What is OpenMoji?

Updated

OpenMoji is an open-source emoji set created by 80+ students and 2 professors at HfG Schwäbisch Gmünd, along with external contributors. It offers more than 4,000 handcrafted emojis that follow the Unicode Emoji standard, available free under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license for designers, developers, and general users.

What OpenMoji Provides

OpenMoji is not just a collection of images — it is a carefully maintained emoji system. According to the project's own description, it includes:

  • 4,495 emojis across many categories, all following a single style guide so they fit together consistently
  • Emoji v17.0 support, tracking the Unicode Emoji standard
  • Colored and outlined variants, covering different use cases such as full-color designs or line-art interfaces
  • Fitzpatrick skin tone support, including multiple skin tone combinations
  • 270 flags, ranging from Andorra to Zimbabwe to Pirates
  • Special interest categories beyond standard Unicode, particularly for technologies and design

Who It Is For

The project explicitly targets three groups:

Audience How They Use OpenMoji
Designers Consistent, handcrafted emoji assets for interfaces, print, or branding
Developers Open-source emoji files to embed in apps, websites, or tools
Everyone else Free emojis for personal or community projects

Licensing and Reuse

All emojis are free to use under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license. This means you can use them commercially and modify them, provided you give attribution and share derivative works under the same license. If you need a permissive license without share-alike conditions, check whether that fits your project before adopting OpenMoji.

How to Get Started

  1. Visit openmoji.org and use the search or browse the collection by category.
  2. Download individual emojis or the full set in your preferred format.
  3. For mobile use, the site offers a way to try OpenMoji on your phone.
  4. If you want to contribute, the project welcomes participation — it has grown through many external contributors and iterative review.

Key Things to Know

  • Handcrafted, not auto-generated: every emoji has been designed, tested, and reviewed over multiple iterations.
  • Standard-compliant: it carefully supports the Unicode Emoji standard, so it works where standard emoji codepoints are expected.
  • Community-driven: it is an academic-community hybrid project, not a corporate product, which affects release cadence and support expectations.

If you need a free, consistent, open-source emoji set with broad Unicode coverage and special-interest categories, OpenMoji is a strong candidate. If you require a different license or a corporate-backed support model, compare alternatives before committing.