emoji

noun

emo·​ji ē-ˈmō-jē 

plural emoji or emojis

: any of various small images, symbols, or icons used in text fields in electronic communication (as in text messages, email, and social media) to express the emotional attitude of the writer, convey information succinctly, communicate a message playfully without using words, etc.

The function of emoji, as [emoji developer Shigetaka] Kurita describes it—adding subtle emotional emphasis to a sentence in text—isn't too different from that of emoticons, the frowny and smiley faces that people have been making out of punctuation since the mid-1990s.

—Britt Peterson

compare emoticon

Examples of emoji in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Her post also included an emoji of a pride flag, a broken heart, and a picture of the singer staring blankly at the camera. —Heather Hunter, Washington Examiner - Political News and Conservative Analysis About Congress, the President, and the Federal Government, 29 Jan. 2025

Blue reshared the video to her Instagram Story, adding three laugh-crying emojis. —Jonathan Granoff, Newsweek, 29 Jan. 2025

Kardashian captioned the post with a simple brown heart emoji. —Kirsty Hatcher, People.com, 28 Jan. 2025

Changpeng Zhao, the billionaire co-founder and former CEO of Binance, commented on X with a clapping emoji after the pardon was announced. —Mackenzie Sigalos, CNBC, 25 Jan. 2025

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from Japanese, literally, "pictograph," from e "picture, drawing" + moji "letter, character"

First Known Use

1997, in the meaning defined above

Kids Definition

emoji

noun

emo·​ji

ē-ˈmō-jē

plural emoji or emojis

: any of various small images, symbols, or icons used in electronic communication (as email) to express the feelings or attitude of the writer or to present information concisely or playfully