You have seen a face like (´｡• ᵕ •｡`) in a caption and want to type kaomoji on your iPhone without copying from a website every time. That is a keyboard problem, and an iPhone offers three ways to solve it.
One is already on your phone, one turns a short word into any face you like, and one is a keyboard with a kaomoji panel. Whether a kaomoji or an emoji suits the moment is covered in the kaomoji and emoji guide; this one is about getting the faces onto the screen.
The kaomoji list already hidden in your iPhone
iOS does include kaomoji. The Japanese Kana keyboard has a key marked ^_^ that opens a long list of text faces Apple supplies: happy, sad, surprised, embarrassed and more. It is free and needs no app.
It has three drawbacks:
- It is Apple's list, not yours. You cannot edit or reorder the faces Apple supplies.
- You switch keyboards to reach it. Every face means a trip to the Japanese keyboard and back.
- The key changes job. It only reads ^_^ when nothing is waiting to be converted. While you type kana, the same key becomes 小゛゜ and makes the last character small or adds the voicing marks ゛ and ゜.
Adding the Japanese Kana keyboard without changing your language
A keyboard is only an input method. Adding one leaves your iPhone's language, region and system font as they are.
- Open Settings, then General, Keyboard, Keyboards.
- Tap Add New Keyboard and choose Japanese.
- Tick Kana, the layout with the ^_^ key, then tap Done.
- In any text field, tap the globe key at the bottom left until the grid of kana appears, or touch and hold it to pick from a list.
- With nothing typed yet, tap ^_^ in the bottom row of the kana keys, to the left of わ.
- A row of faces fills the bar above the keys. Swipe it sideways for more, or tap the arrow at its right-hand end to open the full list in place of the keys.
- Tap a face and it drops into your text.
To remove it later, go back to Keyboards, tap Edit and delete the Japanese entry.
Follow along in Fontora: Font & Nickname Maker
Free on the App Store for iPhone and iPad.
App Store
Text Replacement for the faces you use every day
Most people reach for the same three or four cute kaomoji. For those, Text Replacement beats any list, because you never switch keyboards.
It lives at Settings, General, Keyboard, Text Replacement. Tap the plus button and fill in two fields: Phrase is the kaomoji itself, and Shortcut is what you type to get it. From then on, typing the shortcut in Apple's keyboard brings the face up in the suggestion bar, and pressing space swaps it in.
Pick shortcuts you would never type by accident: a real word turns into a face mid-sentence, while hugg or blushh will not.
Replacements sync to other devices signed in to the same Apple Account with iCloud. Because they run through Apple's own keyboard, they also keep working in apps that block third-party keyboards.
Fill Text Replacement from Apple's list
The awkward part is getting an unusual face into the Phrase field. For any face in Apple's list, the Japanese keyboard solves it: while you are in that field, switch to Kana, tap ^_^ and pick the face. Any other face can be pasted in once, copied from wherever you saw it. Do that for your three favourites, give each a shortcut, and you will rarely need the list again.
Typing kaomoji on iPhone from a keyboard panel
Text Replacement suits a handful of faces, not browsing. Copy-and-paste websites have huge collections but pull you out of the conversation. A keyboard with a kaomoji panel is the comfortable middle.
Fontora, one of our own apps, works this way. Its keyboard has kaomoji alongside symbol packs such as stars, hearts and arrows, and inside the app you can search, favourite and copy them in one tap. The keyboard works with Allow Full Access turned off. Some symbol packs are premium, unlocked with Fontora Pro or for 24 hours by watching a short video, so not everything is free.
Keeping Full Access off matters with any keyboard: Apple warns that Full Access lets the developer transmit what you type, and inserting a face does not need it. Two limits apply to every third-party keyboard: iOS does not allow them in password and other secure fields, and some apps turn them off. The setup guide walks through adding one, and this troubleshooting guide covers a keyboard that keeps disappearing.
Choosing faces that look the same on every phone
A kaomoji is ordinary text, not an image. That is why it pastes anywhere text is accepted and why it can change on the way: the receiving device draws each character with its own fonts, so a missing character becomes an empty box, and one borrowed from a different font can knock the face out of line.
The safest faces use characters every phone has: common punctuation and Latin letters, as in (^o^) or (>.<), and characters from the standard Japanese character set, as in ヽ(・∀・)ノ or (＾▽＾).
The ones that can break borrow from rarer scripts:
- Kannada letters, like the eyes in ಠ_ಠ.
- Thai characters, such as the ๑ cheek in (๑˃ᴗ˂).
- Combining marks, accents stacked on a character to make eyebrows or a blush, which some apps misplace.
- Phonetic letters, like the small curved mouth in the face at the top of this article.
Apps that draw their own text, some games among them, can show boxes even when the phone itself has the font. Before using a face somewhere it matters, send it to a friend with a different phone.
Screen readers such as VoiceOver read a kaomoji aloud as a string of symbol names, so a charming face can sound like noise. Keep faces at the end of a sentence or bio, and never let one carry information.
If you want the rest of your phone to match the faces, the kawaii aesthetic guide covers it.
Quick answers
Does adding the Japanese keyboard change my iPhone's language?
No. Language, region and system font stay as they were, and you can delete the keyboard whenever you like.
Why does a kaomoji show up as boxes for my friend?
Their phone, or the app they are using, has no font for one of the characters, for example a Kannada, Thai or phonetic letter. Swap it for a face built from punctuation and characters found in Japanese fonts.
Can I put kaomoji in my Instagram or TikTok name?
Not in the username or handle, which accepts only a limited set of characters. A display name or bio may accept them, but each platform decides, so check after saving. Styling an Instagram bio and cute fonts for bios go further.
Do kaomoji work on Android?
Yes. They are plain text, but how they look depends on that phone's fonts, which is why simpler faces travel best.
Where to get it
Fontora: Font & Nickname Maker puts kaomoji, symbol packs and 32 included text styles in one keyboard that types with Allow Full Access turned off.
Set up Text Replacement for your three favourite faces either way.