Top 5: Japan’s cutest Kaomoji apps

SHARE:

Kaomoji

This is part of our cute Japanese apps series (RSS), examining a trend of ‘kawaii’ success stories emerging from Japan’s mobile space.

Emoji or emoticons are a big part of Japan’s kawaii culture. People of all ages in Japan express their feelings using emoji, especially on mobile. So it’s no surprise that there are plenty of apps dedicated to ‘Kaomoji’, or facial expressions conveyed through symbols. Here is a list of the best known Kaomoji apps!

Emocolo

EmocoloEmocolo lets users share the latest kaomoji, ranging from simple kaomoji like good morning, thank you, or just a sad face. Users can find the type of kaomoji that they’re looking for, and can customize them freely. Emocolo is available for Android if you’d like to give it a try. This app has also partnered with what the developer says is the biggest kaomoji portal, Kamoji Cafe.

Minna no Kaomoji jiten

Minnna-no-Kaomoji-jitenThis app’s name can be translated as Everyone’s Kaomoji dictionary. Tapping on your choice of kaomoji copies it, and you can then paste it to text message, Twitter, or Line. Minna no kaomoji jiten is available for both iOS and on Android. So far it has a 4.5 rating on Google Play (over 9,700 reviews) and 4.0 rating on the App Store.

Girl’s Kaomoji Book

Girls-Kaomoji-BookThis app claims to be the first app solely dedicated to kaomoji. One of the largest iPhone and iPad app portal sites, meet-i, chose this app as the number one lifestyle app back in 2011. It integrates with both Twitter and mail, allowing users to post from within the app. Girl’s Kaomoji Book is available for both iOS and Android.

Girl’s Kaomoji Jiten 5000

girls-kaomoji-jiten-5000This kaomoji app has over 20,000 kaomoji, a pretty large repertoire to say the least! It takes a log of kaomoji used in the past as well as the most recently used kaomoji. At one point it held the number one free app ranking for iOS and ranked second in the same category on Google Play. Girl’s Kaomoji Jiten 5000 can be downloaded for both iOS and Android.

Kao Mojimoji

kaomojimojiThis Android app contains over 16,000 kaomoji and has a ranking feature, introducing most recent popular kaomoji everyday. The app keeps up to 300 records of past kaomoji usage, and just for fun it also counts how many times you have used a particular kaomoji. This latter function gives users a good reflection of what how they have been feeling based on just kaomoji usage.

On the iPhone and iPad portal mentioned above, there are over 50 apps listed when you search for kaomoji. So this list is just scratching the surface, and we encourage you to explore further. If you have a favorite kaomoji app, do let us know in the comments!

Simple text messages somehow lack the personal touch that so many Japanese people consider important. Kaomoji are an effective way to add a little personality! (˘︶˘).。.:*♡