Your workplace chats could soon get a lot more interesting thanks to a new update coming to Google Workspace.
The company’s Google Chat service is now allowing users to create and use their own custom emojis to be used within your personal and work conversations.
Whether it’s your cutest pet, a favorite office snack, or just a random in-joke that only you and your co-workers will get, the chat software is now offering maximum creative potential for emoji fans.
Google Chat custom emojis
Google says the addition of custom emojis was one of its top feature requests, with the service already available in competing online collaboration services such as Slack.
“Emojis are a great way for people to express themselves in Google Chat,” the company wrote in a Google Workspace update blog (opens in new tab). “We’re excited to announce that we’re making emojis even more expressive and personalized by allowing people to create custom emojis.”
Users can create custom emojis in the web versions of Chat or Gmail by navigating to the “Create” button within the emoji picker. There, you can upload an image of your choice and give it a descriptive name, and then use your custom emoji while sending or reacting to messages in Chat.
Once created, everyone in an organization can view and use custom emojis uploaded by their colleagues in Chat messages and reactions. However, custom emojis won’t be available if you’re talking to guests or external participants.
And to make sure nothing offensive sneaks through, admins can set organizational guidelines and designate emoji managers who can browse and delete custom emojis that might not adhere to the company’s guidelines.
Custom emojis will start rolling out to all Google Workspace customers, as well as legacy G Suite Basic and Business customers on November 8 – however users with personal Google Accounts won’t be able to use the service.
The move comes shortly after a new Google Docs update allowed users to search for and insert emojis directly inline with the text. Users will now simply need to type in “@” followed by the term, emotion, object or whatever other thing they need to bring up a pop-up menu of emojis.
