Matthew Lindfield Seager

Matthew Lindfield Seager

Icon Set from a single image in 15 seconds

I built some AppleScript applets to launch Gmail to a specific account and Brave to a specific Profile (could also be done with Chrome) but I didn’t like the generic “Script” icon.

Screenshot of dock icons showing the ugly default script icon between two snazzy custom icons

At first I just pasted my custom image into the “Get Info” window to update the icon but then when I made changes to the app and re-saved it, the icon got reset. I wanted to permanently updated the “applet.icns” file in the bundle but I didn’t want to spend an hour fiddling around with all the icon sizes.

Turns out, creating an icon set is super easy once you have your starting image:

  1. Copy your image
  2. Paste it onto the icon in the Get Info window
  3. Copy the new icon from the Get Info window
  4. “New from clipboard” in Preview (or just ⌘ N)
  5. Save…
  6. Option click the Format dropdown and choose ICNS
  7. Save

You now have an ICNS file with all 10 variations in it:
Screenshot showing 10 different icons

Step 2:
Paste your image onto the icon in the Get Info window

Step 3:
Copy the new icon set from the icon in the Get Info window

Step 6:
Option click the Format dropdown to expand the available types and choose ICNS