Help and Troubleshooting
Having trouble getting something working on the Desktop? Here are some common snags and how to get yourself out of trouble.
The icon I want to use is missing or isn’t showing up?
We hate it when that happens (yes, it probably happens to us even more). The first thing to do is to double-check a few things:
Is the icon you’re trying to use available in the version of Font Awesome you have installed?
We release icons pretty frequently these days. Make sure you’re using the latest and greatest by downloading a fresh version of Font Awesome.
Are you using Font Awesome Free or Pro?
Some icons are only available in Font Awesome Pro. Double-check that the icon you want is in the version of Font Awesome you have installed and are using. Also, make sure you are using and referencing the right font/typeface for the job in your text layers, i.e. “Font Awesome 6 Pro” is needed to render pro icons.
Do you have Font Awesome’s .otf fonts properly installed and activated?
If you don’t have these installed using your operating system’s font management software or if you haven’t activated them, your desktop app’s won’t have any knowledge of our font being available and thus it won’t be in any font/typeface selection menus.
Did you type the correct name or paste the right glyph of the icon?
This is the one that gets us a lot. Make sure you didn’t fat-finger the name of the icon when typing it in for our ligatures to handle. Or make sure you’ve copied the right glyph to your clipboard before pasting.
Are you using Sharp icons?
You’ll need a Pro license and to be using Font Awesome v6.2.0 or greater in order to use our Sharp icons.
The ligatures feature isn’t working in the desktop app I’m using.
Some desktop apps are known to not support ligatures. Older versions of Microsoft Office are one group. If you’re trying to use our ligatures and you’ve followed all of the instructions properly and done the steps to solve missing icons above, we recommend switching to our glyphs-based method.
The ligatures aren’t working in InDesign.
Go into the Paragraph Style menu and enable the Adobe World-Ready Paragraph Composer. You can also change this in your General preferences to have the value stick the next time you create a document.
I’m not sure how to install or manage font files. Can you show me?
There are some places that have already done that better than we could. Check out Fontspring’s guides for the PC and the Mac.
How do I use the raw SVG files?
Those are there for ninja-level users and for folks who know what to do with SVGs (both in code and on the desktop). We’ve covered the basics of using SVGs on the desktop, but just a heads up, they’ve been optimized for production and do not contain groups or multiple objects - only a single path.
My question or issue wasn’t answered by this information. What can I do?
Let us know! Give us feedback. We’re listening - and want to make Font Awesome as awesome as possible.