Favicons for tabs and Google: Crawl Audit check 199

Short answer: the favicon is the small icon in browser tabs, bookmarks and, often, next to your site in Google results. Check 199 warns if the page doesn't declare one.

What Crawl Audit checks

• Pass: a <link rel="icon"> or rel="shortcut icon" tag.
• Warning: none.

It doesn't check the file's size or format. The catalogue mentions 32 by 32 pixels; Google's current guidance, below, is different.

What Google says

• "Your favicon must be a square (1:1 aspect ratio) that's at least 8x8px." Google recommends "larger than 48x48px". The older "multiple of 48 pixels" rule is no longer on the page.
• Supported formats include ICO, PNG, GIF and JPEG. SVG isn't on Google's list.
• "Google Search only supports one favicon per site, where a site is defined by the hostname." "The favicon URL must be stable".
• "A favicon isn't guaranteed to appear in Google Search results, even if all guidelines are met."

A simple set

<link rel="icon" href="/favicon.ico" sizes="48x48">
<link rel="icon" href="/icon.svg" type="image/svg+xml">
<link rel="apple-touch-icon" href="/apple-touch-icon.png">

MDN notes that rel="shortcut icon" is non-conforming and should no longer be used; plain icon is enough.

On devmarde.com

We declare a favicon.ico containing 16, 32 and 48 pixel versions, plus an SVG icon for browsers that support it. It passes.

Sources

• Google Search Central, Define a favicon to show in search results (updated 28 August 2026).
• MDN, HTML attribute: rel, checked 6 October 2026.