Emoji dictionary
🦋 Butterfly emoji
[buht-er-flahy ih-moh-jee]
What does the 🦋 Butterfly emoji mean?
The butterfly emoji represents the butterfly, as well as the symbolism associated with it: positive transformations, hope during a dark time, and new beginnings.
And because the phrase “butterflies in your stomach” can signify the nervous energy of new love, this emoji can also mean that you have a crush or are falling in love.
Where does 🦋 Butterfly emoji come from?
In 2016, the butterfly emoji was added by the Unicode Consortium, the organization that standardizes computer language, along with a host of other wild creatures like the fox, eagle, bat, duck, owl, and shrimp.
On Google and Microsoft devices, as well as on Facebook, the butterfly emoji design is based on the Monarch butterfly and therefore has orange wings:
National Geographic
In contrast, on Apple devices and Twitter, the emoji has blue wings in reference to the Morpho butterfly.
stlzoo.org
Examples of 🦋 Butterfly emoji
Who uses 🦋 Butterfly emoji?
Nature lovers add this emoji to posts announcing they saw a butterfly or to celebrate the beauty of nature.
Because its life cycle involves a caterpillar that wraps itself in a chrysalis until it emerges as a winged creature, the insect is associated with beauty and transformation. It is often included in posts about life getting better after a hard time or to encourage people who are experiencing challenges that things will look up. While it’s not officially associated with the LGBTQ youth empowerment It Gets Better campaign, people will often include it in posts with the words “It gets better.”
Parents will use the butterfly to mark transformations in their children’s lives.
In 2017, Nylon magazine declared the butterfly emoji “a thing” after seeing it in post of models and influencers. They cited rapper Travis Scott, who had released the song “Butterfly Effect” earlier that year. (The butterfly effect is the phenomenon of a small change or action in a local context having global ramifications.)
As model Kylie Jenner and Scott traded butterfly emoji on Twitter, gossip mags were aflutter about a possible romance between the two, a bit of gossip that has since been more than confirmed.
With notable exceptions like Scott, the emoji is often used to accompany posts by and about women since butterflies are associated with femininity, especially in straight culture.
Note
This is not meant to be a formal definition of 🦋 Butterfly emoji like most terms we define on Dictionary.com, but is rather an informal word summary that hopefully touches upon the key aspects of the meaning and usage of 🦋 Butterfly emoji that will help our users expand their word mastery.