When you create a website, one of the things you should do before launching your site is create a favicon. A favicon is an icon that appears next to a URL in the address bar of a web browser.
To create your own favicon, follow these steps:
- Create the image you would like to use as your favicon using a graphics program such as Photoshop. If you don’t own a graphics program, you can use a free one such as GIMP. Because a favicon is tiny (only 16 pixels x 16 pixels), it’s important to keep the design simple.
- Save your design as a gif, jpeg, png, or bmp.
- Upload your image to one of the many favicon generators available on the Internet. I use the favicon generator at Dynamic Drive. Download the newly created favicon and make sure it is named “favicon.ico”.
- Upload your favicon to your website. It should be placed in the root directory of your website (do not place the favicon in an images folder).
- For HTML pages, place this code in the head section of each web page: <link rel=”shortcut icon” href=/favicon.ico”> — if you are using WordPress, you can find instructions on editing your page header here.
That’s all there is to it!
Sometimes you can’t see your favicon even though you’ve followed all the correct steps. If so, empty your browser cache and then refresh your page. Your favicon should appear.
About Regina Fried
