Emoji Are Building Blocks, Not Buckets

In 2007, the same year cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker published The Stuff of Thought—an exploration of how words carry emotion as much as meaning—a proposal was submitted to add emoji to the Unicode standard. Google brought emoji to Gmail in October 2008, and Apple followed with Apple Color Emoji on iPhone OS the next month. Fifteen years later, it is hard to picture digital communication without 🙏, 😂, and ❤️.

Jennifer Daniel is a creative director at Google and chair of the Unicode Emoji Subcommittee, the body that selects new emoji and ensures they remain interoperable across platforms. We spoke with her about how those tiny pictures carry the weight of body language, why context beats specificity, and what happens when a standards body tries to keep pace with a fast-moving visual culture. The transcript has been edited for length and clarity.

Filling in What Text Removes

Daniel sees emoji less as a new language and more as a supplement that restores the physical cues missing from text. Rhythm, cadence, volume, eye contact, and gesture are all things we channel through emoji when we can't be face to face. Picking the right emoji and placing it well matters; over time, that process becomes second nature.

Emoji, she points out, do not encode new concepts. They reference long-standing ideas that appear in Shakespeare and Ulysses, as well as visual and gestural traditions. "Heart on fire," for instance, has meant religious devotion, heartburn, or desire in different contexts—sometimes all at once. "These are multifaceted, just like the world we live in. And there's a difference between how people really use emoji, versus how people think they use them."

No Do-Overs at the Standards Level

The Emoji Subcommittee sits within the Unicode Consortium, which digitizes the world's languages. That role imposes a very different pace than the usual tech cycle. When you add a code point to Unicode, you can never take it back. There is no deprecation, no iteration after shipping. Unicode looks backward: it digitizes what already exists rather than inventing anew, and it tries to reconcile that methodical approach with the fluid, transient nature of modern communication.

That reality changes how Daniel thinks about selection. At more than 3,500 emoji, the space for new additions is tightening. The subcommittee prioritizes broad, versatile, globally relevant concepts that strengthen bonds—expressions that convey emotion, intent, and body language—rather than ever more specific objects. A golden retriever emoji, she notes, implies a poodle is also needed; choosing one often excludes another. Proposals for popular but overly specific ideas, or those already expressible, are frequently rejected.

The future of emoji selection lies in characters that are broad, carry multiple meanings (including metaphorical or symbolic weight), and can be combined with existing characters to say something new. The tension between people who want maximum specificity and those who prefer broad strokes is productive, Daniel says, as long as it stays that way.

One Sign to Rule the Range of Laughter

Context determines how specific an emoji can be. A laugh can be a belly laugh, a silent chuckle, or something else entirely—but how many emoji does that spectrum require? Daniel suggests one may suffice to indicate the abstract notion of "funny." She compares emoji use to signing a greeting card: you never hand one over without writing your name, at minimum, in it. The emoji is the medium; the gesture makes it yours.

Beyond the -Moji Suffix

Daniel sees Bitmoji, Memoji, and similar tools as pictures rather than emoji. They can function without a standards body because they render as images and have no interoperability requirements. Emoji, in contrast, are a font—copy-and-paste anywhere without editing software. Reacji, which can animate, do something emoji with the current font standard cannot. Font standards will evolve, Daniel says, and that will open new possibilities.

Her recent project turning stickers into a variable font grew out of the repetitive nature of digital conversation. People say "Thank you," "Please," and "On my way" constantly, and those static expressions flatten intent. A variable font, with its range of weights and customizations, lets a sender convey genuine gratitude even when a recipient cannot see their face. "Maybe they can't see it in your eyes, but sharing something special makes them feel it more."

Interoperability for the Post-Pixel World

Current avatars are pixel-based—just pictures—so interoperability is a non-issue. Emoji are different: they are a font that works everywhere without editing software. As digital spaces move toward AR, VR, and more decentralized environments, Daniel raises bigger questions about agreeing on physical representation. Without shared standards, users could find themselves relearning interfaces and creating new characters every time they change platforms.

Daniel remains invested in the broader visual ecosystem, not just emoji. Stickers, GIFs, avatars, video, and filters all contribute to self-expression. "Emoji are an extension of how you speak and how you talk—in whatever format, it's all about being seen, heard, and understood." Her advice for designers is to use them with intentionality, the same consideration one gives to any word, color, or hierarchy. Design, she says, "allows you to look forwards and backwards simultaneously."