Blinkie Maker
Make your own blinkies — the tiny flashing pixel banners from 2000s fan pages. Type a phrase, pick a pixel font, colors and an icon, and download the GIF. Or grab one of the ready-made blinkies below.
Ready-made blinkies
Copy the HTML code, download the GIF, or open any of them in the maker to change the words and colors.
A short history of blinkies
Blinkies started on personal homepages around 1999. Space was tight — a sidebar, a forum signature, the bottom of a fan page — so the format settled on 150×20 pixels: one line of pixel text, a background that flashes between two colors, sometimes a heart or a star at the edge. People made them to say what they liked, which fandom they were in, or what kind of mood the site was in, and traded them like stickers.
The same look is popular again on Neocities, Carrd, Tumblr and personal sites built by hand. This maker draws them the old way: real pixel fonts with no smoothing, a limited color palette and a small GIF that loads instantly.
Where to put your blinkie
- Neocities and HTML sites — paste the HTML code into your page. A row of five or six blinkies under your header is the classic layout.
- Carrd — add an Embed element, choose “Code”, and paste the HTML.
- Tumblr — switch the description or post editor to HTML and paste the code.
- Forums — use the BBCode version in your signature.
- Discord and chats — download the GIF and send it like any image.
Blinkies, buttons and stamps
Blinkies are 150×20. Their cousins are 88×31 buttons, which sites used to link to each other, and 99×56 stamps, which work like small badges about your interests. A typical retro page mixes all three.
FAQ
What is a blinkie?
A blinkie is a tiny animated GIF, almost always 150 by 20 pixels, with a short phrase in a pixel font and a background that flashes, glitters or scrolls. People collected them on GeoCities pages, forum signatures and LiveJournal profiles in the early 2000s, and they are back on Neocities, Carrd and Tumblr.
What size is a blinkie?
The classic size is 150×20 pixels, and every blinkie made here uses it. Two related formats you may see next to blinkies: 88×31 “buttons” (small banners that link to another site) and 99×56 “stamps”.
How do I add a blinkie to Neocities or my own site?
Press “Get code” and copy the HTML line into your page. Blinkies look best in a row, so paste several one after another without line breaks.
Can I use blinkies on Carrd, Tumblr or Discord?
On Carrd add an Embed element and paste the HTML code. On Tumblr paste the code into your description or a post in HTML mode. For Discord and other chats, download the GIF and send it as an image.
Why did some letters disappear from my text?
Pixel fonts only include Latin letters, numbers and common punctuation. Emoji and other symbols are removed. Use one of the pixel icons instead — the heart, star, sparkle, moon, flower or smiley.
Are these blinkies free to use?
Yes. Use the ready-made blinkies and the ones you make on any site, no sign-up and no credit needed.