I\'m confused about what\'s the simplest way to get favicons working on the majority of handsets and browsers.
1) Some sites suggest that it is enough to use:
The code in solution 3 is correct but outdated. Precomposed Touch icons were deprecated in iOS 7 and Android Chrome does not support 196x196 icons anymore, but 192x192 (it really won't use anything above 192x192; full disclosure: I'm the author of this article).
So:
If you can place favicon.ico
in the root of the web site, you can even skip its declaration, since IE looks for /favicon.ico
by convention.