Windows 10 Emoji Keyboard: Here’s How to Use It

• Not many people know that Windows 10 includes a special emoji keyboard.
• The virtual keyboard is hidden behind two shortcuts.
• Besides emojis, the keyboard includes kaomoji and special symbol support.

Emojis are anything but new. Most virtual keyboards include support for emojis, but I bet you didn’t know Windows 10 has one.

I’m not talking about the touchscreen keyboard, nor the Voice Typing feature, which allows you to add text via dictation, without typing a single word.

No, we are going to preview the dedicated emoji keyboard.

How to Use the Windows 10 Emoji Keyboard

1. Click in an input field or text document.
2. Press one of the two combinations: WIN + “.” or WIN + “;”.
3. Click on the emoji you want to use (like this one 😊).

You can also use the search box at the top to find emojis by keywords. To close the keyboard, press the Esc key or click on the X button at the top right corner. You can also drag the keyboard to move it around the screen to a position that suits you.

4. Alternatively, you can select from two additional tabs, one with kaomojis (Japanese emoticons), and one with special symbols (this one has multiple tabs included at the bottom).

Also, read about the Windows 11 emoji panel, it has some novelties you may be interested in.

This article is part of a series: Keyboard Shortcuts: The Effortless Way to Do More in Less Time

Next in the series:
Keyboard shortcuts to speed through text editing in a document

Ionuț-Alexandru Popa

I'm a writer and Editor-in-Chief at BinaryFork. I am passionate about technology, science, space exploration, and movies. I started writing about tech more than 20 years ago, after graduating in Computer Science.