Lying Face Emoji

A yellow face with raised eyebrows, slightly enlarged eyes, a small frown, and a long, protruding nose. The nose is the whole point. It's a direct reference to Pinocchio, the wooden puppet from Carlo Collodi's 1883 Italian novel The Adventures of Pinocchio, whose nose famously grew whenever he told a lie.

Except, here's the thing: that's not quite what happens in the original book. Literary Hub investigated and found that the nose-growing-for-lying happens only a handful of times in Collodi's text, and the nose also grows when it's first carved by Geppetto, for no reason related to dishonesty. The nose-as-lie-detector was Disney's invention), amplified in their 1940 animated film where they "honed in on the puppet's extending nose, making it central to his movie in a way that it is not in the book." Collodi's actual point was about the dangers of disobedience and the value of education, not about lying. But Disney's version is the one that stuck in global culture, and the emoji inherits that Disney DNA, not the literary original.

Emojipedia describes 🤥 as representing "lying, a liar, and other concepts of deceit and dishonesty to varying degrees of intensity." In practice, it's more playful than accusatory. "I totally studied for that exam 🤥" is a lighthearted confession. "Sure, you only had ONE drink 🤥" is teasing a friend's obvious fib. The emoji softens the charge of dishonesty by wrapping it in a cartoon character's nose, making it safer to call out lies without starting a fight.

🤥 fills a specific niche: it's the polite way to say "that's not true" in digital communication. On X and TikTok, it appears under posts with dubious claims, exaggerated stories, and obvious self-promotion. Dropping 🤥 in a reply is a one-emoji fact-check that's softer than 🤔 (which is skeptical but neutral) and less aggressive than directly writing "you're lying."

In group chats, 🤥 is the playful accusation emoji. "I'm not jealous 🤥" is someone admitting their own jealousy through the joke of denying it. "He said he's fine 🤥" is a friend calling out someone's obvious deflection. The Pinocchio reference makes the accusation feel cartoonish rather than serious, which is why it works between friends in a way that a direct "you're lying" wouldn't.

Brands occasionally use 🤥 in marketing for self-aware humor: "We definitely didn't eat all the samples before the launch 🤥." In professional settings, 🤥 is risky. Even in casual Slack, accusing a colleague of lying (even jokingly) crosses lines that other emojis don't. It's best kept to personal conversations where the trust level is high enough for playful dishonesty accusations.

One niche use worth noting: 🤥 has become part of the emoji vocabulary for calling out misinformation on social media. In comment sections under dubious news articles or viral claims, 🤥 serves as a crowd-sourced credibility marker, a way for users to signal "this doesn't seem true" without writing a paragraph.

The story behind 🤥 begins in Florence, 1881.

Carlo Collodi, a Florentine journalist and satirist, began serializing The Adventures of Pinocchio in a children's magazine. The story of a wooden puppet who comes to life was published across 26 issues and completed in January 1883. It was dark, moralistic, and at times brutal, reflecting post-unification Italy's anxieties about education and discipline. Pinocchio's greatest flaw in the original wasn't lying. It was refusing to learn.

The nose barely features. Literary Hub analyzed the original text and found that the nose grows only a handful of times, and not consistently for lying. It grows when first carved by Geppetto (before Pinocchio can even speak), and on a couple of occasions as punishment from the Blue Fairy. Collodi apparently didn't see the nose as the story's central metaphor.

Disney changed that completely). Their 1940 animated film made the nose-as-lie-detector the story's most memorable visual device. The scene where Pinocchio's nose sprouts flowers and a bird's nest after a chain of lies became one of the most iconic moments in animation history. From that point forward, a long nose meant lying, full stop. The cultural association is so strong that scientists at the University of Granada coined "the Pinocchio Effect" for their discovery that lying actually changes nose temperature (it drops between 0.6°C and 1.2°C while the forehead temperature rises). Your nose doesn't grow when you lie, but it does get colder. Science found its own version of the fairy tale.

When Unicode approved 🤥 in Unicode 9.0 (2016), they named it simply "Lying Face" rather than "Pinocchio Face" (probably to avoid intellectual property issues with Disney). But everyone knows who that nose belongs to. The emoji gives digital communication something it desperately needed: a way to call out dishonesty that's playful enough to preserve the relationship. Writing "you're lying" ends conversations. Sending 🤥 continues them.

Approved in Unicode 9.0 (2016) as U+1F925U+1F925 LYING FACE. Added to Emoji 3.0 in 2016. Same Unicode 9.0 batch as 🤡 Clown Face, 🤢 Nauseated Face, and 🤧 Sneezing Face. The design depicts the Pinocchio growing-nose concept, though the cultural source is more Disney's 1940 film than Collodi's 1883 book. The CLDR labels include face, lie, and Pinocchio.

1. 1883Carlo Collodi publishes The Adventures of Pinocchio in Italy. The nose barely features as a lie detector.↗
2. 1940Disney's animated film makes the growing nose the story's central visual device, forever linking long noses with lying↗
3. 200111-year-old Veronique Eldridge-Smith proposes the Pinocchio Paradox: "My nose will grow now"↗
4. 2012University of Granada discovers the real "Pinocchio Effect": lying changes nose temperature by 0.6-1.2°C↗
5. 2016Unicode 9.0 approves 🤥 as U+1F925 LYING FACE, giving the Pinocchio reference its own emoji↗

• •In Collodi's original 1883 book, Pinocchio's nose grows only a handful of times, and not consistently for lying. Disney's 1940 film) invented the nose-as-lie-detector by making it the movie's central visual device.
• •The "Pinocchio Effect" is real: University of Granada researchers found that lying changes nose temperature (drops 0.6-1.2°C) and forehead temperature (rises 0.6-1.5°C). They achieved 85% accuracy in deception detection using infrared thermography.
• •The Pinocchio Paradox ("My nose will grow now") was proposed in 2001 by 11-year-old Veronique Eldridge-Smith, daughter of a logic philosopher. If Pinocchio says it and it's true, his nose shouldn't grow, making it false. If it's false, his nose should grow, making it true. Philosophers still debate it.
• •Collodi's actual moral wasn't about lying. It was about the dangers of disobedience and refusing to learn. The Smithsonian notes that the story championed education, discipline, and work ethic, reflecting post-unification Italy's national priorities.
• •Since 2004, courts have seen emoji and emoticon references spike by over 50% year-over-year, with suggestive or deceptive emoji like 🤥 increasingly appearing as evidence in harassment and fraud cases.
• •🤥 is one of the least ambiguous emojis in the entire set. Nobody reads it as positive. The Pinocchio nose makes the meaning unmistakable across every culture that knows the story. It's the emoji equivalent of calling someone a liar to their face, but with plausible deniability because it's just an emoji.

• •In some contexts, 🤥 can be read as a serious accusation of dishonesty rather than playful teasing. Between close friends, the playful reading dominates. Between acquaintances or in professional settings, it can feel like calling someone a liar, which is always confrontational.
• •Not everyone knows the Pinocchio reference. In cultures where the story isn't well-known, the long nose might read as a different kind of insult or simply be confusing. The cultural universality of the Pinocchio metaphor is often overestimated.
• •Using 🤥 about yourself ("I'll definitely start my diet Monday 🤥") is self-deprecating humor. Using it about someone else ("She says she's happy 🤥") can be gossipy and unkind. Direction matters.

• •Pinocchio (1940 Disney film) established the growing-nose-for-lying concept that the emoji references. The original 1883 book barely features this mechanic.
• •"Liar Liar" (1997 Jim Carrey film) explored the concept of being unable to lie, though without the nose-growing element.
• •Shrek 2 (2004) features a scene where Pinocchio tries to lie and his nose grows, referencing the now-universal cultural shorthand.
• •The Pinocchio Paradox (2001) became a philosophy thought experiment that's been published in academic journals about logic and self-reference.