GIF to ICO Converter

What happens when you convert GIF to ICO

• The image is decoded and written as a PNG-based icon of up to 256 by 256 pixels.
• ICO cannot animate, so only the first frame of an animated GIF is kept.
• Icons are limited to 256 by 256 pixels, so larger images are scaled down to fit, keeping their proportions.

How to convert GIF to ICO online

1. Press "Choose GIF files" and select one or more files, or drag them onto the box. You can add files of any size your device can hold in memory.
2. Adjust the settings if you need to. The output is lossless, so there is no quality setting to worry about.
3. Press "Convert to ICO". Images convert in a second or two each.
4. Save each ICO with its download button. Close the tab and every trace of the files is gone from memory.

Why convert GIF to ICO?

GIF files usually come from short looping animations, reactions and simple graphics. People convert them to ICO because ICO is the format browsers and Windows use for website and program icons.

In short, GIF is good at what it was made for, and ICO is the more practical choice when the file has to open, upload or print somewhere else. GIF opens and animates in every browser, while ICO shown by browsers as a favicon; opening one directly depends on the viewer.

How to convert GIF to ICO on Windows, Mac, iPhone and Android

On Windows

Open this page in Chrome, Edge or Firefox, drag your GIF files in from File Explorer, and press Convert. Each ICO is saved to your Downloads folder.

On a Mac

Safari, Chrome and Firefox all work. Drag the GIF files from Finder onto the drop zone and the ICO files land in Downloads.

On iPhone and iPad

Open the page in Safari and tap Choose GIF files. You can pick from Photos or from the Files app. The converted ICO appears in Files, in the Downloads folder; to put it in your photo library, open it there, tap Share and choose Save Image.

On Android

Open the page in Chrome, tap Choose GIF files and pick them from Files or your gallery. The ICO is saved to the Download folder, where any file manager can find it.

Best settings for GIF to ICO

Icons are square by convention and can be at most 256 by 256 pixels. Choose 256 for modern Windows and high-resolution screens, 48 or 32 for classic desktop icons, and 16 or 32 for a website favicon. Non-square images are scaled to fit without being stretched.

GIF vs ICO: the differences

About GIF and ICO files

What is a GIF file?

GIF stores each frame with a palette of at most 256 colours, so photos turn grainy and animations get large fast. Transparency is on or off per pixel, with no soft edges.

What is an ICO file?

An ICO file is a small container that can hold several sizes of the same icon, and since Windows Vista each size may be stored as an embedded PNG. The largest size an ICO can hold is 256 by 256 pixels.

GIF to ICO not working? Common problems

• Colours look slightly different. Browsers convert images to the standard sRGB colour space when they decode them, so wide-gamut and CMYK images can shift a little.
• A phone photo comes out upright even though it looked sideways elsewhere. That is correct: the rotation stored in the photo is applied during conversion, so the ICO is always the right way up.
• The file is bigger than expected. It depends on the settings. At the defaults, the ICO usually comes out close in size to the GIF; lower the quality for a smaller file.

Convert GIF to ICO from the command line

If you work in a terminal, ImageMagick converts GIF to ICO in one line:

magick input.gif output.ico

To convert every GIF in a folder at once, use magick mogrify -format ico *.gif. The converter on this page does the same job without installing anything.