It's World Emoji Day, celebrated annually for all things emoji -- and just a day after the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 mission's blast off from earth, would you believe it.
And to mark the annual emoji celebration, both iOS and Android have announced 60 new emoji faces that are coming to their respective keyboards very soon.
Emoji coming to Android Q // TechCrunch
Just think about this: written language evolved from cavemen sketches and scrawl, from Egyptian hieroglyphs to... letters and alphabet... only to come full circle back in the form of emoji on our smartphone keyboard. It's an occasion worth commemorating, isn't it?
With the same spirit of emoji face celebration, Google and Apple have announced a bunch of new emoji coming to your smartphone keyboard very soon -- whether you are on an Android phone or iPhone.
Over 60 new emoji are coming to Android Q, and a similar number to iOS as well. And they range everything from cute animals (like sloths) to helpful emoji recognizing people with special needs.
Accessibility based emoji
Accessibility based emoji like the wheelchair, prosthetic arm, and guide dog are also coming to the iOS and Android emoji keyboard app.
Not just this, but slightly tweaked hand-holding emoji, gender neutral relationship emoji, and other odd emoji like garlic, paragliding, chair and a lamp are also coming soon.
gender neutral emoji
No one really knows the exact time and date of the first ever emoji being sent to someone, but we do know that it happened in Japan before anywhere in the world -- the land of the rising sun and the birth of the modern emoji face.?
So why do we celebrate World Emoji Day today? It's largely believed that the London-based founder of Emojipedia -- the online emoji repository -- came up with the idea of celebrating July 17 as a global excuse for commemorating emoji on your keyboard.
And it's been going for five years strong. Here's to all your favourite emoji!