Website basics
Favicon not showing in Google Search or the browser tab? A step-by-step check
Quick answer: Google shows a favicon when your homepage points to a square icon file with a <link rel="icon"> tag, Google may fetch both the homepage and the icon (nothing blocks them), and the icon URL stays stable. After a fix, updating takes days to several weeks. The tab icon in your browser is a separate cache and often needs a hard refresh. To create the file, open the favicon tool with a square logo of at least 256 px; it runs in your browser and nothing is uploaded to Refentra.
Files are processed locally.
On this page
What Google actually asks for
- Shape and size
- Square (1:1), at least 8 × 8 px. Google recommends 48 × 48 px or larger. There is no need to hit an exact multiple.
- File types
- BMP, GIF, ICO, PNG, JPEG, PPM and TIFF
- Where it is declared
- A
<link>tag in the<head>of your homepage;relcan be icon, shortcut icon, apple-touch-icon or apple-touch-icon-precomposed - Crawling
- Googlebot-Image must be allowed to fetch the icon file and Googlebot the homepage; neither may be blocked
- URL
- Stable: do not change the icon’s address often
- Which page counts
- The homepage of a domain or subdomain. A subfolder such as /news cannot have its own favicon
- Time
- Crawling can take several days to several weeks; you can ask for a faster visit with the URL Inspection tool in Search Console
- Content
- Icons Google considers inappropriate are replaced by a default icon
Source: Google Search Central, Define a favicon, checked 5 October 2026. Refentra is not affiliated with Google.
Step 1: make a clean icon file
- Start with a simple square logo. At least 256 × 256 px, ideally a bold shape or a single letter with strong contrast. Fine detail disappears at 16 px.
- Make it square first. A rectangular image gets transparent padding. If you would rather keep control, trim it with the image cropper before.
- Open the favicon tool and choose the image. It accepts one still PNG, JPG or WebP up to 10 MiB and 16 megapixels; the shorter side must be at least 48 px.
- Select “Create ICO” and check the sizes. 16, 32 and 48 px are always created; 64, 128 and 256 px only if your source is at least that large, because the tool does not enlarge pictures. Look at the preview, then select “Download ICO”.
Step 2: put it on your site
Website builders and shops usually have a favicon or site-icon field in the theme or site settings; use it and skip the code. If you edit the HTML yourself, upload the file to the root of your site as favicon.ico and add this line inside the head of your homepage:
<link rel="icon" href="/favicon.ico">Use the same host Google shows for your site (with or without www). The icon must be reachable on that host without a login page or a redirect chain.
Step 3: check that Google and browsers can reach it
- Open yoursite.com/favicon.ico (or the address in your link tag) in a new tab. You should see the icon, not an error page.
- View the page source of your homepage and search for “rel="icon"”. The tag must be there, in the head.
- Check your robots.txt: it must not block the icon file or the homepage for Googlebot or Googlebot-Image.
- In Search Console, use URL Inspection on the homepage and request indexing. This only asks for a visit; Google still decides when it updates.
- For the browser tab, hard-refresh the page or open the site in a private window. Browsers cache icons separately and can keep the old one for a long time.
Still not showing after a few weeks?
- The favicon is declared on a subpage or a subfolder, not on the homepage of the domain or subdomain.
- The homepage redirects to another host and the icon lives on the old one.
- The icon address changed several times, so Google keeps seeing a new URL.
- The file is blocked by robots.txt, needs a login or returns an error for crawlers.
- The icon is a blurry or very detailed image. Replace it with a simpler one at 48 px or larger.
- The site is new or rarely crawled. Keep the setup stable; Google can take weeks.
What the tool does not do
- It does not upload the file to your site or submit anything to Google; you do both.
- It does not create an Apple touch icon, a web app manifest or an SVG favicon.
- It accepts static PNG, JPG and WebP only, no animations and no SVG, and it cannot sharpen a low-resolution logo.
Sources and method
The requirements come from the linked Google page, checked on 5 October 2026. Google can change them, so check the page before a large rollout. Tool steps and limits were checked against the current Refentra favicon tool. This guide was drafted and edited with AI assistance.