# Social Icon block

The Social Icon is a foundational block that displays various icons linking to different social profiles or sites. Each social service is registered as a variation of this block.


## Adding new social icons

The core maintains certain standards for adding new social icons. To add a new variation to WordPress, it must be well-established and popular.

To evaluate if a social service should be added, contributors will consider the following factors:

* Is the service popular enough for core developers to have heard of it before? Is it "mainstream?"
* How long has the service been online?
* Does it have a Wikipedia article?
* Is there a plugin adding social icons in the repository that includes the services in question and has a considerable number of active installations?
* Is this social service frequently requested?


## Adding custom social icons

Starting from WordPress 6.9, it's possible to add custom social icons to your site. See:

* Pull Request that introduced custom social icons - [#70261](https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/pull/70261).
* Developer Blog tutorial for custom social icons - [Registering custom social icons in WordPress 6.9](https://developer.wordpress.org/news/2025/08/registering-custom-social-icons-in-wordpress-6-9/).

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Display an icon linking to a social profile or site.

- **Name:** `core/social-link`
- **Category:** [widgets](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/core-blocks/core-blocks-widgets/)
- **API Version:** [3](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-api-versions/)
- **Block Type:** [Dynamic](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/getting-started/fundamentals/static-dynamic-rendering/) (server-rendered)

## Block Relationships

**[Parent](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-metadata/#parent) blocks (direct):**
- [`core/social-links`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/core-blocks/core-blocks-widgets/core-block-social-links/)

## Attributes

_Defined via the [`attributes`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-attributes/) property in block.json._

| Attribute | [Type](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-attributes/#type-validation) | [Default](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-attributes/#default-value) | Description |
|-----------|------|---------|-------------|
| `url` | `string` | — | [Role](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-attributes/#role): `content` |
| `service` | `string` | — | — |
| `label` | `string` | — | [Role](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-attributes/#role): `content` |
| `rel` | `string` | — | — |

## Supports

_Defined via the [`supports`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-supports/) property in block.json._

- [`anchor`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-supports/#anchor): `true`
- [`reusable`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-supports/#reusable): `false`
- [`html`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-supports/#html): `false`
- [`interactivity`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-supports/#interactivity):
  - `clientNavigation`: `true`

## Context

_Defined via the [`usesContext` and `providesContext`](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-context/) properties in block.json._

**Uses context:**

- `openInNewTab`
- `showLabels`
- `iconColor`
- `iconColorValue`
- `iconBackgroundColor`
- `iconBackgroundColorValue`

## Block Markup

This is a [**dynamic block**](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/getting-started/fundamentals/static-dynamic-rendering/). It is rendered on the server and does not save HTML in post content.

In post content, it is stored as a block comment:

```html
<!-- wp:social-link {"service":"spotify","url":"https://example.com/"} /-->
```

## Source

- [block.json](https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/trunk/packages/block-library/src/social-link/block.json) ([reference](https://developer.wordpress.org/block-editor/reference-guides/block-api/block-metadata/))
- [Source directory](https://github.com/WordPress/gutenberg/tree/trunk/packages/block-library/src/social-link/) — browse `edit.js`, `save.js`, `index.php`, and more.

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