(pronounced eh-moh-jee) is the Japanese term for the picture characters or emoticons used in Japanese electronic messages and webpages. Originally meaning pictograph, the word literally means "picture" + "letter". The characters are used much like emoticons elsewhere, but a wider range is provided, and the icons are standardized and built into the handsets.
All stories in Emoji
-
Why skin tone modifiers don't work for 🤝, explained by an emoji historian
Why doesn't the 🤝 emoji support skin tones? It's a mystery that has troubled Redditors for years — so we asked an emoji ...
-
Algorithm reveals which new emoji Twitter users most desire
Researchers from the Haslam College of Business and the University of Tennessee, Knoxville are tracking the most requested ...
-
This AI uses emoji to protect BLM protestors from facial recognition
Stanford Machine Learning researchers have develop an anonymization tool called the BLMPrivacyBot that covers the faces of ...
-
Emoji have been around since 1862 — here's the complete timeline
We use emoji everyday to say how we’re feeling, what we’re up to, and even as extensions of our personality. An emoji ...
-
There’s yet another proposal for an EV charger emoji
Ahead of world emoji day tomorrow Electrify America is having another stab at getting the Unicode Consortium to approve its ...
-
YouTube now lets creators respond to comments with AI-generated smart replies
Google is making it easier for YouTube creators to engage with their audience and quickly reply to comments under their videos. ...
-
4 eye-opening facts about emoji, explained by an emoji historian
TNW Answers is a live Q&A platform where we invite interesting people in tech who are much smarter than us to answer ...
-
Twitter wants to let you react with emoji -- but why?
A recent test suggests Twitter has toyed with the idea of letting users react to tweets with emoji -- but do we really need ...
-
How the soap and crown emoji subtly communicate fears and advice about coronavirus
In digital communication, where visual information often conveys key ideas in memorable, pithy and fun ways, emoji is king. ...
-
Connect with your remote team: A simple heart emoji goes a long way
It's more important now than ever to show your colleagues and the people around you that you care for them. One emoji can ...
-
WhatsApp teams up with the WHO to release 21 new stickers about quarantine life
The coronavirus pandemic may mean that we won't get any new emoji until 2022, but stickers a thing people use, right? To ...
-
Coronavirus means no new emoji in 2021
Thanks coronavirus: the Unicode Consortium revealed it's pushing its release of Unicode 14.0 -- and the emoji it would include ...
-
Polish electric vehicle advocate lobbies for EV emoji, because why not?
The Polish Alternative Fuel Association is lobbying for the introduction of a universally recognized emoji for electric vehicles ...
-
WhatsApp is bringing dark mode to desktop (but you can't use it yet)
WhatsApp already has dark mode on Android (and it'll soon also be on iOS), so the company is now shifting its attention to ...
-
Moonday Mornings: Twitter adds custom Bitcoin emoji
Hello Forkers, welcome to Moonday Mornings! Hard Fork's wrap-up of the weekend's top cryptocurrency and blockchain headlines ...
-
We asked an actual Italian about the new ‘Italian hand’ emoji
There's something new coming to your phone: the Italian hand (AKA pinching hand) emoji. To understand this more, we asked ...
-
Unicode Consortium finally added a transgender flag emoji and more gender-inclusive designs
The Unicode Consortium revealed 117 new 2020 emoji designs, and among them is a transgender flag and more gender-inclusive ...
-
From sexting to politics: How emoji evolved this decade
To make the process of adding emoji to our phones more democratic, Emoji Voter allows people to vote for which emoji should ...
-
PSA: You can use emoji to easily find the right GIF to use on Twitter, WhatsApp, and more
GIFs are great for punctuating your tweets and message replies. Here's a simple trick to find the right one real quick, using ...
-
Just putting it out there: My emoticon isn't wrong — you are
In this column, “Just putting this out there...,” we write about the odd ways we engage with tech and the unpopular opinions ...
-
This bot smushes emoji together to create messed-up hybrids (that we love)
Every year, the Unicode Consortium, the organization which oversees emoji development, adds new emoji ranging from hand ...
-
Slack made it easier to add custom emoji, here’s how
Welcome to TNW Basics, a collection of tips, guides, and advice on how to easily get the most out of your gadgets, apps, ...
-
How to easily type emoji, emoticons, and symbols in Windows 10
Welcome to TNW Basics, a collection of tips, guides, and advice on how to easily get the most out of your gadgets, ...
-
A cryptocurrency debunker's quixotic quest to save endangered marmots with an emoji
The Vancouver Island Marmot is under threat, with only a couple of hundred observed in the wild. One cryptocurrency anti-influencer ...
-
It's about time we got Afro emoji — these women are making it happen
While there seems to be an emoji to represent everyone and everything, a significant group has been completely left out — ...
-
Emoji license plates show technology has simplified our language. But is that really a bad thing?
We’ve reached a new level of descent into the world of emoji-based interactions. Starting March 1 of this year, drivers ...
-
Enable dark mode in Messenger by sending an emoji
Facebook Messenger is finally rolling out the dark mode feature, and the easiest way to enable it by sending a moon emoji ...
-
The new period emoji is a first step in ending period shame
There's officially a "blood drop" emoji which will be added to smartphones by spring this year. This could be the first step ...
-
5 lessons we forgot we learned from our year-long newsletter experiment
Last week was our beloved/behated daily newsletter's first birthday. We published an article looking back at the seven ...
-
If Facebook's new auto-comment feature isn't rock bottom, it has to be close
It's been two tumultuous years. Still, it's highly unlikely we've witnessed the moment Facebook hit bottom. A new feature, ...
-
How the new mosquito emoji can create buzz to battle mosquito-borne disease
The mosquito emoji was released as a part of the iOS 12.1 update. It's hoped that it will help battle mosquito-bourne diseases ...
-
Period emoji could smash the stigma surrounding menstruation
Plan UK have designed five emoji that represent the period. This campaign is in aid of period poverty and encouraging people ...
-
🚡 is no longer Twitter’s most unpopular emoji
The aerial tramway was the least used emoji after 77 days as of yesterday. Thanks to @leastUsedEmoji, the ABCD emoji is officially ...
-
Trump inauguration kicked off the 'angriest' period in Facebook's history
According to a new study by Pew Research Center, social media users are angrier than they've ever been -- at least as best ...
-
A brief history of the world's most controversial emoji
In the vast library of emoji, one has been the subject of overwhelming scrutiny and debate. Here's everything you need to ...
-
Apple's emojified execs sure look awful as humans
Today's World Emoji Day. To celebrate this stupid holiday I turned Apple's executive staff – who had some poor corporate ...
-
Redheads finally get recognition with ginger emoji
The Unicode 11.0 update brings 157 new emoji including the ginger emoji. Redheads will finally be represented but our smartphones ...
-
Here are the 70 new emoji coming to iOS
Poised to celebrate World Emoji Day on July 17, Apple has released previews of the next 70 emoji coming to iPhone, iPad, ...
-
This app allows you to send rejected emoji to your friends
Declined Emoji: part 1 opens up a world of rejected emoji you never knew existed. Get ready for conversations full of inflating ...
-
Here's a neat one stop shop for creating animated text GIFs
Want to get your meme on with a slab of text? Try this site which makes it easy to create animated text GIFs. I made mine ...
-
Facebook Messenger finally lets you resize any emoji
You know how you can send giant thumb-ups on Messenger by holding down the like button? (If not, you can send a giant ...
-
Turn emoji into awful abominations on this drag-and-drop site
Update: The site seems to be down, sadly enough. Trust me when I say you'll be doing yourself a favor when you waste the ...
