Internet, meet the nine brand new emoji that will be coming to your keyboards.

The Emoji Standard and Research Working Group at the Unicode Consortium will soon introduce nine new emoji, and these additions are now being revealed ahead of World Emoji Day on July 17. (Why is July 17 known as World Emoji Day? If you check the calendar emoji, you’ll see the 17th date of the month is displayed.)

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The new emoji class of 2026 includes:

• Lighthouse

• Eraser

• Leftwards Thumb Sign

• Rightwards Thumb Sign

• The Cracked Smiling Face

• Net with Handle

• The Meteor

• The Pickle

• The Monarch Butterfly

Here are the nine new emoji coming to your keyboard by next Spring.
Credit: Did Someone Say Emoji? Substack

A sneak peek at the designs was shared by Unicode Emoji Subcommittee-Chair Jennifer Daniel on her Substack newsletter, “Did Someone Say Emoji?” Daniel says they should arrive on your keyboard by next spring.

Some of these new emoji additions are interesting. For example, it’s hard to believe that there wasn’t already a Lighthouse or Eraser emoji. Pro wrestling fans will likely get some use out of the leftwards and rightwards thumb signs, as they are perfect for Rob Van Dam’s infamous signature pose when used in tandem. The phallic Pickle is sure to be popular for sexting.

However, the Cracked Smiling Face will surely run away as the true crowd-pleaser of the bunch, just like Hairy Creature (aka Bigfoot) was a fan favorite in the new 2025 emoji. Cracked Smiling Face looks like the perfect emoji to sum up 2026. Yes, the emoji won’t come out until next year. But that’ll be perfect timing for the emoji to sum up 2027, 2028, and then every year beyond that as well. Interestingly, the Cracked Smiling Face is the absolute newest even among its debuting peers. When these nine new emoji were proposed by Unicode earlier this year, the Cracked Smiling Face was originally a completely different emoji known as Smiley Face with Squinting Eyes.

Variations of the Smiley Face with Squinting Eyes from the Unicode Consortium’s proposal for the emoji.
Credit: Unicode Consortium

Some of these new additions might look familiar. You may be checking your keyboard for the Pickle, Monarch Butterfly, and Meteor emoji. You won’t find them. But you will find a Cucumber, a Morpho Butterfly, and a Comet emoji.

As Daniel writes in her Substack, these are all very different emoji, and some changes will be made to the existing emoji to make them all much more visually distinct. For example, the Morpho Butterfly is just a blue butterfly, whereas the Monarch Butterfly will actually look like the majestic orange-and-black butterfly. The Comet emoji and Meteor emoji will also be distinct, with the former showing as a blue streak rocketing through the sky and the latter looking like a flaming meatball.

Asus will sell a standalone version of its upcoming OLED Xbox Ally X20, according to a report from The Verge, walking back earlier plans that would have required buyers to purchase the handheld bundled with a pair of Xreal AR glasses.

An Asus spokesperson confirmed the change to The Verge, saying, “We are actively discussing the release schedule for a standalone version of the new Ally. Please stay tuned for upcoming announcements.”

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Credit: Asus

The Verge’s Sean Hollister, who spent two hours testing the device at Asus’s California offices, wrote that the OLED Ally could prove competitive with the recently released MSI Claw 8 EX AI Plus. The review also highlighted ergonomic upgrades over last year’s Xbox Ally X, including new rubberized grips, quieter face buttons, and a reworked cooling system. Hollister singled out a “transforming” D-pad that can rotate between eight-way and four-way configurations, saying it made a noticeable difference in games like Hollow Knight: Silksong.

The Verge did not report specific pricing or a release date for the standalone OLED Ally, though Hollister noted the device will likely cost more than the current $1,000 Xbox Ally X. The bundle with the ROG Xreal R1 Gaming Glasses could cost up to $2,000, though no price or launch date has been confirmed yet.

Yesterday, Hinge founder Justin McLeod shared more details about his next venture, an AI matchmaking service called Overtone.

McLeod announced his departure from Hinge back in Dec. 2025 to focus on Overtone, which he plans to launch later this year in select locations. (You can put yourself on the waitlist if you’re interested.)

“Overtone is not a dating app,” McLeod wrote in the latest blog post. “By that I mean it’s not a social platform with profiles that reduce people to stats, quotes and photos. There are no opaque, algorithmic feeds trained on split-second impulses. And there’s no juggling likes, matches and chats across many people at once.”

Rather, the post goes on, Overtone is a service. McLeod promises Overtone will make only introductions “worth making” and will explain why someone is a match. He wants to bring back matchmaking, a longtime practice. These days, it’s pretty limited to those who can spend thousands of dollars on a personal matchmaker, like in the movie Materialists.

“But this time with the reach and diversity of modern networks, the collective wisdom of relationship science, and the conviction that when it comes to options, all you need is less™,” he wrote (yes, including the trademark).

Details of what Overtone will look like are scarce, but McLeod also announced the company has raised $18 million from FirstMark Capital, Pace Capital, and Match Group. The latter is the dating app conglomerate that owns Hinge.

Additionally, Match Group and Tinder CEO Spencer Rascoff has joined the board, as have executive leadership adviser and founder of The Signal Institute, Diana Chapman, and famed relationship psychotherapist Esther Perel (who partnered with Hinge last year).

Overtone will come at a time when some daters are skeptical about using AI to find them a match. When Bumble founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd announced earlier this year that Bumble is killing the swipe and ushering in an AI matchmaker, the reaction online was largely negative. But there are budding AI matchmakers out there, such as Sitch Matchmaking and Ditto AI.