Apple has today delivered a new beta of OS X to developers that comes with a major new feature: diverse emoji.
A tipster sent in these screenshots of the new emoji palette found in OS X 10.10.3. You can now click and hold on any emoji to change the skin tone. The same emoji are appearing in iOS 8.3 beta 2 as well.
@ispazio nuove emoji iOS 8.3 b2 pic.twitter.com/dgNhJrwwov
— Andre (@AndLup) February 23, 2015
The new emoji feature a range of skin tone options and a new “neutral” default of yellow, which is required by the Unicode specification to be “non-realistic.”
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There’s a ton of new family emojis to cover off different family composition.
Any emoji in the “people” set that looks like a human can be changed by clicking and holding.
There’s also a bunch of new country flags.
The watch emoji also got a curious update: it’s now an Apple Watch.
The phone emoji also received an update to match the iPhone 6 and the new iOS style.
The new emoji were made possible thanks to a change in the Unicode standard called the “skin tone modifier” which allows users to select the tone of compatible emoji.
There’s no release date for iOS 8.3 or OS X 10.10.3 yet, but Apple is reportedly planning a public beta program which will kick off in mid-March.
Spotted any new emoji we don’t have here? Let us know in the comments!
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