Do browsers download Icon Fonts (like FontAwesome) for every page-load?

Kaustubh Katdare

Kaustubh Katdare

@thebigk • Oct 26, 2024

I'm unable to determine whether the icon fonts like FontAwesome are downloaded to user's computer every time they visit a new website. I'm aware of 'browser cache' - but not sure if the browser must download the font again while visiting a new website. 

My best guess so far is that if the user has earlier visited any site that uses FontAwesome, they'll have the font downloaded on the browser. So, the browser need not download it again; but how can we be sure that the fonts aren't getting downloaded?

PS: I'm working on minimizing the total count of http requests made to the server (with an aim to reduce the page fetch timing). 

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  • yorha 2b

    yorha 2b

    @yorha-4BSkiM • Jul 8, 2018

    1. Trace of page loaded (fetching from cache as already downloaded by browser during my first visit)

    Libw-FontCache..PNG

    2. Page loaded for first time.

    6T5s-FontIncognito.PNG

    Yep, it seems like browser is downloading fonts from your web-server (nginx 1.10.3 ?)

    You can cache static files in reverse proxy server, it will decrease transmission time.

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  • Kaustubh Katdare

    Kaustubh Katdare

    @thebigk • Jul 8, 2018

    #-Link-Snipped-#‍ - Right - that's the right way to track it. However, I've seen that in come cases (on local machines) - the fonts get loaded from local cache. I'm not sure how does browser exactly decide when to download the font and when to load it from cache.

    My best guess was that it should be determined with the object's `max-age` property. I'm trying to leverage the browser caching. 

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  • yorha 2b

    yorha 2b

    @yorha-4BSkiM • Jul 8, 2018

    Roger that.

    Interesting read : #-Link-Snipped-#

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