Smileys & Emotion · Emoji 0.6
💀Skull Emoji
Generally, 💀 means “I’m dead.” It's a reaction to something awful or hilarious.
The 💀 emoji is a skull.
- Unicode
- U+1F480
- Released
- 2010
- Shortcode
- :skull:
- Skin tones
- No
- Popularity
- #51 most used
01 — Meaning
What does the 💀 Skull emoji mean?
People search for this character under a lot of different names, and the ones we have collected number 10.
People also look for it as skull face emoji, death emoji.
02 — Platforms
Skull emoji on iPhone, Android, WhatsApp and X
Same code on both ends, different drawing on each screen — here is the skull as 9 vendors ship it.
See the whole set the way each system draws it — iPhone emojis, Android emojis, WhatsApp emojis and Discord emojis.
03 — Copy & codes
Skull emoji copy and paste
Everything here is the same character in different notation — including the shortcode chat apps know it by, :skull:.
All emoji copy and paste →In your code
Escapes for the languages people actually paste this into. Every one of them produces the same character, and that character is U+1F480.
04 — How to type
How to type the 💀 Skull emoji
No picker to hand? The skull can be typed straight from the keyboard — the codes for that are below, one per system.
05 — Download
Skull emoji PNG and SVG
Grab the skull as transparent PNG or SVG. Each system ships its own drawing, and the licence stays with the vendor, all 9 of them.
Emoji PNG library →
Apple
Google
Twitter / X
Facebook
Microsoft
WhatsApp
JoyPixels
06 — Combinations
Skull emoji combinations
Ready-made combos built around skull for bios, captions and comments. Tap to copy.
All combinations →Want two emojis fused into one sticker instead of set side by side? Emoji Kitchen does that with 💀, and there are more ready-made pairs in emoji combinations and aesthetic emoji combos.
08 — In conversation
What 💀 means from a girl or a guy
Same emoji, different intent depending on who sent it and what came before.
09 — Around the world
What 💀 means in other countries
In US and UK internet slang it means “I’m dead” from laughing, not an actual reference to death.
Used instead of a laughing face to mark something as hilarious or absurd.
Without the context it just reads as death, danger, or a warning sign.
Before you send it: Great for reacting to something funny with friends; risky as a reaction to actual bad news.
10 — Apps
What 💀 means on TikTok, WhatsApp and Discord
The character is the same everywhere, but the artwork and the reading of it change from app to app.
12 — Difference
💀 vs ☠️ — what is the difference?
Two emojis that get mixed up constantly. They are different characters with different names.
Unicode name: Skull
Code: U+1F480 · added 2010
Shortcode: :skull:
Generally, 💀 means “I’m dead.”
Unicode name: Skull and Crossbones
Code: U+2620 U+FE0F · added 2015
Shortcode: :skull_and_crossbones:
Generally, the ☠️ means something is dangerous, serious, or potentially harmful.
13 — History
Where the 💀 Skull emoji came from
This one is older than Unicode emoji: Japanese carriers were drawing it on their handsets years before the standard existed, which it finally joined in 2010.
Same character every time — U+1F480 never changed. Only the drawing did, and only because each vendor redraws its own set. Someone on an older phone still sees the older picture.
Long before Unicode had emoji, Japanese carriers shipped their own picture sets.
💀 existed there as
KDDI au E4F8, SoftBank E11C.
Those codes are why it survived into the standard at all — Unicode had to keep Japanese messages readable.
Skull was approved as U+1F480 and shipped in Emoji 0.6 (2010). Emoji 0.6 is the original 2010 batch that came over from the Japanese sets.
Every vendor keeps its own artwork, so 💀 is redrawn by Apple, Google, Twitter / X, Facebook, OpenMoji, Samsung, Microsoft, WhatsApp, JoyPixels. The character you send never changes — only the picture does.
14 — FAQ