Photo by Denis Cherkashin on Unsplash

Emojis are in every corner of the internet. Everyone I know uses emojis, all the way from my grandparents to my friend’s 5 year old brother. Personally, I use emojis daily. I’ll throw a couple of them in while I’m talking to friends or trying to add some pizazz to social media comments. I’d bet it’s safe to say that you use them as well — or at least know people who do. Emojis can be a great and fun way to convey emotions. They also add visual interest and can be a quick way to say a lot in a single character. That being said — how do emojis fare for those who can’t see them?

According to the World Health Organization, “at least 2.2 billion people have a near or distance vision impairment.” In order to be inclusive to all degrees of sight (or lack thereof), we need to know how to communicate in an accessible manner.

Emojis can be read aloud to users with the power of screen readers. If emojis are used right, they can still convey all of the emotion and context intended, despite not being visible. Before we can determine how to best use emojis, let’s figure out what emojis “look” like to screen readers.

Screen readers read off an emojis Unicode String in order to identify it. This is similar to ALT text on images.

I highly recommend you watch the video linked below by Molly Burke. She gives us a glimpse into how visually impaired people “see” emojis.

Molly is a blind YouTuber and accessibility advocate. She makes a lot of videos on how she pursues her passions for makeup and fashion despite being blind. She has a lot of great videos on how she navigates technology and the world around her.

Accessible emoji usage

In order to use emojis in a way that are beneficial to everyone, I’m going to give you a few tips on how to use them. At an emojis best, they can add fun and context to a post or message. At their worst, they can cause frustration and abandonment.

1. Use emojis sparingly

I’m sure we all know someone who spams three or more of the same emoji in a row. I know I’ve done it! Sometimes those videos of cats getting scared by cucumbers deserve multiple “rolling on the floor laughing” emojis. Feel free to emoji spam your sighted friends and family all day, but be mindful when posting to a more public audience. This is especially true when using emojis in your websites or apps.

Image from: Upworthy

If you send five “thumbs up” emojis to someone, a screen reader will read out the words “thumbs up” five times. You can probably see how this can get extremely frustrating and time-consuming. If you are going to use emojis, try to only use one or two.

Listen to this screen reader read an emoji-filled sentence.

2. Use them at the end

It can be confusing “face with spiral eyes” for screen reader users “eye in speech bubble” when you use emojis in the middle “pile of poo” of your sentences.

Putting emojis in the middle of a sentence or paragraph “disrupts the flow for visually impaired users and delivers a poor user experience.” It is recommended to keep any emojis at the end of your message in order for those who use screen readers to easily follow.

“A friend sent me a text the other day that said this: ‘Wishing you a prosperous new year excited face with money symbols for eyes and stuck-out tongue excited face with money symbols for eyes and stuck-out tongue excited face with money symbols for eyes and stuck-out tongue excited face with money symbols for eyes and stuck-out tongue. You guys free tonight? Give me a call.’ …I never got to the part where I was supposed to give them a call.” — Beth at Easterseals

3. Don’t replace words

Never use an emoji as a replacement for an actual word. This makes it more difficult for ALL users to understand, not just visually impaired users.

“For example, if you are substituting the word ‘scary’ with a scared emoji face, although some may be able to convey your message meaning, for a screen reader user a post may read ‘Halloween was so — face screaming in fear — this year’.” — Kelly Chan

I find myself struggling to read these kinds of messages as well. Please make it easier for everyone and stick to using your words. I don’t want to decipher your Tweet like it’s a caveman drawing.

4. No emoji bullet lists, please

I find a bullet-point list using emojis as bullet points DAILY on LinkedIn. Sure, emojis can add a lot of visual interest to your post, but you only need one or two to draw someone’s eye. Your post is much more valuable to readers if it is actually readable. Drew Herrema has a great LinkedIn post about this topic:

5. Don’t rely on emojis

It’s no doubt that emojis offer a quick solution for conveying a lot of things very quickly. Many people have started to use emojis as a crutch for conveying emotion and context without having to say anything. This might be useful for your casual conversations, but if you rely on emojis for public communication you won’t be able to convey your message to a large portion of the audience.

6. Be careful about context

There is a good chance that your audience spans across various cultures, age groups, and nationalities. Different people can have completely different meanings for certain emojis/symbols, so something innocent can mean something completely different to them. I’m looking at you eggplant emoji.

“This ambiguity is proving to be particularly challenging as more and more computer-mediated communications constitute evidence in legal cases and police investigations, including a case in which a judge ruled that a prospective tenant owed a landlord unpaid rent, after determining that a message containing a string of emojis conveyed clear intent to take possession of the apartment, even though no actual contracts were ever signed.” — CBC News

Additional reading

• Voicemoji →
  Check out how users can use their voice to type with emojis
• Deque →
  How screen readers read punctuation and symbols
• Cecilie Skou Anderson’s post on Be My Eyes →
  10 tips on making accessible social media posts.