Change your LG, HTC or Samsung emoji to the original Google ones
By Marc Knoll Smilies, emoticons or emoji…no matter how you call them, they are essential when trying to add some kind of emotion to text messages. How the emoji look like on your Android device depends on its user interface. HTC, Samsung and LG use their own designs that differ from the original Google emoji.
Especially if you come from a Nexus device, having to deal with these weird looking smiley faces on other devices can be annoying. For example, I upgraded from a Nexus 4 to an LG G2 and I hated the LG emoji. Thankfully, if you have a rooted device, you can easily change the look to the original Google (or iOS) design.
Table of Contents
Switch to the original Google or iOS emoji
You can either change the emoji manually or with the help of an app:
Emoji Switcher app
Note: This app requires root access. If you don’t know what that means, read this and this.
All you need to do here is to download the app on Google Play, launch it and select the emoji you want to use. You can choose between Google, LG G3, Samsung Galaxy S4 and iOS. After rebooting your device, you’re should be able to use the new set of emoji.
Doing it manually
Note: Again, your device needs to be rooted. I recommend that you only use this method if you know what you’re doing or the app didn’t work (please check if you have root access). If you’re afraid that something could go wrong, make a Nandroid backup.
Here are the steps you need to follow:
- Make sure you have an Android file explorer with root access. I recommend using Root Explorer.
- Download the font zip file of your choice:
- iOS
- Samsung
- Extract the font file and copy it to /system/fonts/ on your device, replacing the original NotoColorEmoji.ttf file. If you want to be on the safe side, rename the original file to NotoColorEmoji_OLD.ttf or something similar.
- Change the font file’s permission to rw-r–r– (see screenshot below).
- Reboot your device and start using your new emoji!
If you run into any troubles or got questions, please let me know in the comments!
24 thoughts on “Change your LG, HTC or Samsung emoji to the original Google ones”
I have Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini, rooted of course, and I tried to switch to iOS emojis in manual way, and i found out that this phone don’t have NotoColorEmoji.ttf file in that folder you said to put the new .ttf file. So I putted the new file there, made the changes to that files permissions, and rebooted my device, but nothing happened. Have you any idea why it didn’t work?
Try renaming it with your current emoji listed example maybe its called “AndroidEmoji-samsung.ttf”
If you hold down the speak to text button on the Swype keyboard, it’ll pull up the emoji icon trays. I just traded my S4 Mini in today for a Droid Mini. Hope you’re having better luck with yours than I did in the 6 months with mine!
now i cant even see the them 🙁
Make sure you change the perms to what is show.
I also had to change the ownership to root as well otherwise mine didn’t show up.
Hello, I have an HTC Desire 816 and neither process works. Any suggestions or help available?
Hey, i am using the HTC Desire 510 and naming the ios emoji ttf file “AndroidEmoji-htc.tff” worked.
Tried using the app, didn’t work. Tried doing it manually, after several attempts still couldn’t get emojis to change. Finally, I tried switching my new emojis (Google emojis) with a different file than NotoColorEmoji.tff, LG_ColorEmoji.tff (I have an LG phone) and it worked. It seems pretty obvious now I guess. If it’s not working, try a different file.
Hello. I have a Motorola 5.0 but it is not rooted. I was wondering if there was a way I could root my phone because I really hate the google ones. Can anybody help
?
you will need to be more specific on your device, i can try and help you? PM me on XDA developers my username is Beshnazzle
Using an HTC One and replaced the NotoColorEmoji, AndroidEmoji and AndroidEmoji-htc ttf files with ios emojis and they show at first but all jumbled up in the wrong order i.e. plants where faces should be. So I restart and it replaces them back with the original HTC emojis on the keyboard. Any advice you can give to what I’m doing wrong? Thanks
i have the HTC Desire 510, what i did was removed the permissions of any other emoji font and renamed the ios emoji to AndroidEmoji-htc.ttf and that was the only one with the correct permissions and it worked perfectly even after reboots
Hi my name is Frank and I rooted my HTC one m7 recently and I tried to switch my emojis to the ios one but it doesnt let me do it I tried the app called “emoji switcher” but nothing happened also I tried to do it manually and nothing happened I also installed busybox and nothing any suggestions?? Please help me
It don’t let me download , it says not for this version !
I Can’t Rename The File Because It Says The File Is Read-Only
Okay so for the iOS emojis, it’s in two different parts. So how would I put those in to the fonts folder? Like, do I rename one so they have different names?
I have an HTC One M7, rooted and with s-off running jelly bean. I replaced the system emojis .ttf file with the Google one but the emojis just show up as squares. Help?
Aemoji switcger app method doesn’t works but the manual method works perfect.
Thank you .. ❤
How???
Worked brilliantly on my LG G2 🙂 Only thing I think is weird is, the thinking emoji isn’t there on the Marshmallow set. Which is weird, since I have it on other devices.
Didnt work and now i have no emojis…I need help
I used the manual method on my Nexus 6p running android Nougat. I changed or checked all the permissions to get it to work
I downloaded the ‘Emoji Switcher” app, & when I opened it, it says Are you rooted? & says after “failed to get root!”
PLEASE HELPPPP