Click any kaomoji to copy it. Faces are sorted by mood (happy, love, sad, angry and shrug) plus animals, all ready to paste into chats, Discord and bios.
Click to copy it, then paste with Ctrl + V (⌘ + V on a Mac) or a long press on phones.
Windows
Press Win + . to open the emoji and symbol panel, then search for “smiley (katakana tsu)”.
In Microsoft Word, type 30C4 and press Alt + X.
Mac
Press Control + ⌘ + Space to open the Character Viewer, then search for “smiley (katakana tsu)”.
iPhone and Android
Copy it here and paste it. To type it again later, save it as a text replacement (iPhone: Settings › General › Keyboard › Text Replacement; Gboard: Settings › Dictionary › Personal dictionary).
Kaomoji (顔文字) is Japanese for "face characters": kao means face and moji means character. Unlike Western emoticons such as :-), which you read sideways, kaomoji stand upright and show the feeling mostly in the eyes: (^_^) is happy and (T_T) is crying.
They are not the same as emoji. Emoji (絵文字, "picture characters") are single pictures, while kaomoji are built from ordinary text: Japanese katakana like ツ and ノ, the Greek letter ω, Korean ㅅ, Kannada ಠ, box-drawing lines and math symbols. That is why kaomoji keep the color and font of your text.
How to read a kaomoji
Most faces follow the same layout: arms, a face in parentheses, then effects. The eyes carry the mood (◕ ^ ಥ ╥), the mouth sits in the middle (‿ ▽ ω ᴥ), and arms like ノ ヽ づ ٩ ۶ wave, hug or cheer. Extras such as ✧ ♡ or a flipped table ┻━┻ set the scene.
Animals swap the parentheses for ears: ʕ ʔ make a bear, ฅ are cat paws, and ᐢ are bunny ears. See bunny symbols and the cat symbol page for more.
How to type kaomoji
On Windows 10 and 11, press Win + . (period) and open the kaomoji tab in the emoji panel. On iPhone, add the Japanese Kana keyboard and tap its ^_^ key for a list of faces. On Android, Gboard has an emoticon tab next to its emoji. On a Mac, the easiest way is to copy them from this page.
Discord has built-in /shrug, /tableflip and /unflip commands. If you paste the shrug into Discord or Reddit yourself, the backslash can vanish because Markdown treats it as an escape character; type it as ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ instead. For cute and anime-style faces, see anime symbols.
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between kaomoji and emoji?
Kaomoji are faces built from text characters, like (◕‿◕). Emoji are single picture characters, like 😊, drawn differently by each platform.
How do I type kaomoji on Windows?
Press Win + . (period) to open the emoji panel, then choose the kaomoji tab. Or copy them from this page.
Why is my shrug missing an arm?
Apps that use Markdown, such as Discord and Reddit, read the backslash as an escape character and hide it. Use Discord's /shrug command, or add extra backslashes as shown above.
What does ツ mean?
ツ is the Japanese katakana letter tsu. Its shape looks like a smiling face, which is why it appears in the shrug and in many usernames.