As surprising as it may be, emojis are serious business. Before new symbols ever show up as iPhone emojis or on any other digital device, they have to pass through a surprisingly strict design, review, and approval process.
The Unicode Consortium—an organization dedicated to keeping text, characters, and emoji representation consistent across digital platforms—has recently published a tentative list of emojis that could arrive on smartphones and other devices in the near future. Shared by Emojipedia (which is basically a handbook of all emojis), the list outlines nine emoji candidates currently under consideration for Emoji 18.0, which is expected to be finalized in September 2026.
Among the proposed additions are a squinting face emoji, left- and right-pointing thumb gestures, a pickle, a lighthouse, a meteor, an eraser, and a net with a handle. The draft also includes a monarch butterfly emoji meaning that the existing generic butterfly is getting a species upgrade.
It’s a pretty interesting mix overall. While I’m not entirely sure why we urgently needed a ‘net-with-a-handle emoji’, I’m definitely excited about the squinting face (or the sus-emoji, if you will) and its various use cases.
In addition to the nine new emoji concepts, Emoji 18.0 would also introduce 10 new skin tone variants tied to the two base emojis. That technically brings the total number of new emoji options to 19. Emojipedia has already shared sample artwork for several of the candidates, however, the approval from Unicode is still pending.
If everything goes according to plan, these new characters could start appearing on iPhones and other Apple devices sometime in late 2026 or early 2027. So we can expect new iPhone emojis to be dropped soon enough!
However, they will appear slightly different from the current drafts since Apple uses its own proprietary design language—commonly referred to as Apple Color Emoji. The company’s designers will eventually create custom versions of each approved emoji.
I am, personally, looking forward to see how these new additions will appear in Apple’s design language, and whether any of them will manage to leave a lasting mark in the texting space—much like the now-legendary crying face emoji has done in recent times.
