After widespread complaints, the Big Sur update fixes an issue that caused website icons to not appear in the Favorites section of Safari on macOS.
- What’s happening? Apple has released an update to its old Big Sur operating system that fixes a persistent issue with website icons in Safari.
- Why care? macOS Big Sur 11.7.3 broke favicon icons in Safari Favorites, but the macOS Big Sur 11.7.4 update fixed the annoying problem.
- What to do? If you’re using macOS Big Sur or Monterey, download the Safari update by choosing System Preferences → General → Software Update.
macOS Big Sur 11.7.4 Fixes Safari Icons Issue
macOS Big Sur 11.7.3 came out in January 2023, and shortly after that, people started complaining about favicons disappearing from Safari’s Favorites section.
These are the icons you see on newly created tabs. Typically, websites saved in Safari’s Favorites appear as large icons on the New Tab and Start pages, making it easier to visually distinguish your favorite websites. Instead of favicons, people saw empty web icons showing only the first letter of the website.
Many affected customers have reached out to the Reddit and Apple support communities to express their dissatisfaction with the issue. Someone suggested that clearing Safari’s history might help fix the problem, but only temporarily. This is too drastic a solution to avoid (in our opinion), especially now that Apple has provided a fix.
Refreshing icons in Safari using a terminal command also fails.
Interestingly, at some point Apple seems to have removed the option to hide or show website icons in Safari tabs from the iPhone, iPad, and Mac software because the switch is missing from current versions of iOS, iPadOS, and macOS.
What’s new in Safari 16.3 for macOS Big Sure and Monterey
Regardless of the macOS Big Sur 11.7.3 update, Apple has also released Safari 16.3.1 for Big Sur and Monterey systems, available through the usual software update mechanism. It contains a fix for a WebKit security vulnerability that was also fixed in iOS 16.3.1, iPadOS 16.3.1, and macOS Ventura 13.2.1.
The vulnerability allows an attacker to create malicious web content that could allow them to execute fraudulent code on a client’s device. Apple deemed it important enough to issue a bulletin acknowledging that attackers could have exploited the vulnerability. After installing this update, the build number for Safari 16.3 will be 167614.4.6.11.6 on macOS Big Sur and 177614.4.6.11.6 on macOS Monterey.
Don’t underestimate the importance of the latest Apple software updates. The issue with WebKit alone appears to be serious enough to prompt an alert from the National Cyber Information System at the Department of Homeland Security’s Cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency, urging people to upgrade.