Coronavirus impacting release date of new emojis in 2021

Smartphone users will have to wait a little longer for new emojis.

A non-profit group called the 'Unicode Constortium' oversees the creation of emojis.

The group has decided to postpone the release of version 14.0 of the Unicode Standard by 6 months.

Unicode Constortium, which relies heavily on volunteers, is pushing back the release date due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

Typically, new emojis are announced earlier in the year and added to mobile devices in September. The group says any new emoji characters incorporated into Emoji 14.0 would appear on phones and other devices in 2022.

"Under the current circumstances we've heard that our contributors have a lot on their plates at the moment and decided it was in the best interests of our volunteers and the organizations that depend on the standard to push out our release date," said Mark Davis, President of the Consortium. "This year we simply can't commit to the same schedule we've adhered to in the past."

Some new emojis that were part of Unicode's 13.0 standard will be released this fall, including the transgender flag and a gender-neutral Santa Claus.