emoticon

noun

emo·ti·con i-ˈmō-ti-ˌkän

plural emoticons

: a group of keyboard characters (such as :-)) that typically represents a facial expression or suggests an attitude or emotion and that is used especially in computerized communications (such as email) compare emoji

Example Sentences

Recent Examples on the Web On November 20, Hsu posted a very suggestive photo of herself with Liu with only a smiley face emoticon in the caption. —

Aimée Lutkin, ELLE, 1 June 2023 Decades of texting have seen emoticons made from colon and parenthesis replaced by more obvious and emotive emojis. —

Cody Godwin, USA TODAY, 18 Feb. 2023 On June 23, 2004, AVEN adopted cake as an official community emoticon. —

Courtney Lane, Bon Appétit, 22 June 2022 The outline of an emoticon. —

cleveland, 21 Nov. 2022 Their favorite emoticon was ;). —

Vulture, 6 Jan. 2022 Wayne likes this: thumbs-up emoticon. —

Wayne and Wanda, Anchorage Daily News, 11 Sep. 2021 Results generally support earlier findings, indicating that the valence of the cue (smiley or emoticon) affects the corresponding impression formation. —

Ncbi Rofl, Discover Magazine, 28 Aug. 2012 These have been decisions taken in the spirit of the shrug emoticon. —

Ian Parker, The New Yorker, 22 Feb. 2021 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'emoticon.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.