A favicon is the small image you see in a browser tab representing a site. If you prefer a minimalist approach and want no favicon at all, there's a simple trick: use a data URI scheme. By placing <link rel="icon" href="data:,"> in the HTML's <head> section, you create a blank favicon. This line embeds an empty data string, making the browser recognize a favicon but display nothing.
For myself, this is particularly useful during development of a new site where I may not have gotten to the stage where it's time to create a proper favicon yet. Setting it to blank like this keeps me from getting distracted, wondering why there is a 404 request showing in Chrome's Developer tools.