The list of all new emoji of 2026 has been published! Curious what they look like? These emoticons are coming to your smartphone this year.
New emoji in 2026
New emoji will come to your smartphone in 2026! Every year a series of new pictures are added to the keyboard with emoticons. This will be no different in 2026, because the list of all new emoticons has been published. A total of nineteen pictures are introduced, nine of which are completely new emoticons. This concerns the following nine emoji:
- Squinted face;
- Hand with a thumb pointing to the left;
- Hand with a thumb pointing to the right;
- Butterfly;
- pickle;
- Lighthouse;
- Meteor;
- Eraser;
- Net with a handle.
The nine new emoji complement the existing images. You can now choose a cucumber, thumbs up or down and a blue butterfly. More options will be added soon with the pickle, thumb to the left or right and orange butterfly. This is a first version of the emoticons, so it is not yet the final design. The emoji may be adjusted later in 2026, so minor changes can still be made. These are the preliminary versions:
iOS 27.4 introduces emoji
The Unicode Consortium publishes a list of new emoji every spring, after which companies such as Apple and Google start working on their own version of the images. The final version of the emoticons will be shown in September 2026, but Apple users will not be able to use them yet. Apple developers first have to work on the new design of the images for the iPhone, iPad and Mac.
Apple usually only adds the new emoticons to its own operating systems a year later. They traditionally appear in the fourth version of a major iOS update. It is therefore expected that Apple will only add the nine new emoji in iOS 27.4 in 2026. Do you have an iPhone, iPad or Mac? In that case, you won’t be able to get started with all the new images until the spring of 2027, when iOS 27.4, iPadOS 27.4 and macOS 27.4 will be released.
Even more new pictures
So you’ll have to be patient a little longer, because you won’t be able to use the pickle, lighthouse and other nine emoji until the spring of 2027. The Unicode Consortium has also added ten skin tones to two of the basic emoji, making a total of nineteen new images added in 2027. For Android users, the new emoji may appear in 2026.
Fortunately, we don’t have to wait that long for new pictures, because Apple will add the emoji that were announced in 2025 in iOS 26.4. That means you can expect a series of new emoticons in March or April. Check out which pictures come to your iPhone with iOS 26.4! Don’t want to miss any updates and stay informed about the new emoji? Then sign up for our daily or weekly newsletter!
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