July 17, 2026, 6:19 am | Read time: 3 minutes
Every year, the Unicode Consortium releases a major emoji update to give users more ways to communicate with text. Sometimes, however, the organization also revises existing emojis. This can happen for various reasons. Sometimes the small images are used for purposes other than originally intended. In other cases, companies suddenly design different versions, and the consortium must intervene to maintain the Unicode standard.
Jennifer Daniel, chair of the Unicode Emoji Subcommittee, has published a preview of the Emoji 18.0 update in a post on her personal blog. Specifically, it involves nine new designs that are already finalized:
- Monarch butterfly
- Net with handle
- Meteor
- Thumb pointing right
- Smiley face with cracks
- Thumb pointing left
- Lighthouse
- Pickle
- Eraser
What Do the New Emojis Mean?
The smiley face with cracks is meant to give users a new way to express when things aren’t “all good” and the facade is crumbling. The net with handle will make it easier to describe the activity of catching something. Previously, only a bucket was available for this purpose. Completely new are the lighthouse and the eraser.
While there are already pointing fingers to the left and right, the new side-facing thumbs have a new meaning. According to Daniel, the two emojis are less about indicating direction and more about a somewhat condescending “Look at him/her.”
The pickle, on the other hand, joins the sliced cucumber to sharpen its meaning, especially in English-speaking regions. There, the previous cucumber was used for things like pickleball or a tricky situation (“in a pickle”).
Not all of the emojis shown are truly “new.” Rather, the Unicode Consortium is tidying up existing designs and clarifying the meaning of individual motifs.
Big Emoji Update! Apple Core and Bigfoot Coming Soon to Phones
Emojis Are Much Older Than You Think
Clear Distinction of Existing Emojis
The best example of this cleanup is the new meteor, which draws a clear line from the previous comet. The comet has been part of Unicode since 1.1 in 1993 and is considered an emoji classic. Originally, the design was set as a sparkling blue ice ball in the sky. But in 2016, Apple replaced the comet with a flaming rock–also known as a meteor–in iOS 10.2. Some companies like Microsoft and Samsung followed suit, while others stuck with the original design. As a result, the actual comet appears as a meteor on some devices. Emoji 18.0 solves this issue by giving the meteor its own design, independent of the comet.
It was similar with the butterfly, which some users see as a blue morpho and others as a monarch butterfly. Emoji 18.0 resolves this discrepancy by including both variants in the standard.
Also interesting: Emojis are much older than you think
Launch Next Year
It will still be a while before Emoji 18.0 actually reaches users. The finalization of the update for the standard is scheduled for the end of September. However, the Unicode Consortium only provides the framework within which individual companies design their own emoji versions according to their design guidelines.
As a rule, it takes several months for the new emojis to appear on individual platforms. So we will have to wait until early 2027 to try out the pickle, meteor, and others.