2026 / Most Popular New Emoji

Using the same real-world usage data that powers Emojitracker.com, the Most Popular New Emoji award crowns the world’s favorite new emoji each year.

Emojipedia’s data analysis digs deep into the numbers, looking at which emoji introduced by Unicode over the past year has resonated most with users. Previous winners include the likes of 🙂‍↔️, 🩷, ❤️‍🔥, 🤍, 🥰, and 🥹.

As announced over on the Emojipedia blog, the 2026 winner is 🫪 Distorted Face!

The 🫪 Distorted Face emoji came first, with the 🫍 Orca in second, and 🫯 Fight Cloud in third. The 🧑‍🩰 Ballet Dancer emoji came in 4th place, followed by the 🪎 Treasure Chest emoji in 5th.

This is the 🫪 Distorted Face emoji’s second award, having won the Most Anticipated Emoji Award in 2025.

Any emoji approved as part of Emoji 17.0 was eligible for this award.