Heart Symbol (♥ ❤ ♡): Copy and Paste
Tap any heart to copy it. Plus the difference between the text heart and the emoji, and why yours sometimes turns out black instead of red.
Tap a heart to copy it
The ones on top are text symbols: they take the colour and size of the surrounding letters. The ones below are emoji and bring their own colour.
Text hearts
They behave like any other letter: they inherit the colour, the italics and the size of your text.
Emoji hearts
Every platform draws these its own way; the colour does not follow your text.
What is the heart symbol?
The heart symbol (♥) is a Unicode character from the Miscellaneous Symbols block, at code point U+2665. It is not an image and not an emoji: to a computer it is one more letter.
It has been in Unicode since 1993, long before emoji existed, because it came from the French deck of playing cards: ♠ ♥ ♦ ♣ entered the standard together as typographic symbols. That is why the heart has a hollow twin (♡), just like the spade and the diamond do.
That history explains the quirk that surprises most people who copy it: the “real” heart is black. It takes the colour of the text rather than carrying its own, because it was born as a typographic sign and not as a colour drawing. The red heart on your phone is a different thing, and it deserves its own section.
Why it is red sometimes and black others
Some characters can be drawn two ways: as a text sign or as a colour emoji. Two invisible characters called variation selectors decide which, and they are written immediately after the symbol:
| What you write | Code points | Result |
|---|---|---|
| ♥ | U+2665 | Text sign, coloured like your letters |
| ♥︎ | U+2665 U+FE0E | Forced to text, even where the system prefers emoji |
| ❤️ | U+2764 U+FE0F | Forced to emoji: the familiar red heart |
The one in the last row, U+FE0F, is what turns a symbol into an emoji; its partner U+FE0E does the opposite. Neither is visible or takes up space on screen, but they are there — which is why pasting a red heart into a code editor sometimes leaves an odd gap behind it, or your cursor needs two presses to move past it.
It also explains behaviour that looks like a bug: you copy a red heart from WhatsApp, paste it into a document, and it comes out black. The colour was not lost; the invisible selector was, or the document font has no colour version of that character.
How much a heart costs in a counter
If two tools have ever given you different totals for the same text, hearts are a good illustration of why. These are the three ways to count them, measured on the very characters you can copy above:
| Heart | Code points | UTF-16 units | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| ♥ | 1 | 1 | Text heartU+2665 |
| ❤️ | 2 | 2 | Red emoji heartU+2764 U+FE0F |
| 💙 | 1 | 2 | Blue heartU+1F499 |
UTF-16 units are what JavaScript, X (Twitter) and most web forms count. Code points are what a person would call “characters”. For ♥ the two figures agree; for emoji they do not, and that is where the discrepancies come from.
The effect is starkest in an SMS. Any heart other than the plain text one forces the whole message into UCS-2 encoding, which drops the limit from 160 characters to 70, and each coloured emoji then eats two of those seventy. A single 💙 can cost you half a message — check it in our SMS character counter, which applies that rule. The text ♥ is not in the GSM alphabet either, so no heart is truly free in an SMS.
How to type a heart on each system
The shortcuts give you the text heart ♥. For coloured ones you need the emoji panel, or you can copy them here.
Windows
Types the text heart ♥ directly.
For the coloured ones, Windows key + . opens the emoji panel.
macOS
Opens the emoji viewer; search for “heart”.
There is no direct shortcut for ♥ — copy it or find it there.
Linux
Type the code point, then press space or Enter.
Works in GTK apps; elsewhere use the Compose key.
Android & iOS
Coloured hearts live under the symbols category.
The text ♥ is not there — copy it from this page.
HTML & CSS
Also ♥ or ♥ for the black heart.
In CSS, content: "\2665". The white ♡ is ♡.
Word & Docs
In Word: type the code, then press Alt + X.
Or Insert → Symbol, “Miscellaneous Symbols” subset.
Windows’ Alt + 3 is a survivor from the MS-DOS era: in the original code page, position 3 held a heart. That is why it works with the numeric keypad and needs no leading zeros, unlike modern Alt codes which take four digits.
What each colour means
Worth saying before the list: Unicode does not define meanings. The standard fixes the drawing and a descriptive name — “blue heart”, nothing more — and everything else is custom that shifts by country, platform and generation. What follows is common English-language usage, not a rule.
- Red ❤️ — romantic love, the default choice.
- Yellow 💛 — friendship. Snapchat also uses it to mark your closest contacts, which spread the association.
- Green 💚 — environmental causes and health; occasionally envy.
- Blue 💙 — loyalty and trust; common in sports and institutional support.
- Purple 💜 — strongly tied to K-pop fandom among younger users.
- Black 🖤 — mourning, dark humour, or simply an aesthetic.
- White 🤍 — calm affection, purity, condolences.
One practical note: in formal contexts the text heart ♥ is far less conspicuous than a colour emoji, because it blends with the typeface. It is the sensible option for a signature, a heading, or anything destined for print.
Frequently asked questions
How do I type a heart symbol on my keyboard?
Why does my heart show up black instead of red?
What is the Unicode code for the heart symbol?
Does a heart count as one character or two?
What does each heart colour mean?
Can I put a heart in my username?
Related tools
Star Symbol ★
Copy ★ ☆ ✦ and the emoji stars.
Currency Symbols € $ £
Copy € $ £ ¥ and see where each one goes.
Arrow Symbol →
Arrows in every direction and style.
Character Counter
Check how much each symbol really costs.
SMS Counter
One emoji can cut your SMS from 160 to 70 characters.
Nickname Generator
Decorated names with symbols for games and socials.