A kaomoji is a Japanese text face like (=^･ω･^=), drawn with characters instead
of a picture. Search by mood or animal, or pick a category, then tap a face to
copy it. Your last few copies stay in the recently copied row.
Recently copied
Faces you copy show up here, kept on this device only.
Tap a face to copy it. Everything runs in your browser and nothing is uploaded.
Cat kaomoji
Happy kaomoji
Sad and crying kaomoji
Angry and disapproving kaomoji
Love and heart kaomoji
Table flip kaomoji
Shrug kaomoji
Lenny face
Surprised and shocked kaomoji
Hug kaomoji
Dancing and celebrating kaomoji
Sleepy and tired kaomoji
Animal kaomoji
Every face is ordinary text, so it pastes into a bio, a chat or a caption and looks the same for the person reading it, as long as their phone has the characters. Why some faces break covers when it does not.
How to use it
- Type a feeling or an animal in the search box: happy, sad, angry, love, cat,
bear, shrug, table flip or lenny. Part of a word works, and so does pasting
part of a face, like
ツ. - Or tap a category to see only that group.
- Tap a face to copy it, then paste it wherever you want it.
The recently copied row keeps your last 12 faces on this device, so the ones you use every day are one tap away next time.
What kaomoji are made of
Kaomoji come from Japanese internet culture in the 1980s and 90s, where
keyboards had full-width punctuation and two alphabets of kana to draw with.
Where a Western emoticon like :-) is read sideways, a kaomoji is read upright,
so there is room for eyes, a mouth, cheeks and arms.
| Part | Characters | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Eyes | ^ ◕ ಠ ° ･ | (◕‿◕) |
| Mouth | ω ▽ ‿ 益 ᴥ | (=^･ω･^=) |
| Arms | ヽ ノ ٩ ۶ ╯ ┐ ┌ | ヽ(・∀・)ﾉ |
| Props | ┻━┻ ♡ ✧ ♪ | (╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻ |
The characters come from all over Unicode. ಠ is a letter from Kannada, a
script of southern India. ω is Greek omega, 益 is a Chinese character
meaning "benefit" picked for its shape, and ʖ in the lenny face is a
phonetic symbol. The eyebrows in ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) are combining marks, which attach
to the character before them, so the face only holds together when copied
whole.
Why some kaomoji break
- Missing characters. A device without a font for a character shows a box
instead. Every face on this page uses characters that iPhone and Android
fonts draw, but an old laptop, a smart TV or a game's chat box can still show
boxes for the rarer ones, like
ᓚᘏᗢor༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つ. - Markdown eats backslashes. In Discord, Reddit and Slack,
\_is an escaped underscore, so¯\_(ツ)_/¯loses its left arm. Type¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯instead, or wrap the face in backticks. - Different widths. Many faces mix full-width characters like
（and＾, which are as wide as a Chinese character, with narrow ones. They line up differently in a code editor or a monospace font, and a face can look lopsided there. - Screen readers. A screen reader reads each character by name, so
(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻comes out as a long string of symbol names. Add a word alongside anything that has to be understood, not just seen. - Character limits. A kaomoji is several characters, and some count double
on X.
(╯°□°)╯︵ ┻━┻is 12 characters. Check a bio or a post with the Word Counter before a limit cuts it off.
Related tools
- Fancy Text Generator turns your name into bold, script, bubble or upside-down text to sit next to a face.
- Glitch Text Generator stacks the same kind of combining marks the lenny face uses, until the text looks cursed.
- Word Counter counts a kaomoji the way a reader sees it, so you know how much of a bio it takes.
- Case Converter changes the words around your face to Title Case, UPPER CASE or aLtErNaTiNg case.
Common questions
What is a kaomoji?
A kaomoji is a face made out of text characters. The word is Japanese, from kao (face) and moji (character). Where Western emoticons like :) are read sideways, kaomoji are read upright, so the eyes, mouth and arms can be drawn from punctuation, Japanese kana, box-drawing lines and letters from other alphabets. They are sometimes called Japanese emoticons or text faces.
How is a kaomoji different from an emoji?
An emoji is a single picture character that each phone draws in its own style. A kaomoji is built from several ordinary text characters, so it looks much the same wherever you paste it, keeps working where emoji are not allowed, and has thousands of variations that no emoji covers, like flipping a table.
How do I type the lenny face?
The lenny face, ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°), is hard to type because the eyebrows and the curve under the nose are combining marks that attach to the space before them. Search for lenny above and tap one to copy it, then paste it. The same goes for the shrug, ¯\_(ツ)_/¯, which needs the katakana ツ.
Why did the shrug lose an arm when I pasted it?
Discord, Reddit, Slack and other apps that use Markdown treat a backslash followed by an underscore as an instruction, so the backslash disappears and the left arm goes with it. Type an extra two backslashes before the first underscore, as in ¯\\\_(ツ)_/¯, or put the shrug in a code block.
Why do some kaomoji show as boxes?
A box means the device has no font with that character. Every face here uses only characters that the built-in fonts on iPhone and Android phones draw, so on a current phone they all render. Older computers, some smart TVs and a few games have smaller fonts and may show boxes for the rarer characters, such as the cat loaf or the Tibetan brackets.
Where can I use cat kaomoji?
Anywhere that accepts text: an Instagram or TikTok bio, a Discord message, a text, a username that allows symbols, or a code comment. Try ฅ^•ﻌ•^ฅ or (=^･ω･^=) for a cat, and ᓚᘏᗢ for one lying down.
Is anything I type here sent to a server?
No. The list is built into the page, search runs in your browser and the recently copied row is saved on your device only. The site records which category was picked, which category a copied face came from and how long a search was, so we know what to add next. What you type in the search box is never part of that.