024×1024 PNG or SVG), then use our Image Converter to generate all required sizes automatically. We'll create 16×16, 32×32, 48×48, 180×180, 192×192, and 512×512 versions, plus ICO and SVG formats.