Guide
How to insert emojis in Outlook, Slack, Word and GitHub
Desktop apps rarely have an emoji button. Here is the shortcut for each one — and the shortcodes that work where a picker does not exist.
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Emoji shortcuts by app
Outlook
No picker of its own on desktop. Put the cursor in the message body and press Win + . on Windows or Control + Command + Space on Mac. Emoji survive in subject lines, and in most spam filters.
Slack
Type a colon and the first letters of the name — :fire: — and pick from autocomplete. Custom workspace emoji are uploads, not Unicode, so they only exist inside that workspace.
Microsoft Word
Same system shortcut as Outlook. Word renders emoji with Segoe UI Emoji, which draws several of them flat and monochrome — that is Word, not your file.
GitHub
Markdown shortcodes work everywhere: issues, pull requests, comments and README files. :rocket: becomes 🚀. GitHub also has its own set of custom shortcodes like :shipit:.
Google Docs
Insert → Emoji, or type @ followed by the emoji name. Docs also auto-replaces classic emoticons like :) as you type.
Excel and Sheets
Emoji work in cells and in conditional formatting, and they sort as text. Handy for status columns — ✅ ⚠️ ❌ read faster than words.
FAQ
Emojis in Outlook, Slack and Other Apps — questions
How do I insert an emoji in Outlook?
Click into the message body and press Win + . (period) on Windows or Control + Command + Space on Mac. Outlook has no emoji button of its own on desktop, so the system picker is the way in.
Can I use emoji in an email subject line?
Yes, and they render in most clients. Keep it to one — subject lines with several emoji are more likely to be flagged as promotional.
Why do emojis look flat and grey in Word?
Windows draws them with Segoe UI Emoji, which renders part of the set as monochrome outlines. The document is fine; on another device the same file shows colour.