Unicode Emoji Update

117 New Emojis In Final List For 2020

Jeremy Burge

• 9 min read
117 New Emojis In Final List For 2020

The emoji list for 2020 is now complete, with 117 emojis making the final cut for release this year.

Additions include Bubble Tea, Smiling Face With Tear, bottle-feeding parents and the Transgender Flag.[1] Emojipedia is today releasing sample images for each of the new emojis approved as part of this list.

Above: New emojis approved for release in 2020. Video: Emojipedia.

Welcome additions include an emoji showing People Hugging which shows a greater sense of empathy than the previous excited-looking 🤗 Hugging Face, a pinched finger gesture which is commonly referred to simply as "Italian Hand Gesture".

Variations of existing emojis now approved for 2020 include a woman or gender-inclusive person in a tuxedo, as well as a gender-neutral person or a man in a veil (both were changes proposed by Google). These, along with other approved emojis, will be coming to phones later this year.[2]

Also included in this update is a gender-inclusive alternative to 🎅 Santa Claus and 🤶 Mrs. Claus, named Mx. Claus. This addition is part of an ongoing effort to make more consistent set of gender options across the board, and expands upon the 138 new gender-neutral emojis added in late 2019 as part of Emoji 12.1.[3]

veil-mx-claus-tuxedo-emojipedia-2020
Above: New emoji options available in 2020: Woman in Tuxedo, Mx Claus, Man with Veil.

Announced today by the Unicode Consortium, the 117 new emojis form part of Emoji 13.0 and will come to most platforms in the second half of 2020.[4] As part of today's announcement, Unicode has posted data files and charts for Emoji 13.0, with the sample images shown in the charts for vendor guidance.

2020-emojipedia-sample-image-collection
Above: Original images from Emojipedia showing how the new emojis may look.

As with all new emoji releases, the appearance of each emoji varies by platform. Images shown on this page (and tweet thread) are original designs created by Emojipedia in a glossy style to show one potential way these may look when implemented on major platforms such as iOS, Android, WhatsApp, or Twitter.

📋 2020 Emoji List

Listed below are are each of the new emojis approved in Emoji 13.0, minus any skin tone variations.

Image Emoji
Image Smiling Face with Tear
Image Disguised Face
Image Pinched Fingers

With Skin Tones
Image Anatomical Heart
Image Lungs
Image Ninja

With Skin Tones
Image Person in Tuxedo

With Skin Tones
Image Woman in Tuxedo

With Skin Tones
Image Person with Veil

With Skin Tones
Image Man with Veil

With Skin Tones
Image Woman Feeding Baby

With Skin Tones
Image Person Feeding Baby

With Skin Tones
Image Man Feeding Baby

With Skin Tones
Image Mx Claus

With Skin Tones
Image People Hugging
Image Black Cat
Image Bison
Image Mammoth
Image Beaver
Image Polar Bear
Image Dodo
Image Feather
Image Seal
Image Beetle
Image Cockroach
Image Fly
Image Worm
Image Potted Plant
Image Blueberries
Image Olive
Image Bell Pepper
Image Flatbread
Image Tamale
Image Fondue
Image Teapot
Image Bubble Tea
Image Rock
Image Wood
Image Hut
Image Pickup Truck
Image Roller Skate
Image Magic Wand
Image Piñata
Image Nesting Dolls
Image Sewing Needle
Image Knot
Image Thong Sandal
Image Military Helmet
Image Accordion
Image Long Drum
Image Coin
Image Boomerang
Image Carpentry Saw
Image Screwdriver
Image Hook
Image Ladder
Image Elevator
Image Mirror
Image Window
Image Plunger
Image Mouse Trap
Image Bucket
Image Toothbrush
Image Headstone
Image Placard
Image Transgender Symbol
Image Transgender Flag

For the purposes of this list, Person in Tuxedo and Person with Veil are shown as new, even though these are existing code points. Not listed: new sequences for Man in Tuxedo and Woman with Veil which are expected to have the same appearance as the current implementations.

emojipedia-apple-emoji-evolution-2020
Above: Key additions in the emoji set each year. Images: Apple 2014–2018; Emojipedia 2019–2020.

Vendor Preview

For most users, these new emojis will come to devices in software updates throughout 2020.

A number of designs from Google are shown below which are subject to change prior to final release, but give a reasonable indication of how these might look on Android. In past years, Apple has waited until the second half of the year to preview new emojis, often doing this on World Emoji Day in July.

Prior to today's announcement, Twitter already supported Woman in Tuxedo, Transgender Flag and Transgender Symbol emojis, and these are also shown below.

google-twitter-2020-emojis
Above: Emojis coming to Android and Twitter in 2020. Images: Google (via Unicode chart / Twitter (via Twemoji).

Release

Unicode announced the publishing of Emoji 13.0 data files on 2020-01-29 (California / US Pacific Time), with the announcement being made ahead of the rest of the Unicode 13.0 release to give vendors appropriate time to work on their emoji release for the year.

Expect to see these new emojis on major operating systems in the second half of 2020.

These tend to come to Android in beta around August, and to iOS and macOS in October or November.

new-emojis-2020-release-schedule

Resources

Be First 🥇

Sign up for our free, monthly email so you're first to know the latest emoji news. Emoji Wrap is published monthly, and we won't use your email for anything else.

👇 Your email address 👇

new-emojis-2020-emojipedia
Above: New in 2020: Ninja, Bubble Tea, Pinched Fingers, Accordion, Coin, Person Feeding Baby, Smiling Face With Tear, Teapot, People Hugging. Images: Emojipedia Sample Image Collection.

  1. Transgender Flag was drafted as a 2020 emoji candidate in 2019, and some vendors including WhatsApp, Facebook and Twitter added this ahead of approval by Unicode. The result has been a flag that works on some platforms, but not others. ↩︎

  2. This has been achieved by reclassifying the previous emojis for Man in Tuxedo and Bride with Veil as gender-neutral. Future software updates will show these with an ambiguous gender, and rename them to Person in Tuxedo and Person with Veil respectively. New sequences in Emoji 13.0 permit a choice of a woman or man for either the tuxedo or veil-wearing emojis. During this transition, current platforms will continue to show the older, gendered appearance for these emojis, until the new gendered sequences are implemented on iOS, Android, and other apps later in 2020. ↩︎

  3. First pushed by Google in early 2019, having three choices for human emojis (person - with no gender specified, or options for a woman or man) avoids issues where some emojis have a woman, man, or an ambiguous gender. Many of these decisions are a relic of much earlier emoji releases, such as the gender pair of a bride being a man in tuxedo, which previously prevented there from being the option of a woman wearing the same clothing. ↩︎

  4. Unicode lists this update as 62 emoji additions, with 55 gender or skin tone variations. This is technically correct per the Unicode emoji specifications, however it does mean that Mx Claus is counted in the 'new' section, while Man with Veil is counted as merely a gender variation. Of the 117 emojis, one is considered an emoji component, meaning it is used as part of a sequence, but will not necessarily be shown on emoji keyboards. ↩︎