Splatter Emoji

A chaotic blob of something viscous, mid-impact. Most platforms render it as a purple splatter, the kind of shape you'd get from dropping paint, throwing powder, or stepping on a grape with too much enthusiasm.

This emoji has a fascinating backstory. It was originally proposed as "Splash" (L2/23-261) by Aurora Zeng and Kamile Demir in July 2022. The Unicode Technical Committee renamed it to "Splatter" during review. The proposers made a specific argument: this emoji should NOT represent water. We already have 💦 (sweat droplets) and 💧 (droplet) for that. Instead, 🫟 represents non-water splashes: paint, powder, sauce, ink, slime, and, critically, the colored powder thrown during Holi, the Hindu festival of colors celebrated by hundreds of millions of people.

The emoji was approved in Unicode 16.0 (September 2024) and ranked as the second most anticipated emoji in the 2024 World Emoji Awards poll, behind only Face with Bags Under Eyes. Apple shipped it in iOS 18.4 (March 2025).

The purple color wasn't specified in the proposal, but most platforms went with it. Purple sits at an interesting crossover: it's artsy enough for paint, festive enough for Holi powder, and gory enough for the splatter horror genre. One emoji, six different vibes depending on context.

🫟 is brand new and still finding its identity. But the early lanes are already visible.

Holi festival. The proposal explicitly cited Holi as a primary use case. Holi is the Hindu spring festival where participants throw colored powder (gulal) and water at each other in celebration. Hundreds of millions of people celebrate it, primarily in India and Nepal. Before 🫟, there was no way to represent a color powder explosion in emoji. 🎨 (artist palette) and 💦 (water droplets) were the closest approximations, and neither was right.

Art and creative expression. Jackson Pollock didn't live to see emoji, but his artistic descendants are already claiming 🫟. Paint splatter, drip art, abstract expressionism, messy studio sessions. The emoji captures that mid-action moment when paint hits canvas. "Working on something 🫟🎨" is the new studio selfie caption.

Gaming, specifically Splatoon. Nintendo's Splatoon franchise (30 million+ copies sold across three games) is a third-person shooter where players compete by covering territory with colored ink. The entire game is about splattering. The 🫟 emoji is basically the Splatoon logo in emoji form, and the gaming community noticed immediately.

Mess and chaos. Spilled coffee, dropped sauce, cooking disasters, kids with face paint. 🫟 fills the "things got messy" gap that 💦 was too clean for. It's the emoji of controlled (or uncontrolled) chaos.

Horror and Halloween. The purple color leans into the splatter film genre's aesthetic. Blood splatter, gore effects, haunted house decor. Dexter)'s blood spatter analysis scenes now have an emoji. October usage is guaranteed to spike.

Nickelodeon nostalgia. If you grew up watching Double Dare) or getting slimed at the Kids' Choice Awards, 🫟 is your childhood in emoji form. Green slime was Nickelodeon's entire brand identity from the 1980s through the 2000s.

The splatter has a deeper cultural history than a purple blob might suggest.

The oldest context is Holi, the Hindu spring festival that dates back centuries. Participants throw colored powder (gulal) and colored water at each other, celebrating the triumph of good over evil, the arrival of spring, and the divine love of Radha and Krishna. The festival is mentioned in ancient texts and poems from the 4th century CE. Hundreds of millions of people celebrate it annually, primarily in India and Nepal. The visual of colored powder exploding in mid-air is one of the most photographed moments in any religious celebration worldwide. Before 🫟, there was no emoji to capture it.

The artistic splatter enters the story in the mid-20th century. Jackson Pollock pioneered "drip painting" in the late 1940s, flinging and pouring household paint onto canvases laid flat on the floor. Critics called it random. Pollock shot back: "I can control the flow of the paint, there is no accident." His painting No. 5, 1948 sold for $140 million in 2006 (adjusted), making it one of the most expensive paintings ever sold. The splatter as art form was established. (Fun footnote: a 2006 Lithub article argues that drip painting was actually invented by a Ukrainian grandmother, not Pollock.)

The horror splatter arrived in 1963 when the term "splatter film" was coined to describe movies that focus on graphic gore. The genre has roots in 19th-century French Grand Guignol theatre, which staged realistic scenes of blood and carnage. Dexter) (2006-2013, revived 2021) made blood spatter analysis into mainstream entertainment, even though real-world bloodstain pattern analysis has been called "completely unreliable" by a 2009 National Academy of Sciences report.

Then came Nickelodeon. From the mid-1980s through the 2000s, green slime was Nickelodeon's signature material, appearing on Double Dare), the Kids' Choice Awards, and virtually every show on the network. Getting slimed was a rite of passage. The Color Run (launched 2011) extended the splatter aesthetic to fitness events, showering runners with colored corn starch powder at intervals. It's drawn over 4 million participants globally, though it's been criticized for appropriating Holi.

The emoji version captures all of these. A purple splatter can be Holi powder, a Pollock painting, a horror movie still, slime from Double Dare, or just the pasta sauce that didn't stay in the pot.

Splatter was proposed as "Splash" in L2/23-261 by Aurora Zeng and Kamile Demir on July 31, 2022. The proposal argued that existing water emojis (💦, 💧) couldn't represent non-water splashes: paint, powder, sauce, ink, or the colored powder of Holi. The UTC accepted it and renamed it from "Splash" to "SPLATTER" (U+1FADFU+1FADF) during the Unicode 16.0 process.

It was approved in Unicode 16.0 (September 10, 2024) alongside seven other emojis including 🫜 Root Vegetable, 🪏 Shovel, and 🪗 Harp. Google shipped first on September 10, 2024. Apple followed on March 31, 2025 with iOS 18.4.

The emoji ranked second most anticipated in the 2024 World Emoji Awards, behind Face with Bags Under Eyes. The fact that a purple blob beat out a harp, a shovel, and a fingerprint in public voting says something about the universal appeal of things going splat.

1. 400Holi festival mentioned in ancient Indian texts and poetry. Colored powder celebrations predate recorded history
2. 1897Grand Guignol theatre opens in Paris, staging realistic scenes of gore and carnage↗
3. 1947Jackson Pollock pioneers drip painting, creating splatters as high art↗
4. 1963The term 'splatter film' is coined to describe gore-focused horror movies↗
5. 1986Nickelodeon's Double Dare premieres, making slime and messy splatters a children's TV staple↗
6. 2011The Color Run launches in Phoenix, AZ. Grows to 4 million+ global participants↗
7. 2015Nintendo's Splatoon launches. The franchise will sell 30 million+ copies across three games↗
8. 2024Splatter approved in Unicode 16.0 (September 10). Ranked 2nd most anticipated emoji in World Emoji Awards↗

• •Holi is mentioned in ancient Indian texts and poems from the 4th century CE. The festival celebrates the triumph of good over evil and the arrival of spring. Hundreds of millions of people participate annually, making it one of the most visually spectacular celebrations on Earth. The 🫟 emoji gives it digital representation for the first time.
• •The Color Run was launched in 2011 in Phoenix, Arizona by Travis Snyder and has hosted over 500 global events with more than 4 million participants. Runners get showered with colored corn starch powder at intervals. It's been criticized by South Asian communities as cultural appropriation of Holi.
• •Nickelodeon's green slime originated on the Canadian show "You Can't Do That On Television" (1979-1990). A contestant would get slimed whenever they said "I don't know." The substance proliferated across Double Dare, the Kids' Choice Awards, and virtually every Nick show. It became the network's signature material for two decades.
• •The "splatter film" genre has its roots in 19th-century Grand Guignol theatre in Paris, which staged realistic blood and gore for live audiences. The theatrical tradition ran from 1897 to 1962. Modern splatter films like those of George Romero and Sam Raimi are its descendants.
• •A 2006 article argues that drip painting was actually invented by a Ukrainian grandmother, Janet Sobel, not Jackson Pollock. Pollock visited an exhibition of Sobel's work in 1944 and began his drip technique shortly after. The art historian Clement Greenberg confirmed the connection but Pollock got the credit.

• •Holi, the Hindu festival of colors, is the primary cultural context the emoji was designed for. The proposal explicitly cited it as a celebration "not representable by the current emoji set." Holi's visual spectacle, clouds of colored powder filling the air, has been photographed by National Geographic, BBC, and every travel publication on Earth. 🫟 gives it an emoji for the first time.
• •Jackson Pollock's drip paintings (1947-1956) turned paint splatters into fine art worth hundreds of millions of dollars. His No. 5, 1948 sold for $140 million (adjusted). LIFE magazine famously asked in 1949: "Is he the greatest living painter in the United States?" The answer, depending on who you ask, was either obviously yes or obviously no.
• •Nintendo's Splatoon (2015-present, 30M+ copies) turned ink splattering into a competitive gaming mechanic. Players cover territory with colored ink rather than shooting opponents. Splatoon 3 sold 3.45 million copies in three days in Japan, making it the fastest-selling game in Japanese history at launch.
• •Nickelodeon slime (1979-present) defined an entire network's brand identity. Getting slimed on the Kids' Choice Awards became a celebrity rite of passage. Double Dare) (1986-1993, revived 2018) made messy physical challenges into prime-time children's entertainment. The green splatter was Nickelodeon's logo, essentially.
• •Dexter) (Showtime, 2006-2013, revived 2021) made blood spatter analysis a household term. Dexter Morgan is a forensic blood spatter analyst who's secretly a serial killer. The show's opening credits feature close-up shots of breakfast preparation that look like crime scene evidence. A 2009 National Academy of Sciences report later found that real bloodstain pattern analysis was "completely unreliable."
• •The Color Run (2011-present) has hosted 500+ events with 4 million+ participants, making paint-powder-splattering a mainstream fitness activity. But its relationship with Holi is contested: South Asian communities have raised questions about whether a for-profit fun run copying the visuals of a Hindu religious festival constitutes cultural appropriation.

• •Splatter is U+1FADFU+1FADF in Unicode 16.0. Single codepoint, no variation selector needed. Requires Unicode 16.0 support, so fallback handling is important through at least 2026.
• •The purple color is a vendor default, not a Unicode specification. Future platform updates could change the hue. Don't build logic around the color being purple.
• •Discord and Slack shortcode support may be delayed. Check platform-specific emoji lists before building pickers that include 🫟.

See the full Emoji Developer Tools guide for regex patterns, encoding helpers, and more.