Service dog, deaf people and mixed race couples: Meet new emoji candidates for 2019

Note that these candidates aren’t guaranteed entry to the Unicode Standard. The latest emojis join the older list which included emojis like flamingo, ice cube, sloth, and waffle.

61 new emoji characters shortlisted for release in 2019 (emojipedia)

Unicode Consortium, the organisation that regulates emojis has shortlisted 179 candidates -- 61 characters plus variants -- for release in 2019.

Giving a thumbs up to diversity, making up a large chunk of those new emoji are 55 characters to represent couples of different genders and skin tones, The Verge reported on Thursday. The shortlisted emoji includes representation of a person with hearing impariment as well.

The list of draft candidates will be reviewed and finalised in the next meeting, this coming September, Unicode Consortium said in a blog post.

Additionally, eight "emoji provisional candidates" for 2020 have also been added which includes ninja, military helmet, mammoth, feather, dodo, magic wand, carpentry saw and a screwdriver, it said.

"Leading up to July, we'd already decided on the bulk of the candidates for 2019. We had a special focus on accessibility, and were working out how to do a last few accessibility emoji and how to handle mixed-skin-tone groups. In July, we further solidified the draft specification for Emoji 12.0, and added to the candidate list two new accessibility emoji and the 55 mixed-skin-tone couples," Unicode president Mark Davis told Emojipedia.