GIF to ICO Converter — Free, Online, No Upload

GIF images are sometimes used as simple graphics, logos, or icons — and occasionally you need to use one of these as a favicon or Windows application icon. Browsers and Windows expect icons in ICO format, not GIF, so you need to convert before the icon can be deployed.

ICO is a container format that packages one or more sizes of an icon (16×16, 32×32, 48×48 pixels) into a single file. When you convert a GIF to ICO, the image is scaled to the appropriate sizes and packed into the ICO container. Browsers select the most appropriate size automatically based on where the icon is being displayed — the tiny browser tab, the larger bookmark manager entry, or a home screen shortcut.

GIF's 256-color limit is actually an advantage here — simple, flat-color graphics with few colors convert to ICO cleanly. The limited palette that's a drawback for photos is often appropriate for icon-scale graphics. Transparent areas in GIF (using the single transparent color index) are preserved in ICO. For animated GIFs, only the first frame is used for the ICO, since ICO doesn't support animation. If the GIF source is a simple logo or symbol with clean edges and flat colors, the ICO result will look sharp even at 16×16.

Typical sizes: GIF 5–50 MB (animated clip (3s)); ICO 10–100 KB (multi-size icon).

Both formats keep every pixel, so the ICO looks the same as the GIF.