Smashing Magazine we smash you with the information that will make your life easier. really.

Favicons, Episode 8

By Smashing Editorial, November 20th, 2008 in Design Showcase | 49 Comments | Forum

Every now and again we showcase beautiful favicons, tiny pieces of art you’ll find in your browser’s address bar or when searching through your bookmarks. Favicons are important because they provide visual indicators to visitors and help them easily associate content with a bookmark in their browser. Besides that, favicons are just nice to look at, and there are way too many websites that don’t make use of them. We want to change that, which is why we are presenting the 8th episode of our favicons series — for a change, a small article with very small images and a quick loading time.

We’ve written enough about favicons in the past. If you’d like to find out more about them, feel free to look at our previous posts:

Notice that these favicons were chosen not simply for their beauty; it’s been important to us that the favicon fits perfectly with the overall website design. Pay close attention to the small details of the design. All favicons are linked, of course, to the websites where they are used (if they still exist) — click on them to get more insight into how favicon design relates to overall layout design. The favicons are listed in no particular order.

	Notifu
	Celsius Compile
	Derek Allard
	Typo3 Switch
	Tajloro
	Nicole Bauer
	Computersight
	Leisure and Cultural Services Department, Hong Kong
	Sodevious
	Inspired Buddy
	Digital Camera Resource Page
	Accessites
	Creative News
	Bed and Breakfast Brescia
	Web Urbanist
	LoupDeLou
	Vida Comunicação
	Clay Ant
	Patrick Monkel’s Karma
	Designspotter
	Train 1 on 1
	Turism Point Romania
	Heartprints
	The Pennsylvania Federation of College Republicans
	Burrow Physiotherapy Pontefract
	Dean J. Robinson
	Salt Solutions
	Lyte Byte
	Foxycart
	Notified
	Evoluted
	Lifesize
	Iconified
	Kidsmodern
	Knoxville Tourism
	Etnies
	Max Voltar
	we:presenter
	Scrumy
	Stefano Verna. (Yes, a simple idea, but very effective in a bookmark list.)
	Web Magazine
	My Bank Tracker
	Get a Freelancer. (Reminds me of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro.)
	Scinexx
	Diplod
	Strands
	Custom Canvas
	I like to Design. (Last but not least, a very animated one.)

Published in Design Showcase, November 20th, 2008
Tags: favicons, inspiration, showcases

1.

John (November 20th, 2008, 3:07 pm)

Great post. I love favicons. Im inspired now. My fav is computersight from this list. Nice post thanks.
2.

zanders (November 20th, 2008, 3:37 pm)

I love Link [www.patrickmonkel.nl] and Link [www.evoluted.net] mainly because I’ve always been a fan of natural/leaf designs.
I also like Link [www.tajloro.com], but feel the enlarged version of the favicon appears too many times on the actual site. Shame.
Brilliant post yet again! You’re the only magazine that I read every post, instead of skipping 90% of the content, like usual!
3.

Tammy Hart (November 20th, 2008, 3:58 pm)

When I realized that favicons were sticking out to my mind, it made me realized that I needed one, so in my recent design update, I included one: Link [www.tammyhartdesigns.com]
4.

Oliv. G (November 20th, 2008, 4:05 pm)

and what about this favicon > Link [www.weblogr.fr] :)

what do you think about animated favicon?
5.

wefwef (November 20th, 2008, 4:11 pm)

Some fantastic favicons. Just goes to show how good you can make them.
6.

Sean (November 20th, 2008, 4:12 pm)

The one listed for CodeIgniter is derekallard… CodeIgniter’s favicon is the little flame.
7.

Dan Kordik (November 20th, 2008, 4:17 pm)

Hey, nice to see us up there! Just one thing though- it’s “Scrumy”, not “Scrummy”, damn domain squatters. Proof: Link [scrumy.com]
8.

Albert (November 20th, 2008, 4:43 pm)

I think Patrick Monkel’s Karma, Designspotter and Evoluted have done great job to get their Favicons that great
9.

bim (November 20th, 2008, 4:54 pm)

You forgot to mention smashing magazine favicon.. simple and effective. I think I have a good one too…what do you think? Link [www.bimaltailor.co.uk]
10.

Ricky (November 20th, 2008, 5:30 pm)

The very best, most practical use of favicons that I’ve seen the WC3 orgs validation pages. When you’re validating your markup or CSS, you don’t even need to wait for the page to load, just watch the Favicon. A green Favicon means your markup passed validation, a Red Favicon and you know you’ve got more work to go.
11.

Rémi (November 20th, 2008, 5:55 pm)

Beautiful set !
I would like to know, what are your favorites tools to make yours favicons ?
(to draw, and to generate).
Thanks
12.

mikemike (November 20th, 2008, 6:30 pm)

Wow, this post is littered with misspellings.
13.

Derek Allard (November 20th, 2008, 7:40 pm)

Indeed a fantastic article… thanks! Just FYI, the third icon down (robot head) is labelled “CodeIgniter”, but it’s actually the favicon for my personal site, Link [derekallard.com].
14.

Corey (November 20th, 2008, 8:09 pm)

the etnies favicon links to maxvoltar.com
15.

aperta (November 20th, 2008, 10:16 pm)

Thanks…
16.

Seaer (November 21st, 2008, 12:20 am)

I love the new wipeelist.com favicon! sexy and transparent yum
17.

Eliwagar (November 21st, 2008, 12:37 am)

Hi, is there any palce to submit favicons? Nice Greetings from Germany :)

———
no chance! (Sven)
18.

David Perel (November 21st, 2008, 1:06 am)

This is a nifty idea! Favicons are like a black art and can sometime be more recognizable / memorable than the site itself!

Link [www.from-the-couch.com]
19.

Kat (November 21st, 2008, 1:27 am)

A great list. Thanks!
It’s probably worth noting that animated favicons like the last one on the list won’t display in IE…
20.

Andrew Butterworth (November 21st, 2008, 1:44 am)

Nice list. I love looking at favicons and seeing how people have re-interpreted their branding for such a small space. Check out this one I did here Link [smartcityfutures.co.uk].
21.

Martin (November 21st, 2008, 2:28 am)

Does smashing magazine have a copy editor? I only skimmed this article and still noticed a good few mistakes. It’s disappointing that the decent content on this site is let down by bad attention to detail in the copy.
22.

JFK (November 21st, 2008, 3:27 am)

The animated one is more disturbing than useful, as a page, that plays sound on load.
23.

FinalFrag (November 21st, 2008, 3:28 am)

Nice list, although the one about CodeIgniter is wrong… It shows the favicon of Derek Allard… the one from CodeIgniter is a black flame on a white background (www.codeigniter.com)
24.

Laura (November 21st, 2008, 4:29 am)

thanks for the mention!!!
25.

cristian (November 21st, 2008, 5:11 am)

Nice source, thanks!
26.

Vitaly Friedman & Sven Lennartz (November 21st, 2008, 6:35 am)

@25
dereks website is called “codeigniter…”
will change it nevertheless to avoid further misunderstandings.
27.

andy (November 21st, 2008, 7:33 am)

Thanks Smashing!
i love favicons - i used them to design my personal homepage of frequently visited sites.
If you want to see it - Link [www.andyhowes.com] (don’t worry - not spam)
28.

Web Major (November 21st, 2008, 8:56 am)

I change mine with the seasons… I think it gives the site a more personal and “with it” feel. Right now it’s the same as my gravatar… Link [www.webmajor.com]
29.

Soh (November 21st, 2008, 10:33 am)

Any recommended tutorials out there to create favicons? Best practices? Tips?
30.

penantang.com (November 21st, 2008, 8:30 pm)

favicon is the most things in website..it’s like a core of website…
31.

Aw Guo (November 21st, 2008, 10:41 pm)

Chinese characters are sometimes a very good choice :)
32.

John (November 22nd, 2008, 10:44 am)

How about a nice set of iPhone icons/bookmarks?
33.

Akiva Levy (November 22nd, 2008, 10:54 am)

What’s with the Magen David for Salt Solutions?
I have never understood when companies choose a religious symbol for their business but then neglect to mention anywhere why they did so.
In this case, as a Jew, I would expect to visit Salt Solutions and see some evidence of their faith, but no.
Qoui?
34.

Amir Rahim (November 22nd, 2008, 1:01 pm)

i love favicons - i used them to design my personal homepage. If you want to see it Link []
35.

Will Sullivan (November 22nd, 2008, 11:16 pm)

Not to toot my own horn, but I dig my pocket protector for the “nerd” in Link [www.journerdism.com] :)
36.

Eli (November 23rd, 2008, 1:13 am)

Maybe someone would like to comment on my favicon…I did ist for a page with cat related content.
Link [www.katzencontent.com]
37.

Fred (November 23rd, 2008, 8:35 am)

Nice Collection! Especially the animated ones are interesting.
Another nice favicon under Link [blog.janorth.de]
38.

mutt (November 23rd, 2008, 2:03 pm)

This one is cool:

from Link [whereisthatfire.com]
39.

Peter (November 23rd, 2008, 10:57 pm)

I love it.
40.

speedcu (November 24th, 2008, 12:11 am)

very nice collection! thanks
41.

JoepH (November 24th, 2008, 1:45 pm)

Based on our new logo, we designed this on-off button style favicon.
Link [www.compubase.nl]
42.

d669 (November 25th, 2008, 5:43 am)

Leaf favicon based on the identity at Link [www.marianvanzijl.nl]
43.

Jaf (November 26th, 2008, 3:28 am)

hmm, nice collection … i have got one too a molecule like favicon