Facebook rolls out 1,500 new ‘diverse’ emojis for Messenger

Facebook’s emoji for Messenger are becoming more diverse and less sexist.

Tomorrow, the chat app is rolling out a 1,500 new emojis on the chat app including the ability to let users customize the emojis’ skin color, placing it in line with Unicode Consortium’s standards.

Other changes include new red-headed emojis and more female police officers and doctors and more. That move comes a month after a group of Google employees pushed the Unicode Consortium to make the emojis more gender inclusive in its next update.

“We’re diversifying the genders to create a more balanced mix that’s more representative of our world,” Facebook said.

Technically, the change also means Facebook Messengers will now see a uniform set of emojis; prior to this, the emojis appeared inconsistently and would often revert to the emojis seen on their operating systems.

It’s the latest enhancement to Facebook Messenger, which has 900 million monthly users, including debuting new chat bots to ensure people spend more time (and money) within the app.

More in Media

Amazon bets creator video podcasts can be the next TV network – if it can fix measurement

Amazon’s Upfront presentation leaned into its podcast offerings, which the company believes are the next generation of TV networks.

Media Briefing: BuzzFeed’s $120M sale marks another step in the repricing of digital media scale

Byron Allen’s $120 million BuzzFeed deals marks another turning point in the collapse of the platform-era media business model.

Mail Metro Media shifts ad strategy toward PMPs and fewer ads as it unifies stack

Mail Metro Media wants to drive 300% PMP growth over the next three years as part of plans to turn a high-volume digital direct business into an outcomes shop.