Emoji

An emoji is a small pictogram — a face, object, or symbol — inserted into text to add tone, emotion, or meaning that plain words can miss. Emoji help convey whether something is a joke, friendly, sarcastic, or serious.

In text-only chat, where you cannot hear tone of voice or see facial expressions, emoji do real communicative work: a single 🙂 can soften a message that might otherwise read as cold. This makes them especially useful when talking to strangers who cannot read your tone from context.

Emoji are distinct from older text-based emoticons like :) — emoji are actual images built into the platform, while emoticons are made from keyboard characters.