Emoji Search
Type a word — happy, cat, pizza, rocket — and see every emoji that matches, from the current Unicode emoji set. Click one to copy it and see its official name, the Emoji version that added it, its keywords and its code points. Free, no sign-up.
Loading the emoji list…
How to Use Emoji Search
- 1. Search. Type a word. Every word you type has to match the start of a word in the emoji’s name or in one of its keywords, so red heart and heart red both find ❤️, and thum finds the thumbs.
- 2. Narrow by category. The pills limit results to one of Unicode’s nine groups, such as Food & Drink or Flags.
- 3. Choose a skin tone. For emoji that have tone variants, such as 👋, the list and the copy button use the tone you pick.
- 4. Click an emoji. It is copied to your clipboard, and a panel shows its name, category, keywords and code points, with HTML, CSS and JavaScript escapes for developers.
Where the Data Comes From
Names, groups and version numbers come from Unicode’s emoji data file for the current Emoji version, and the search keywords come from the Unicode CLDR English annotations (the same data keyboards use for emoji suggestions). The page loads the list on first use and shows the Emoji version at the bottom. It is a compact copy: each base emoji is listed once, and skin-tone variants are built from it, which keeps the file small.
What an Emoji Is, Technically
An emoji is text. Some are a single code point (😀 is U+1F600); others are sequences that the font draws as one picture. The panel shows the exact code points so you can see which.
| Kind | How it is built | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Single code point | One character | 😀 — U+1F600 |
| With a variation selector | A character plus U+FE0F, which asks for the colour emoji style | ❤️ — U+2764 U+FE0F |
| Skin tone | The emoji followed by a tone modifier, U+1F3FB (light) to U+1F3FF (dark) | 👋🏽 — U+1F44B U+1F3FD |
| Joined (ZWJ) sequence | Several emoji glued by the zero-width joiner, U+200D | 👩💻 — U+1F469 U+200D U+1F4BB |
| Flag | Two regional indicator letters spell the country code | 🇺🇸 — U+1F1FA U+1F1F8 |
| Keycap | A digit or symbol, U+FE0F and U+20E3 | 1️⃣ — U+0031 U+FE0F U+20E3 |
A platform that does not know a sequence shows its parts instead — a person and a laptop rather than a technologist — and one that has not added a new emoji shows a blank box. The Added in line tells you which Emoji version introduced it, so you can judge how widely it will display.
Skin Tones
Since 2015, emoji for people and body parts can carry one of five skin-tone modifiers based on the Fitzpatrick scale. The search applies the tone you choose to every emoji that supports it. Emoji with two people, such as couples and people holding hands, take the same tone for both. Mixed-tone pairs exist in Unicode, but this tool does not build them.
Using Emoji in Code
The panel gives the HTML character reference (😀), the CSS escape for a content property (\1F600) and the JavaScript escape (\u{1F600}). Save a file as UTF-8 and you can usually put the emoji itself in the source instead; the escapes help when an editor, a build step or an older system mangles it.
Frequently Asked Questions
- How do I find an emoji by its name?
- Type any part of the name or a related word. The search matches word starts in the official name and the CLDR keywords, ranks name matches first, and lists the results in Unicode order after that.
- How do I type an emoji on Windows or a Mac?
- On Windows, press the Windows key and the full stop (or semicolon) to open the emoji panel. On a Mac, press Control+Command+Space. This page is useful when you want to search by keyword, change the skin tone or see the code points.
- Why do emoji look different on an iPhone, an Android phone and Windows?
- Unicode defines which emoji exist and what they are called, not how they are drawn. Each company designs its own artwork, so the same emoji can differ in style or detail between platforms. The meaning stays the same.
- What is a zero-width joiner sequence?
- A way to combine emoji into a new one. The joiner (U+200D) tells the font to draw the neighbouring emoji as one picture where it can: a woman, a joiner and a laptop make a woman technologist. Systems that cannot do this show the parts separately.
- Why can’t I see some emoji?
- Newer emoji need a recent system or app. If your device was released before the Emoji version shown in the Added in line, it may draw a box or a question mark. Updating the system, or using an app that brings its own emoji, usually fixes it.
- Which skin tones can I use?
- The five Fitzpatrick-based modifiers, from light to dark, plus the default yellow. Only emoji that depict people or body parts have tones; others stay the same.