- More than 50 new emoji will be made standard in 2019, based on a list from the Unicode Consortium.
- Many of the new emoji are tied together by the theme of inclusivity, introducing symbols for deaf people, blind people, and people in wheelchairs.
- While Unicode made the new emoji official in March, it may be a while before they show up on your favorite device.
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More than 50 new emoji will become standard in 2019, based on the final list approved by the Unicode Consortium. Unicode is responsible for defining which emojis make onto all platforms, including iPhones, Android devices, and computers.
Many of the new icons are tied together by the theme of inclusivity, introducing emoji for deaf people, blind people, people in wheelchairs, and those with prosthetic limbs. This year’s update will allow users to choose the race and gender of both people when choosing an emoji that features a couple. Unicode first introduced support for skin color in 2015, but users were limited to heterosexual emojis for couples, and could only select couples with the same skin tone.
While there are 59 distinct new emoji, variations for skin tone and gender make for a total of 230 individual images. A March update to Unicode made the emoji usable online, but each company will choose when to introduce its own version of the new emoji. (Apple typically adds new emojis to its iOS devices with a Fall update.)
Here are the new emoji coming online later this year, with images from Emojipedia: