The Kiss: Person, Person, Medium-dark Skin Tone, Medium Skin Tone emoji (🧑🏾❤️💋🧑🏽) shows two people sharing a romantic kiss, one with a medium-dark skin tone and the other with a medium skin tone. It means love, affection, and intimacy between partners, and it lets couples see their own skin tones reflected in a romantic emoji.
What Does the Kiss: Person, Person, Medium-dark Skin Tone, Medium Skin Tone Emoji Mean?
This emoji means romantic affection, specifically a kiss between two people, shown with two distinct skin tones.
The image depicts two gender-neutral figures leaning in to kiss, with a heart and lips symbol at the center of the sequence. The first person carries the medium-dark skin tone modifier (🏾) and the second carries the medium skin tone modifier (🏽). Because both figures use the neutral "person" base (🧑) rather than a man or woman, the emoji does not assign gender to either partner.
In practice, people use it to express love, passion, tenderness, and closeness. It sits in the People & Body emoji category, alongside the other couple and kiss emojis.
Why does the emoji show two different skin tones?
Unicode lets couple emojis carry a separate skin tone for each person, so couples can choose a combination that matches them. This particular emoji pairs medium-dark with medium, one of many combinations in the kiss family.
What Is the Technical Makeup of This Emoji?
This emoji is a ZWJ (zero width joiner) sequence of ten codepoints that renders as a single image on supported devices.
The full sequence is U+1F9D1, U+1F3FE, U+200D, U+2764, U+FE0F, U+200D, U+1F48B, U+200D, U+1F9D1, U+1F3FD. Reading it in order:
- U+1F9D1 is the person base, followed by U+1F3FE, the medium-dark skin tone modifier.
- U+200D is the zero width joiner that links the parts together.
- U+2764 with U+FE0F is the red heart in emoji presentation, and U+1F48B is the kiss mark.
- The final U+1F9D1 and U+1F3FD add the second person with the medium skin tone modifier.
The emoji arrived in Unicode 13.1 and Emoji 13.1, the release that introduced mixed skin tone couples for the kiss and couple-with-heart emojis. Its shortcode is :kiss_person_person_medium_dark_skin_tone_medium_skin_tone:.
How Do You Use This Emoji in Texting and on Social Media?
Use it to show romantic affection toward a partner, or to celebrate a couple whose skin tones match the emoji.
It works best when the people in the conversation are actually in a relationship or celebrating one. Common situations include anniversary posts, goodnight messages, and photo captions on dates or weddings.
Example messages:
- Three years today and I would choose you every time 🧑🏾❤️💋🧑🏽
- Goodnight, my love. See you in the morning 🧑🏾❤️💋🧑🏽
- Engagement shoot done! So happy with these photos 🧑🏾❤️💋🧑🏽
On social media, couples often use it in bios or as a signature at the end of a caption. It tends to read as sincere and warm rather than playful or flirty, because the full kiss with a heart is a more committed gesture than a simple blown kiss.
Why Does Skin Tone Representation Matter in Couple Emojis?
Representation matters because couples want an emoji that looks like them, and a single default yellow or one-tone pairing leaves many pairs out.
Before mixed skin tone couples were added in Emoji 13.1, people with different skin tones had to choose a tone that matched only one partner or fall back on a generic version. The mixed options let interracial and intercultural couples, as well as couples who simply have different complexions, pick a combination that reflects both people.
This emoji is one specific combination. If your tones differ from medium-dark and medium, the same kiss family includes many other pairings, and you can find them through the People & Body category.
Because the base figures are gender-neutral, the emoji also suits couples of any gender combination, including same-sex and nonbinary couples.
How Does the Emoji Look on Different Platforms?
It looks slightly different on each platform, but every supported version shows two figures kissing with a heart, and the skin tones follow the sequence.
Support depends on the operating system or app version, since this emoji is part of the 13.1 release. Based on the supported platform data:
- Apple: iOS 14.5+ and macOS 11.3+
- Google: Android 12.0+
- Microsoft: Windows 11+
- Samsung: One UI 4.0+
- WhatsApp: version 2.21.16+
- Twitter/X: Twemoji 13.1+
On older systems, the emoji may break apart into its component pieces: two separate people, a heart, and a kiss mark, instead of one combined image. If you see this, the device or app does not yet support the 13.1 sequence, and updating the software usually fixes it.
Which Emojis Pair Well With This Kiss Emoji?
Heart, sparkle, and celebration emojis pair naturally with it because they reinforce the romantic message.
Common combinations include red hearts, love letters, flowers, rings, and champagne for anniversaries. You can also add a 🥰 or 😘 for extra warmth, or a 👍 when responding to a partner's plan in a relaxed way (see the Thumbs Up emoji).
If you want to build a longer romantic message without hunting for each symbol, the Emoji Translator tool can turn a phrase into emojis, and you can then swap in this kiss emoji where it fits.
To see which romantic and couple emojis are popular at the moment, check the trending emojis page.
When Should You Avoid This Emoji?
Avoid it in professional settings and with anyone who is not your romantic partner, because a kiss emoji implies intimacy.
Sending it to a coworker, a client, or an acquaintance can come across as inappropriate, even if you mean it as a joke. It is also a poor fit for group chats where not everyone knows the relationship, since it can create confusion or embarrassment.
Be careful about using it in a new or uncertain relationship too. A full kiss with a heart can feel like a bigger statement than you intend, so a lighter reaction such as the Eyes emoji may suit early flirting better.
Finally, do not use it to represent a couple you do not know. Picking skin tones for other people can feel presumptuous, so only choose this combination for yourself or when you know it reflects the couple in question.
How Do You Copy and Paste This Emoji?
You can copy this emoji with one click on this page and paste it into any app that supports Emoji 13.1.
Click the emoji or the copy button above, then paste it into your message, caption, bio, or document using your usual paste command. Because it is a long ZWJ sequence, copying it is far easier than assembling it by hand, and the copy keeps all ten codepoints intact so the two skin tones stay correct.
If the pasted emoji appears as separate pieces on your device, check that your operating system or app meets the version requirements listed above. Once updated, the same copied emoji will display as a single kissing couple.
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