The ICO file will download to your computer and clicking on it will open the file in your default photo viewer. Here you can see we have a rather effective result and that is how to convert PNG to. Feb 13, 2010 I want to change a png file to an ico what is a good software to do this? I have created a png image and i want to use that as the icon for all my files and folders, but vista only allows ico files to be used as icons so how do i convert the png to the ico? There are some png to ico Software there that may interest you.
Even though Photoshop is one of the premier graphic editing programs in the world, it does not install with the capability to work with ICOs (icon image files). Instead, you have to download and install a plugin, and once finished, you can save images as ICOs and work with them just like any other image filetype.
Downloading the Plugin
For the ICO format to be usable, even available in Photoshop, you have to download the plugin. It is supplied by Telegraphics.com.au and is simply called 'ICO Format.' For most computers, you want to download the 32-bit version on the far-right side of the download screen.
Installating the Plugin
After the plugin is downloaded, you have to install it. First, extract or 'unzip' the downloaded ZIP file. It decompresses into a folder containing three files: the GNU Public License, a readme file and the plugin. To install the plugin, copy or drag and drop it into C:Program FilesAdobeAdobe Photoshop CSxPlug-insFile Formats (the 'x' stands for whatever version of the Creative Suite you have). Restart Photoshop if it is already running.
Using the New Functionality in Photoshop
You are now able to save any image in the ICO format. However, you have to decrease the size of any image to 256-by-256 pixels before the ICO format shows up in the 'Save As' dialog box. Anything greater, and the option disappears. PNGs, because they support transparency, are a good image type with which to start. Icons look more professional when they're not just squares on the desktop, but actual cut-outs that fit inside that 256-by-256 square.
The ICO Format
The ICO and PNG filetypes are closely related. In fact, several Windows operating systems (Vista and 7) have recommended that icon files be stored as compressed PNGs. Because modern operating systems support 32-bit color, icon files are now allowed to be 256-by-256 to allow icon scaling on screens with high resolutions. Historically, icons have only been 16-by-16 or 32-by-32. On XP, they were 48-by-48. So transforming a PNG to ICO is a common conversion and, with the simple installation of the plugin, one that is easy to accomplish in Photoshop.
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Other than the fact that PNG is a more common image format, is there any technical reason to favor favicon.png vs. favicon.ico?
I'm supporting modern browsers which all support PNG favorite icons.
8 Answers
Answer replaced (and turned Community Wiki) due to numerous updates and notes from various others in this thread:
- ICOs and PNGs both allow full alpha channel based transparency
- ICO allows for backwards compatibility to older browsers (e.g. IE6)
- PNG probably has broader tooling support for transparency, but you can find tools to create alpha-channel ICOs as well, such as the Dynamic Drive tool and Photoshop plugin mentioned by @mercator.
Feel free to consult the other answers here for more details.
All modern browsers (tested with Chrome 4, Firefox 3.5, IE8, Opera 10 and Safari 4) will always request a favicon.ico
unless you've specified a shortcut icon via <link>
. So if you don't explicitly specify one, it's best to always have a favicon.ico
file, to avoid a 404. Yahoo! suggests you make it small and cacheable.
And you don't have to go for a PNG just for the alpha transparency either. ICO files support alpha transparency just fine (i.e. 32-bit color), though hardly any tools allow you to create them. I regularly use Dynamic Drive's FavIcon Generator to create favicon.ico
files with alpha transparency. It's the only online tool I know of that can do it.
There's also a free Photoshop plug-in that can create them.
.png files are nice, but .ico files provide alpha-channel transparency, too, plus they give you backwards compatibility.
Have a look at which type StackOverflow uses for example (note that it's transparent):
The apple-itouch thingy is for iphone users that make a shortcut to a website.
The theoretical advantage of *.ico files is that they are containers than can hold more than one icon. You could for instance store an image with alpha channel and a 16 colour version for legacy systems, or you could add 32x32 and 48x48 icons (which would should up when dragging a link to Windows explorer).
This good idea, however, tends to clash with browser implementations.
PNG has 2 advantages: it has smaller size and it's more widely used and supported (except in case favicons).As mentioned before ICO, can have multiple size icons, which is useful for desktop applications, but not too much for websites.I would recommend you to put a favicon.ico in the root of your application. An if you have access to the Head of your website pages use the tag to point to a png file.So older browser will show the favicon.ico and newer ones the png.
To create Png and Icon files I would recommend The Gimp.
Some social tools like Google+ use a simple method to get a favicon for external links, fetchinghttp://your.domainname.com/favicon.ico
Since they don't prefetch the HTML content, the <link>
tag will not work. In this case, you might want to use a mod_rewrite rule or just place the file in the default location.
An ico can be a png.
More precisely, you can store one or more png inside this minimal container format, instead of the usual bitmap+alpha that everyone strongly associates with ico.
Support is old, appearing in Windows Vista (2007) and is well supported by browsers, though not necessarily by icon editing software.
Any valid png (whole including header) can be prepended by a 6 byte ico header and 16 byte image directory.
GIMP has native support. Simply export as ico and tick 'Compressed (PNG)'.
Avoid PNG in any case if you want reliable IE6 compatibility.
protected by KobiFeb 8 '15 at 9:44
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