An icon associated with particular website. It is often displayed in a web browser in address field (usually left to the URL), on tab bar, or in bookmarks.
A favicon is an icon associated with a particular website. It is often displayed in a web browser in the address field (usually left of the URL), on a tab bar, or in bookmarks.
Originally, favicons had a size of 16x16 pixels, though now they can be larger. How large the favicon is depends on the user agent. Favicons were introduced by Internet Explorer 5, which was using those small graphics for bookmarked websites. Bookmarked websites were called favorites in IE5, which led to the name "favicon".
Favicons were originaly produced in ico format, but now they can use other types of image files (ie. gif or png). The benefit of using ".ico" files is that these can hold images in multiple sizes (usually 16x16, 32x32 and 48x48 pixels) for different contexts such as in the browser or on the desktop.
Favicons help give a website identity. They are often a scaled-down version of a website logo.
