The first version of Apple Color Emoji was released alongside iPhone OS 2.2 in November 2008 and contained 471 individual emoji glyphs.^[9] Originally limited to Japanese iPhone models, this restriction was later lifted.^[10]

The designers of the first Apple Color Emoji typeface were Raymond Sepulveda, Angela Guzman and Ollie Wagner.^[11]

Due to the iPhone originally launching in Japan on the SoftBank network, some Apple emoji designs may have been created to resemble those on SoftBank phones.^[12] For example, 💃 (defined by Unicode as 'dancer' with no specified gender) is feminine on Apple and SoftBank phones^[13] but was previously masculine or gender-neutral on others.^[14][15]

In the years 2011–2018 the Apple Color Emoji font expanded from 471 to 3,633 emoji^[16] as of September 2021.^[17]

An updated emoji keyboard was released in iOS version 8.3, this update also added varied skin tones and same-gender couples included in Unicode 6.^[18] As a result, the human emoji faces switched to a neutral yellow skin tone by default, similar to the smiley emoji.^[19][20]

The majority of Apple Color Emoji designs were updated with the release of iOS 10.2 in December 2016, with many appearing to be 3D-rendered.^[21] According to Apple Vice President of User Interface Design Alan Dye, emoji redesigns were due to the advent of Animoji, Memoji, and higher resolution screens.^[22]

157 new emoji were added to iOS in October 2018.^[23]

The designers of the Apple Color Emoji typeface in versions after the initial release have not been publicly credited, following Apple's standard practice of not crediting work to individuals.^{[citation needed]} Former Apple employees have offered accounts of who created various designs.^[24][25][26]

Prior to iOS 5 SoftBank encoding was used for encoding emoji on Apple devices. Beginning with iOS 5, emoji are encoded using the Unicode standard.^[27][28] Emoji glyphs are stored as PNG images,^[29] at several resolutions (strikes of 20, 32, 40, 48, 64, 96 and 160 pixels squared) using a proprietary "sbix" table that was later standardized in OpenType version 1.8.^[29][30][31]

The font contains a number of Easter eggs. Several glyphs contain portions of the text of Apple's Think different advertisement ("Here's to the crazy ones..."), including 1F4CB "Clipboard" (📋), 1F4C4 "Page facing up" (📄), 1F4D1 "Bookmark Tabs" (📑), and 1F4D6 "Open book" (📖), among others. Other emoji, specified as generic objects, appear as Apple products. For example, 1F4BB "Personal computer" (💻) appears as a modern MacBook,^[32] while 231A "Wristwatch" (⌚) shows an Apple Watch. 1F301 "Foggy" (🌁) shows the Golden Gate Bridge behind San Francisco fog, a reference to Apple's California headquarters, and 1F4F0 "Newspaper" (📰)'s headline reads "The Apple Times".^[33]

A variety of styles are used in the original sets. For example, 🐬 and 🐙 (dolphin and octopus) were quite stylized with 'button' eyes, while 🐈 and 🐀 (cat and rat) were more realistic, resembling watercolor paintings. This mixture of styles creates a range of possible designs: for example, 🐏 and 🐑 (ram and sheep) look clearly different, as do 🐫 and 🐪 (Bactrian camel and dromedary).

Because of the calendar emoji (📅) showing July 17, this date was chosen for the annual World Emoji Day.^[34] The date originally referred to the day Apple premiered its calendar application, iCal, in 2002.^[35][36]

Although primarily intended for onscreen display (iOS having limited printing capabilities), some printed displays and signs have used Apple Color Emoji designs.^[37] New York magazine used Apple Color Emoji in a printed feature on the growing use of emoji.^[38]

Below is the full list of emoji. If this typeface is not installed on your system, they may display in the default font.

• Core Text

• Review of Apple Color Emoji by Si Daniels, Program Manager for Fonts at Microsoft
• Top five nonsensical relationships you have to remember to be able to find the right emoji, ever (Casey Johnson)