Facebook 4.0 Emoji Changelog

Facebook 4.0 Emoji Changelog

After several months of quiet rollout, Facebook have confirmed that their latest emoji release is now accessible to the majority Facebook users.

This update includes support for Emoji 12.0, as well as a number of design changes to family, gesture and facial expression emojis.

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Above: New emojis added to the latest version of Facebook's emoji set.

Facebook 4.0 includes all 230 new emojis approved in 2019, including ๐Ÿฅฑ Yawning Face and ๐Ÿฆฉ Flamingo as well as selection of emojis representing accessibility (e.g. ๐Ÿฆป Ear With Hearing Aid), new color options for shapes (e.g. ๐ŸคŽ Brown Heart), and various different combinations of people holding hands (e.g. ๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿพโ€๐Ÿคโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿป Women Holding Hands: Medium-Dark Skin Tone, Light Skin Tone).

61 of these new emojis are unique codepoints, while the remaining 169 are new recommended ZWJ sequences for the likes of skin tone and gender variation support.

Additionally, 474 emojis have updated designs as part of this release. All hand gestures have been given a glossier appearance, a notable number of facial expressions have been tweaked and all of the non-RGI family ZWJ sequences have been given an update to match the new family design released last year.

๐Ÿ†• New

The first major set of additions amongst the 230 new emojis are 71 new emojis featuring people holding hands.

Constructed via different ZWJ sequence, these combine ๐Ÿ‘ฉ Woman, ๐Ÿ‘จ Man and ๐Ÿค Handshake to permit each person to have a different skin tone.

In the past, Facebook has already permitted shared skin tones for any of these hand-holders, but this is the first time mixed skin tones are included.

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Above: A selection of the new people holding hands emojis in Facebook 4.0.

Accessibility and representation of differently-abled people is the second of the major themes evident in Emoji 12.0. Additions in this category include objects such as ๐Ÿฆฝ Manual Wheelchair and people emojis such as ๐Ÿ‘ฉโ€๐Ÿฆฏ Woman With Probing Cane and ๐Ÿงโ€โ™€๏ธ Deaf Woman.

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Above: A selection of the new accessibility emojis in Facebook 4.0.

The last major theme within Emoji 12.0 is the addition of new colored shapes and hearts. A total of 14 new designs have been added to these categories, including ๐Ÿค White Heart and ๐ŸŸฅ Red Square.

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Above: A selection of the new shape options as they appear in Facebook 4.0.

All eight new animals[1] are now available for Facebook users, including the accessibility-oriented ๐Ÿฆฎ Guide Dog and ๐Ÿ•โ€๐Ÿฆบ Service Dog, as well as the much-requested ๐Ÿฆฉ Flamingo.

Unlike most other vendors, Facebook's oyster emoji does not include a pearl.

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Above: Eight new animal emojis in Facebook 4.0.

๐Ÿง† Falafel and ๐Ÿง‰ Matรฉ are amongst the eight new food and drink emojis in this update. The ๐Ÿงƒ Beverage Box includes the ๐Ÿ’ฏ Hundred Points symbol in its artwork for 100% Juice.

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Above: New food and drink options in Facebook 4.0.

Other additions in Facebook 4.0 include ๐Ÿค Pinching Hand, ๐Ÿฅป Sari and ๐Ÿฉธ Drop of Blood.

Browse all new emojis in Facebook 4.0.

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Above: A selection of other Emoji 12.0 designs as they appear in Facebook 4.0.

๐Ÿ†™ Changed

๐Ÿ˜€ Grinning Face has lost its clenched-teeth grin for an open-mouth smile, as per the design of other major emoji vendors.

Emojipedia-Facebook-4.0-Emoji-Changelog-Comparison-Grinning-Face

๐Ÿ˜ญ Loudly Crying Face has had its eyes inverted, perhaps in attempt to channel a greater sense of sadness.

Emojipedia-Facebook-4.0-Emoji-Changelog-Comparison-Crying-Face

๐Ÿ˜ต Dizzy Face now features 'X'-shaped eyes instead of spiral-shaped eyes. This emoji continues to be fragmented between the two design styles (X or spiral eyes) across major platforms.

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๐Ÿคฎ Face Vomiting now has its eyes shut in discomfort instead of featuring an intense wide-eyed stare.[2]

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๐Ÿ˜  Angry Face and ๐Ÿ˜ก Pouting Face now both display the same design - one in-keeping with other vendors' ๐Ÿ˜  Angry Face design. However, in losing its red gradient ๐Ÿ˜ก Pouting Face is now notably inconsistent with the design of other vendors.[3]

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All hand and gesture emojis have been revised in Facebook 4.0. These have been given a glossier appearance more similar to the vendor's other human designs (๐Ÿ‘ฉ Woman, ๐Ÿคนโ€โ™‚๏ธ Man Juggling and ๐Ÿคท Person Shrugging, for example).

๐Ÿคž Crossed Fingers has been revised with a more glossy apperance and slightly modified finger placement.

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๐Ÿค™ Call Me Hand is now glossier and has had its protruding little finger slightly reduced in size.

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โœŠ Raised Fist no longer displays a wrist below its the clenched palm and digits.

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๐Ÿ‘‘ Crown is now angled differently and features encrusted sapphires instead of purple gemstones.[4]

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๐Ÿšฑ Non-Potable Water has been corrected to display the standard cross-through-tap design, as opposed to indicating a ban on binning litter. This mix-up was first introduced in December of last year.

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In version 2.2 of Facebook's emoji set, a series of 125 family emoji designs with skin tone modifier support were added.[5]

These designs remained unchanged in previous updates but in version 4.0 these have been updated to feature greater detail in their clothes, hair and facial features. This family with a dark skin tone applied ๐Ÿ‘จ๐Ÿฟโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿฟโ€๐Ÿ‘ง๐Ÿฟโ€๐Ÿ‘ง๐Ÿฟ is shown here as an example.

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๐Ÿ“ถ Release

Facebook 4.0 was released on August 14, 2019 and continues to roll out for users across the globe.

In the past year, Facebook expanded the reach of its emoji designs by also displaying these in the native iOS Facebook app. Previously, Facebook's own emoji designs only showed on Facebook for web and Android.

While these new emojis are now supported by Facebook, input is a different matter. Android users will require Android 10.0 or above to see the new choices on the emoji keyboard.

The Facebook website emoji picker hasn't yet been updated to include these new additions so desktop users will need an Emoji 12.0-compatible OS such as Microsoft Windows 10 May 2019 Update or the forthcoming macOS Catalia update expected from Apple later this year.

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Above: Facebook supports the new 2019 emojis, but these aren't yet available in the website emoji picker interface.

An alternative for accessing these new emojis is to copy and paste from a browser, eg ๐Ÿค White Heart.

Last month's update from Facebook now shows for a majority of users, with rollout continuing for all remaining users in the coming weeks and months.


  1. The ๐Ÿฆช Oyster emoji has been featured amongst the animal emojis in all previous Emoji 12.0-orientated changelog articles as all other vendors display the creature with a pearl on top of its fleshy interior, indicating that the ๐Ÿฆช Oyster is of the non-edible Pinctada genus and therefore "not true oysters". However, as Facebook's design lacks of pearl, it could be considered an edible Ostreidae oyster and therefore be featured amongst the food and drink emojis instead of the animals. For consistency with other changelogs, however, it has been featured with the animals. โ†ฉ๏ธŽ

  2. Prior to the Facebook 3.0 update across the latter half of 2018 this emoji had it's eyes shut in this fashion, so this change is somewhat of a row-back. โ†ฉ๏ธŽ

  3. This is perhaps a mix-up, and ๐Ÿ˜ก Pouting Face may be updated in a future minor update. โ†ฉ๏ธŽ

  4. Perhaps made of amethyst. โ†ฉ๏ธŽ

  5. While these designs were not recommended for general interchange (RGI) by the Unicode Consortium, they were constructed via valid ZWG sequences. Single skin tone modifiers were enabled across all existing family combination emojis (e.g. ๐Ÿ‘ฉโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉโ€๐Ÿ‘ง Family: Woman, Woman, Girl and ๐Ÿ‘จโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉโ€๐Ÿ‘ง Family: Man, Woman, Girl), thus allowing for families of different skin tones to exist on their platform (e.g. ๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿปโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿปโ€๐Ÿ‘ง๐Ÿป Family - Woman: Light Skin Tone, Woman: Light Skin Tone, Girl: Light Skin Tone and ๐Ÿ‘จ๐Ÿฟโ€๐Ÿ‘ฉ๐Ÿฟโ€๐Ÿ‘ง๐Ÿฟ Family - Man: Dark Skin Tone, Woman: Dark Skin Tone, Girl: Dark Skin Tone). โ†ฉ๏ธŽ