Note: This post is regarding upcoming WordPress 4.9.8 and this is not applicable to production sites… yet.
In WordPress 4.9.8, among the improvements will be support for the latest Emoji 11 release. WordPress, technically, has already supported it—you’ve been able to add a 🦸 or 🦹 character even since general emoji support was added. One of the pieces of emoji support within WordPress was using the Twemoji library to polyfill emoji that your operating system didn’t support.
In other words, while you can add any Unicode character to your post, it is generally up to your operating system to support it, except for emoji, which WordPress provides a backwards-compatible way for them to display. Emoji 11 went live in early June and WordPress 4.9.7 adds support for the polyfill for these new emoji. Have an old computer? Apple hasn’t released a new version of OS X yet? You’re not on Android P, which is only in development anyhow? No problem, WordPress has your back.
So, no matter if you’re in the heat of summer 🥵 or the dead of winter 🥶, or if you’re 🥺 or 🥳, WordPress is here for you. There are a lot more than just a few smileys or the all-important cupcake 🧁. There are a ton of science-related emoji 🧬 and 🥎 to supplement the existing ⚾️.
If you’re reading this while, um, doing something else ( 🧻 ), Emojipedia has a great run down of the new emoji, specifically as presented by Twemoji.
I’m a little excited by the cupcake emoji, so I decided to use real cupcakes to help make it happen…. These baked goods would be from my wife, Vanessa’s own Qué Bueno Bakery, which is a bronze level Unicode sponsor for the cupcake emoji.
Okay, maybe I’m more than a little excited.
— Gary (@GaryPendergast) June 8, 2018
If you’re a 🦸 and testing out Gutenberg, the emoji won’t yet render when editing a post. There’s an issue for it—need to find a good way to ensure the emoji aren’t saved as images when they’re rendered via Twemoji.
What is your favorite new emoji coming soon to your WordPress site?
Note: I updated the original post to denote WordPress 4.9.8. The 4.9-branch patch wasn’t in yet before 4.9.7 shipped for the security fix.