👑 Crown emoji

The crown emoji is widely used to supplement or stand for many concepts of royalty and, by extension, excellence. It is popularly used to tag social-media discussions of the British Royal Family, especially on occasions of royal weddings and babies.

The emoji also tags discussions about the popular Netflix series, The Crown, which follows the life of Queen Elizabeth, as does the fantasy books and HBO show Game of Thrones (e.g., can’t wait for tonight’s episode of #GOT 👑👑👑). The crown emoji sees use in reference to other monarchies around the world, notably used upon the death of the long-reigning Thai King Bhumibol in 2016.

Some Christians use the crown emoji to tag discussions of Jesus Christ, known as the Prince of Peace and for his ministry about the Kingdom of God or Heaven in the New Testament.

Many sports team go by names such as the Royals or Kings. Social-media posts cheering on the Kansas City Royals or Sacramento Kings, for instance, frequently include the crown emoji (e.g., Go @SacramentoKings 👑!!!). Speaking of sports, basketball star LeBron James has earned the nickname the King. The crown emoji is often used by itself to refer to him (e.g., I’m watching the 👑 take down the Chicago Bulls.).

The drag and LGBTQ community also use the crown emoji to note a queen, slang for a drag performer or a gay person.

Many women more generally will use the crown emoji to express themselves (sometimes captioning selfies) as queens, or powerful, beautiful, and successful women—like Beyoncé, whose fanbase calls her Queen Bee and uses the crown emoji to accentuate that. Another fanbase, followers of the South Korean K-pop boy band Got7, have adopted the crown emoji as an unofficial symbol for their band, viewing the members as princes. Younger women may use the crown emoji to present themselves as—or be labelled as—princesses, earnestly or insultingly suggesting qualities of innocence, adoration, or being “high-maintenance.” Here, the crown emoji is often paired with the princess or gem stone emoji.

King, queen, and other royalty terms appear in many expressions in English, and some users add to or substitute the crown emoji for them (e.g., You deserved be treated like 👑 (royalty) or I’m living it up like a 👑 (king/queen)).