Convert GIF to ICO (favicon)
GIF to ICO is a favorite of the pixel-art crowd: hard edges and small palettes survive the trip to 16 pixels far better than photographs do. The first frame of your GIF is center-cropped square and written at 16, 32 and 48px into one .ico, with GIF’s transparency preserved.
Also useful: Convert PNG to ICO (favicon)
How it works
Drop in the GIF — for sprites, one whose canvas is already 16, 32 or 48px converts with the least resampling.
The first frame is taken, center-cropped square, and packed as 16/32/48px entries with its hard-edged transparency intact.
Compare the 16px result against your source grid, then ship the .ico to your site root or grab the zip.
GIF vs ICO
For favicon duty, GIF-era pixel art beats modern gradient logos at their own game: art drawn on a 16px grid passes into the icon nearly untouched, while smooth marks blur when shrunk. The one thing left behind is motion — tabs killed animated icons decades ago, on purpose.
| GIF | ICO | |
|---|---|---|
| Compression | Lossless, 256-color palette | Lossless (BMP or PNG entries) |
| Transparency | Yes (full alpha) | Yes (full alpha) |
| Animation | Yes | No |
| Support | Universal | Universal for favicons |
| Best for | Simple animations and pixel art | Favicons and Windows app icons |
Frequently asked questions
No — that is the whole reason I built this. The conversion runs in your browser using WebAssembly, so your files never leave your device; there is no server in the loop at all. It also means the tool keeps working offline once the page has loaded, and there is no file size limit beyond your device’s memory.
No — the ICO format holds still images, and browsers deliberately don’t animate tab icons anyway (imagine a page of flashing tabs). This tool takes the first frame. If a different frame is the one you want, export it as a still first, then convert that.
Sharpest when the source size divides cleanly into the icon sizes — 16, 32, 48 or 96px sources scale crisply. Odd sizes get resampled, which softens single-pixel detail. If you drew the art at 16×16, it passes into the 16px entry essentially untouched; the 32 and 48px entries are scaled up from it.
It stays transparent. GIF transparency is all-or-nothing per pixel, and the ICO’s alpha channel represents that exactly — so the hard-edged cutout look of classic pixel art carries straight through to the tab icon.
At 16px, well-drawn pixel art wins against almost anything: it was authored for exactly that grid, while logos have to survive downscaling. A 16×16 GIF sprite passes into the icon essentially pixel-for-pixel. Modern marks catch up at 32 and 48px where there is room for curves — the multi-size .ico lets both coexist in one file.
The animation will not survive — tab icons are still images by design, so you get frame one. If frame one is a title card or a blank, export the frame you actually want as a still via GIF to PNG first, then convert that. For motion in the tab: browsers deliberately ended that party in the 2000s, and nobody misses it.
Related tools
Convert PNG to ICO (favicon)
Convert PNG to a multi-size ICO favicon in your browser — free, no upload. One file with 16, 32 and 48px icons with full alpha, ready for any site root.
Convert BMP to ICO (favicon)
Convert BMP to ICO in your browser — free, private, no upload. Fitting, since ICO files store bitmaps internally: your image simply gains the icon sizes.
Convert GIF to PNG
Convert GIF to PNG in your browser — free, no upload needed. Extracts the first frame losslessly, transparency intact — often smaller than the GIF itself.
Convert GIF to JPG
Convert GIF to JPG in your browser — free, private, instant. Grab a compact still frame from any GIF for thumbnails, previews and strict upload forms.