2019 emoji candidates include a service dog, mixed-race couples and more

2019 emoji

On Thursday, the Unicode Consortium added three characters to its list of 2019 emoji candidates. New characters now being considered for Unicode 12 include a service dog, mixed-race couple, and deaf people.

In announcing the additions, Unicode president Mark Davis explains::

Leading up to July, we’d already decided on the bulk of the candidates for 2019. We had a special focus on accessibility, and were working out how to do a last few accessibility emoji and how to handle mixed-skin-tone groups. In July, we further solidified the draft specification for Emoji 12.0, and added to the candidate list two new accessibility emoji and the 55 mixed-skin-tone couples.

First teased in June, the candidates for 2019 also include a sloth, onion, beverage box, yo-yo, and more. 

The final Emoji Version 12.0 list is planned for release in March 2019. Until then, the announced characters are only candidates, and subject to change.

Among the other new emojis possibly coming next year are:

Flamingo and White Heart are two of the emojis most requested by Emojipedia users in 2018. Both are shortlisted for the 2019 release of Emoji 12.0.

Draft candidates for 2019 also include a diving mask, ax, waffle, Diya lamp and a Hindu temple.

Unicode 11.0 launched and June is part of the upcoming iOS 12 and macOS Mojave releases. Among the 62 new emoji released this year are a softball, kangaroo, llama, partying face, parrot, lobster, and others.