"This exciting update brings more gender options to existing characters."
Apple have announced that iOS 10 will be featuring more than 100 new gender diverse emojis.
The company has highlighted twelve particular emojis in their press release to give an outline of which will be expected this Autumn.
These new emojis will portray women playing various sports and performing jobs that have been predominantly male-orientated, such as weightlifting and constructions.
In a press release, Apple states:
“This exciting update brings more gender options to existing characters, including new female athletes and professionals, adds beautiful redesigns of popular emoji, a new rainbow flag and more family options.”
According to TechCrunch, other new emojis will include single-parent families, and a water pistol one that replaces the handgun rifle emoji:
“Apple is working closely with the Unicode Consortium to ensure that popular emoji characters reflect the diversity of people everywhere.”
In addition, Apple CEO Tim Cook announced iOS 10 for iPhones and iPads at the annual Worldwide Developers’ Conference in June 2016.
He unveiled features for the ‘Messages’ app as it is the most popular app used by avid iPhone users.
Features include adding larger emojis, stickers and a QuickType word suggestion bar which will suggest emojis.
The emojis will automatically replace words depending on what the user is typing.
He disclosed to the audience at the Keynote in San Francisco:
“Messages is the most frequently used iOS app and with iOS 10, it will become more expressive. Automatic suggestions will make it easy to replace words with emoji.”
Furthermore, Google also aims to promote gender equality through emojis that represent women from a range of professions.
Apple has been a longtime leader in the fight for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender equality.
In 2002, Apple earned a score of 100 per cent at the Human Rights Campaign’s (HRC) inaugural Corporate Equality Index.
HRC also honoured Tim Cook in 2015 with the Visibility Award at the 19th annual HRC National Dinner.
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