Go-Live Clearance

Visual completeness · Favicon

Favicon Checker

A missing favicon is a small thing that makes a big first impression. Browser tabs show a blank icon. Bookmarks lose their visual anchor. Pinned tabs are unrecognizable. Paste your URL and we check for <link rel="icon">, /favicon.ico, and apple-touch-icon, then stamp CLEARED / HOLD / DENIED.

Favicon problems we catch

These are tiny details that make your site look unfinished on launch day.

  • No favicon at all

    Browser tab shows a blank or default globe icon. Bookmarks have no visual identifier. Looks like a dev environment, not a product.

  • <link rel='icon'> present but 404

    The href points to a path that returns 404 or serves HTML instead of an image. The tag exists but the favicon never loads.

  • Favicon returns HTML instead of an image

    SPA fallback routing serves index.html for unknown paths, including /favicon.ico. The browser gets an HTML response and can't display it.

  • Missing apple-touch-icon for iOS

    iPhone and iPad users who 'Add to Home Screen' get a blank or screenshot-based icon. Apple requires a dedicated apple-touch-icon link.

Copy-paste favicon fixes

Use Next.js file-based favicons for zero config, or explicit link tags for any stack.

Next.js App Router — file-based

Place in app/ directory:
- app/favicon.ico      (classic .ico)
- app/icon.png         (modern PNG, 32×32+)
- app/apple-icon.png   (iOS home screen, 180×180)

Next.js wires <link> tags automatically.

Plain HTML

<head>
  <link rel="icon" href="/favicon.ico" sizes="any" />
  <link rel="icon" href="/icon.svg" type="image/svg+xml" />
  <link rel="apple-touch-icon" href="/apple-touch-icon.png" />
</head>

# Ensure /favicon.ico returns an image, not HTML.

Server-rendered (Java/Spring)

# Put favicon.ico in the static web root
# Spring: src/main/resources/static/favicon.ico
# Also add <link rel="icon" href="/favicon.ico"> in the layout
# Make sure the security config permits GET /favicon.ico anonymously

Still check by hand

  • □Test in an incognito window — browsers cache favicons aggressively
  • □Include both .ico (legacy) and .png/.svg (modern) formats
  • □Add apple-touch-icon (180×180 PNG) for iOS home screen
  • □Verify /favicon.ico returns an image content-type, not text/html

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