Fun Fact: You can use any inline SVG for a favicon and keep it right in the HTML document.
This also allows you to use an emoji directly as a favicon, like so:
<link rel="icon" type="image/svg+xml" href="data:image/svg+xml,<svg xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg' viewBox='0 0 100 100'><text y='.9em' font-size='90'>(your emoji here)</text></svg>" />