In honour of the release of Google Chrome I thought I’d put together a quick tour and critique of the various icons for the top five web browsers currently out there—I’ll explain exactly why a little later. It is very important to create a visual brand for your product, we all know this and we see it every day in advertisements. We have become accustomed to the Firefox and Globe, the Internet Explorer Electron, the Opera Big O, the Safari Compass, and now the Chrome Thing-a-ma-jig. (Anyone got a better name for it?)

Figure 1. Chrome Thing-a-ma-jig

Shortcut Logos

No matter your browser preference you’ve no doubt become accustomed to a few of these browser icons. Except of course the people who think the IE icon is a magical link to the Internet and don’t really get the concept of a browser. Some of the icons have evolved over time such as with Firefox and especially Internet Explorer, others are comparatively new. That being said they are all round which is a little coincidental.

Figure 2. Five browser shortcuts

The Firefox logo is great, good colours, and it incorporates the idea of the web through the globe. Internet Explorer on the other hand makes no sense at all and simply has the most recognizable brand. Google Chrome has a bemusing bright bizarre icon which really doesn’t make any sense at all. Opera is very self indulgent but works for the community they are targeting. Finally, Safari uses a compass which I believe represents what you need when you go on Safari on the web. I’ve always disliked this icon and have trouble associating it with Internet browsing.

Web Page Icons

Below you will find a sample of the HTML file type icons that are associated with each browser. The reason I decided to write this was due to the crazy bright/ugliness of the Google Chrome icon. Look at how ridiculus a directory full of HTML files looks (see Figure 5). My favorite is the Firefox icon which again uses good colours and looks good in small or large numbers on the screen. Second place would go to Internet Explorer, the combination of the recognizable logo with the simple clear page theme works very well. Opera’s icon is a little dark for my tastes and stands out much too loudly. I think the issue would be fixed immediately if they dimmed the border of the page to the same grey as IE leaving the red O intact. Safari unfortunately wouldn’t allow me to set it as the default browser for HTML and thus didn’t change the icon from the default (which is IE on most people computers). If they did an icon very similar to the IE one but with the compass in place of the E it would look pretty good.

Figure 3. Firefox web page icons

Figure 4. Internet Explorer web page icons

Figure 5. Chrome web page icons

Figure 6. Opera web page icons

Figure 7. Safari web page icons, sort of

What are your two cents on the various browser icons? Do you agree with my bewilderment with the Google Chrome logo? Can you think of a better name than Thing-a-ma-jig? Let me know.