Hear-no-evil monkey Emoji

Smileys

A cartoon-style brown monkey face with its hands pressed firmly over its ears to block out sound. It is one of the three famous wise monkeys, depicted here with a wide, blank expression.

Usage Context

This emoji is frequently used to express shock, embarrassment, or a desire to ignore something unwanted or awkward. People often use it when they are overwhelmed by noise, gossiping, or simply pretending they didn't hear a problematic statement. It is a natural companion to 🙈 and 🙊 when discussing the three wise monkeys.

History

Based on the ancient Japanese proverb 'see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil,' the motif dates back to the 17th-century carvings at the Toshogu shrine in Nikko, Japan. The 'hear-no-evil' monkey, known as Kikazaru, was formally added to the Unicode standard in 2010 as part of the initial wave of emoji adoption to support international messaging.

Details

Glyph

🙉

Unicode

U+1F649

Shortcode

:emoji_u1f649:

HTML Entity

&#xD83D;&#xDE49;

Specifications

Vendor Twitter/X

Category Smileys

Subcategory monkey-face

Unicode Version 6.0

Emoji Version 1.0

License CC-BY 4.0

Twemoji Attribution

Emoji graphics by Twitter/X, licensed under CC-BY 4.0

Twemoji graphics are licensed under CC-BY 4.0. You must provide appropriate credit when redistributing or modifying these assets.

CC-BY 4.0 License Twemoji Repository