U+FE0F "️" Variation Selector-16 Unicode Character
Unicode Version 17.0
️
U+FE0F "️" Variation Selector-16 is a non-printing format character that instructs a compatible system to display a preceding emoji character in its colorful, fully graphical emoji style rather than as a simple black-and-white text symbol. This selector is commonly used after standard Unicode characters that have both a text presentation and an emoji presentation, ensuring they render with the vibrant, pictorial form seen in modern messaging apps. Without this variation selector, the same base character would typically appear as a monochrome glyph, so U+FE0F plays a crucial role in achieving the intended visual appearance of many popular emojis.
General Properties
| Code Point | U+FE0F |
| Version Added | 3.2 |
| Name | Variation Selector-16 |
| Block | Variation Selectors |
| General Category | Nonspacing Mark |
| Canonical Combining Class | Not Reordered |
| Bidirectional Class | Nonspacing Mark |
| Alias | VS16 (abbreviation) |
Encodings
| HTML Decimal Encoding | ️ |
| HTML Hex Encoding | ️ |
| UTF-8 Encoding | 0xEF 0xB8 0x8F |
| UTF-16 Encoding | 0xFE0F |
| UTF-32 Encoding | 0x0000FE0F |
| C/C++/Java Escape | \ufe0f |