Add a favorite icon (favicon) to a WordPress blog

Alot of browsers support the use of images to represent your website or blog in places like the website tab or RSS Feed results.  These images are called favorite icons and are set through a file called favicon.ico

WordPress maintains a page that lays out how to add a favicon to a blog, but here is my two cents to get you finished with this task quickly:

Steps:

1. Create a file called favicon.ico
   – I used Photoshop.  You can get a FREE plugin to open and save .ico files from here
   – Make sure your image is 16×16 pixels.  I will usually crop my image square and then reduce the image to 16×16…it works good enough for me.
   – Most icons look better on a transparent background, which is supported by ico files.
2. Upload it to your WordPress blog’s root directory and theme root.
   -The copy in the root folder of your wordpress blog allows the favicon to show up in RSS Feed results, and also when you are in the Admin area.  The copy in the root folder of your Active Theme allows the icon to show up on all of the blog pages.

Note: When you’re testing your new icon, you may have to clear the cache on your browser and close/reopen the browser to refresh things so you can see if it worked.  Other users have reported that if it still doesn’t show up you can try deleting the site from your Favorites and Adding it to your Favorites so that it recaches the icon.

Here is an online .ico creator I found while updating the icon on my website: http://tools.dynamicdrive.com/favicon/