Emoji and Pictographs

Q: How do I propose a new emoji?

For answers to questions about proposing new emoji, the criteria for accepting or rejecting emoji proposals, and the overall process and timeline for standardizing new emoji, please see the Emoji Submission FAQ.

Q: What are emoji?

Emoji are “picture characters” originally associated with mobile phone usage in Japan, but are now popular worldwide. The word emoji comes from the Japanese word 絵文字 (emoji), whereby 絵 (e) means picture and 文字 (moji) means character.

Emoji are often pictographs — images of things, such as faces, weather, vehicles, buildings, food, beverage containers, animals, or plants—or icons that represent emotions, feelings, or activities. Most emoji are displayed in color.

Q: What is the plural form of emoji?

Both “emoji” and “emojis” are considered acceptable plural forms in English. The Unicode Standard uses “emoji” as the plural form due to the Japanese origin of the word. Other publications, such as the Associated Press Stylebook, recommend using “emojis” as the plural form.

Q: Where can I learn more about emoji in the Unicode Standard?

See Unicode Emoji, which provides links to many emoji-related resources, and introduces the Unicode Emoji Standard and Research Working Group and its processes. Also see Unicode Technical Standard (UTS) #51, Unicode Emoji, which serves as the technical documentation for emoji in the Unicode Standard.

Q: How do emoji differ from emoticons, pictographs, and dingbats?

Emoticons, derived from “emotion” plus “icon” are specifically intended to depict facial expression or body posture as a way of conveying emotion or attitude in email and text messages. They originated as ASCII character sequences, such as :-) to indicate a smile—and, by extension, a joke—and :-( to indicate a frown. In East Asia, more elaborate sequences have been developed, such as (")(-_-)(") to indicate an upset face with hands raised. Over time, many platforms began replacing such sequences with images, and also began providing ways to input emoticons directly, using a menu or palette. The original emoji used by Japanese mobile phone carriers included a large number of emoticons, along with many non-emoticon emoji.

Pictographs are simply pictorial representations of objects. Some characters are treated as both an emoji and a pictograph, such as U+1F32D 🌭 HOT DOG. Some characters are treated as an emoji, but not as a pictograph, such as U+203C ‼️ DOUBLE EXCLAMATION MARK. Some characters are not treated as an emoji, but are treated as a pictograph, such as U+26E8 ⛨ BLACK CROSS ON SHIELD.

Dingbats are derived from a well-established set of symbols, specifically the ITC Zapf Dingbats 100 series. They constitute most of the characters in the Dingbats block, and are implemented via the industry-standard “Zapf Dingbats” font that is available on most platforms. Emoji and dingbats share some similarities, and a few characters in the Dingbats block are even treated as emoji, such as U+2728 ✨ SPARKLES. However, while there is often a great deal of flexibility in the range of glyphs that may be used for presentation of emoji, most of the characters in the Dingbats block are expected to be presented with glyph shapes that closely align with those shown in the Unicode Character Code Charts, particularly when displayed with “text presentation.”

Q: When is a proposed pictograph considered a symbol and when is it considered an emoji?

The difference is in the way the character is used and displayed. While emoji are pictographic symbols, their path to the Unicode Standard is different from non-emoji symbols. For proposing a character as emoji see the other questions on this page as well as Emoji Encoding Principles.

Non-emoji pictographic characters instead follow the same process as new letters or other symbols: a proposal to encode the characters must demonstrate their use as plain text characters that will enable public data interchange. For guidelines on submitting a character as a symbol, see Submitting Character Proposals.

Q: Are icons, such as those appearing on device user interfaces or web pages, eligible to be encoded as symbols in Unicode?

An icon is a representative symbol that has conventional, widely understood meaning, On electronic devices, an icon may, in some cases, be handled by an emoji, an image, or by higher level protocol. In order to be considered eligible for separate encoding as a symbol, a strong argument is needed for interchange as plain text in a text stream. To be considered an emoji, see other questions on this page and Emoji Encoding Principles. For guidelines on submitting a character as a symbol, see Submitting Character Proposals.

Q: What are the most frequently used emoji?

See Emoji Frequency and Emojipedia’s Emoji Statistics pages for the latest information about how frequently emoji are used.

Q: What limits are there on emoji that depict people?

The current set of emoji includes skin tone and gender options for the majority of emoji that depict people.

The Unicode Consortium is unable to standardize the complete customization of each emoji, particularly those that depict people. For example, not every emoji that depicts people can wear glasses, have red hair, or be presented as a child or older adult, although such emoji exist.

Many platforms offer emoji-like avatars or stickers, which generally provide extensive customization options. See also What about emoji whose Unicode character names include WHITE or BLACK?

Q: What about representing diversity?

The Unicode Standard does not require a particular appearance for emoji that depict people or body parts, such as U+1F474 👴 OLDER MAN or U+270B ✋ RAISED HAND. In fact, UTS #51 recommends that such depictions be as neutral or generic as possible with respect to physical appearance, such as using non-realistic skin tone colors, or a gender-neutral appearance for emoji other than those listed in Section 2.3, Gender, as having a gendered appearance.

However, many users want more realistic skin tones for emoji representing people and body parts. To support this, many such emoji may be followed by an emoji modifier character specifying one of five possible skin tones, based on the Fitzpatrick scale. See Section 2.4, Diversity. Furthermore, Emoji ZWJ Sequences may be used to explicitly specify a gendered appearance for emoji that depict people; by themselves such emoji are recommended to have a gender-neutral appearance. See the list of RGI (Recommended for General Interchange) sequences in the emoji-zwj-sequences.txt data file.

Of course, there are many other types of diversity in the depiction of people besides different skin tones, such as different hair styles and color. It is beyond the scope of the Unicode Standard to provide a standardized mechanism for representing every aspect of appearance diversity that users might want to specify. The best approach for communicating very specific depictions of people—or any type of image in which the preservation of a specific appearance is very important—is the use of inline images as described in the answer for What is the longer-term plan for emoji?

See also What about emoji whose Unicode character names include WHITE or BLACK?

Q: What are “gender-inclusive” emoji?

Gender-inclusive emoji, such as U+1F9D1 🧑 ADULT, are intended to function as the gender equivalent of the neutral skin tone. Gender-inclusive emoji are not intended to represent only people with non-binary gender identity or presentation. Rather, they are meant to be truly inclusive in the sense that they are unmarked or ambiguous as to gender presentation.

Q: How were emoji originally encoded in Unicode?

See Section 1, Introduction, of UTS #51.

Q: Does each emoji have only one meaning?

No. Emoji, which are treated as pictographs, are encoded in the Unicode Standard based primarily on their general appearance, not on an intended meaning. The meaning of each emoji can vary depending on language, culture, or context, and may change or be repurposed over time.

Emojipedia is a good source of information about the current meanings of emoji.

Q: Does the Unicode character name define the meaning of an emoji?

No. A Unicode character name is a unique identifier, but may not encompass all the possible meanings of an emoji, and in some cases may even be misleading. The annotations in the Unicode Character Code Charts and the keywords in the Unicode Emoji Charts help to define their intended meanings and usage. The CLDR project maintains additional keywords in different languages for emoji. For example, the names and keywords for emoji in various Romance languages are listed here

Q: If the Unicode character name of an animal emoji includes the word “FACE,” must its glyph represent the face of the animal?

For some animals, there are two emoji, one of which has a Unicode character name that includes “FACE.” For example, U+1F415 🐕 DOG and U+1F436 🐶 DOG FACE. In these cases, the use of “FACE” in the Unicode character name is important for distinguishing the two emoji; the emoji with “FACE” in the Unicode character name should represent the face of the animal, and the other should represent a different depiction, such as the full body. For other animals, there is only one emoji whose Unicode character name may or may not include “FACE”. In those cases, the use of “FACE” in the Unicode character name is not significant, so the emoji may represent any depiction of the animal, such as only the face.

Q: How many emoji are currently in the Unicode Standard?

See Section 3, Which Characters are Emoji, of UTS #51.

Q: Which emoji should an emoji font or emoji keyboard support?

Any font or keyboard whose goal is to support emoji should support the characters and sequences listed in the data files referenced by UTS #51, which are considered RGI (Recommended for General Interchange).

Q: Will more emoji be added to the Unicode Standard?

Yes. Each new version of the Unicode Standard generally adds new emoji, though the exact number varies.

Q: How does the standardization of emoji affect the other work of the Unicode Consortium?

A beneficial side effect of the standardization of emoji is an overall improvement of language support. The implementation of emoji requires the use of mechanisms that are also used by various languages. Due to the demand for emoji, many platforms have improved or accelerated their overall Unicode support. The Unicode Consortium’s Adopt-a-Character campaign, whose proceeds fund the work to standardize the scripts of digitally-disadvantaged and historic languages through Adopt-a-Character Grants, has also benefited from the attention paid to the standardization of emoji due to their popularity and as evidenced by the Sponsors of Adopted Characters page.

Q: How are emoji displayed?

Emoji are typically presented in color (aka “emoji presentation”), but some can also be presented in black and white (aka “text presentation”). Whether a particular emoji displays in color or in black and white can be controlled through the use of variation selectors, but it can also vary from platform to platform. For guidelines on which emoji should be displayed with emoji presentation and how, see Section 4, Presentation Style, of UTS #51.

Q: Why do certain characters appear as emoji on some platforms but not others? Is there a way I can control this?

Certain characters can be followed by a special character called a variation selector to request a particular appearance: U+FE0F for the emoji style (typically colored), and U+FE0E for the text style (black and white). For more information, see Presentation Style in UTS #51.

Q: What about characters whose Unicode character names include “WHITE” or “BLACK”?

The Unicode character names of symbols such as U+25FC ◼ BLACK MEDIUM SQUARE or U+25FB ◻ WHITE MEDIUM SQUARE are not meant to indicate that the corresponding character must be presented in black or white, respectively. Rather, the use of “BLACK” and “WHITE” in the Unicode character names is generally meant to contrast filled versus outlined shapes, or a darker color fill versus a lighter color fill.

Q: What about other colors that appear in Unicode character names?

Other colors that appear in Unicode character names, such as for U+1F499 💙 BLUE HEART or U+1F4D9 📙 ORANGE BOOK, specify the recommended appearance when displayed in color. Note that the black and white glyphs that appear in the Unicode Character Code Charts use shading patterns to represent color.

Q: Does the Unicode Consortium control the design of emoji?

No. The Unicode Consortium provides Unicode Character Code Charts that show a representative glyph in a black and white “text presentation,” but is not a designer nor purveyor of emoji images. It is not the owner of any of the color images used in its emoji documents and charts, and does not negotiate licenses for their use. It does not have any control over the emoji images that platform vendors use. Inquiries for permission to use vendor emoji images, or for reporting issues with those emoji images, should be directed to those vendors, not to the Unicode Consortium. See Emoji Images and Rights.

Q: How long after an emoji is standardized will it appear on my phone?

As part of normal software release cycles, platform vendors periodically decide which characters in the Unicode Standard to support in new versions of their software. Supporting new emoji involves adding new glyphs to fonts, enhancements to emoji input methods, and updates to libraries that specify character properties and their behavior, such as word selection or line breaking. Furthermore, the Unicode Consortium has no control over which emoji are supported by platform vendors, nor how emoji appear on their platforms.

Q: Why is the flag emoji for my country not available on my devices?

For concerns about the availability of flag emoji on your devices, contact the manufacturer. Their software determines what characters are available on your devices.

Q: Why are some flags supported in the Unicode Standard, but other flags are not?

The Unicode Standard encodes a set of 26 regional indicator symbols at the end of the Enclosed Alphanumeric Supplement block. These can be used in pairs to represent any territory that has a unicode_region_subtag as defined by CLDR, such as “DE” for Germany (or 🇩 🇪). The pairs are typically displayed as national flags, such as 🇩🇪 and there are currently 257 such pairs. For more information, see Annex B: Valid Emoji Flag Sequences of UTS #51. UTS #51 also defines a mechanism in which an emoji tag sequence can be used to represent a unicode_subdivision_id defined by CLDR for regions such as England, Scotland, and Wales For more information, see Annex C: Valid Emoji Tag Sequences of UTS #51.

Q: What about other flags?

See Flags in Guidelines for Submitting Unicode Emoji Proposals.

Q: Who is responsible for updating the designs of region flags?

The Unicode Consortium has no control nor influence over the designs of region flags, and it is therefore the responsibility of governments to proactively communicate design changes of these flags to emoji vendors.

Q: What is the longer-term plan for emoji?

The Unicode Consortium encourages the use of inline images (aka “stickers”) as a longer-term solution, because they allow much more freedom of expression. See Section 8, Longer Term Solutions, of UTS #51.

Q: Are emoji a new language?

Emoji do not—and cannot—constitute a “language,” because they lack the grammar and vocabulary that are necessary for human language. Emoji are used in social media to add a sense of playfulness, and help to convey gestures, facial expressions, tone of voice, and intentional ambiguity. In other words, emoji can be used to augment human language.

Q: Are emoji universally understood?

The meanings that Emoji convey are not “universal” and depend on audience and context. The images represented by emoji can have or may develop very different overtones and usage depending on the language and culture. Combinations that refer to specific words in a particular language may be found, such as a bombshell movie in English being represented as 💣🐚🎥. Emoji can also be used as verbs, adjectives, and nouns, and their order generally follows the word order of the target language.

Q: If I include emoji in a document, will someone displaying it a century from now be able to read them properly?

Consider the broader question of any character, not only emoji. Take, for instance, the symbol U+0040 @ COMMERCIAL AT. This character was already commonly included as a key on typewriters manufactured in the United States during the first half of the 20th century. It was used for prices on shop signs or advertisements and for accounting purposes: “tomatoes @ 12¢/lb” (tomatoes at 12 cents per pound). Back in the 1960s, in the “ancient” history of computers, this character was encoded in ASCII as the commercial “at” sign. Email had not yet been invented. This particular symbol got picked up for other uses, such as for marking identifiers in some programming languages. Today, the most common uses are in email addresses and as prefixes for social media handles. Such a change in function could not have been anticipated, but such changes frequently occur for various symbols—including, of course, emoji.

For the Unicode Consortium, the important thing about the stability of “@” is that in 1963 it was 0x40 @ COMMERCIAL AT in ASCII, and at present it is U+0040 @ COMMERCIAL AT in the Unicode Standard. Software still universally identifies it as the same character today, more than 50 years after its first use with computers. There is no reason to suspect that 50 years from now, U+0040 @ COMMERCIAL AT will no longer be interpretable in text data as the same character, even if additional uses are invented for it.

Q: How does Unicode preserve character stability?

When new characters are added to the Unicode Standard, they are added in a way that does not invalidate any character in prior versions of the standard. This is called forward compatibility. Everyone developing any kind of computing system, from laptops to mobile phones to some future quantum computing cyborg implant, has very strong incentives to ensure that is the case. Nearly 98% of all text data created and interchanged on the web is already encoded according to the Unicode Standard, specifically UTF-8 (see Usage statistics of UTF-8 for websites), and that percentage keeps growing year by year. Even larger volumes of text data are generated and maintained in servers and computers not directly accessible on the web. There are vast, growing quantities of such text data. It would require a complete worldwide collapse of the information technology infrastructure for all of that stored text data to suddenly become uninterpretable. Text data that is encoded according to the Unicode Standard is actually much more robust and stable than the particular hardware on which it might be stored in any given decade.

Q: Can an emoji be removed from the Unicode Standard?

Per the Unicode Character Encoding Stability Policies no code point for an emoji, once it has been added to the Unicode Standard, will ever be removed. There have been limited instances whereby the emoji status of a character or sequence has changed over time, and some vendors may choose to support only a subset of the RGI (Recommended for General Interchange) emoji.

Given that most emoji have multiple uses and meanings in various contexts, the Unicode Consortium does not entertain discussions of removing emoji.