Just for showing a static icon, it's very likely to be a bad trade-off not to just use an image file. It's a highly optimized path, both client- and server-side

Just for showing a static icon, it's very likely to be a bad trade-off not to just use an image file. It's a highly optimized path, both client- and server-side It's when you need small variations, e.g. in color, size or shape, or some animation, that benefits kick in. Also, you can put all icons in the same easily cacheable JS-file.