Skull and Crossbones Emoji
A skull above two crossed bones, the warning mark for poison, death and mortal danger.
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Meaning & usage
What does the Skull and Crossbones emoji mean?
A skull above two crossed bones, the warning mark for poison, death and mortal danger.
Genuinely ominous, and the one skull that has not been softened by internet use. Where 💀 now means laughter, this one still means poison, danger or death.
How to use ☠️ naturally
Hazard warnings, pirate references and genuine danger. It is the one skull that still means death, where 💀 has drifted to meaning laughter.
Reaction symbols work like visual emphasis: they reinforce a word, rate an idea or replace a short response. Repetition normally increases intensity, but it can also make a message feel more performative.
From standard to slang
The history of ☠️
- 2015
First defined as emoji
According to Unicode’s Emoji Versions data, Skull and Crossbones was first defined as emoji in Emoji 1.0, dated 2015. The first release where Unicode versioned the emoji set as a standard in its own right.
- Before the keyboard
Its visual roots
A skull over crossed femurs, the poison mark used on bottles since the nineteenth century and on flags long before that. It was a text dingbat before it was an emoji, which is why it needs a variation selector to appear in colour.
- Today
How its use evolved
Hazard warnings, pirate references and genuine danger. It is the one skull that still means death, where 💀 has drifted to meaning laughter.
Dates follow Unicode’s official Emoji Versions chart. Versions before Emoji 1.0 are labelled retrospectively. See the history of emoji.
In conversation
Examples of ☠️ in messages
These examples show the emoji in complete messages, where the words make its intended tone easier to read.
Do not drink whatever is in that bottle ☠️
The chilli was a genuine mistake ☠️
Pirate night at the pub, apparently ☠️
When to use it
Using ☠️ clearly
Hazard warnings, pirate references and genuine danger. It is the one skull that still means death, where 💀 has drifted to meaning laughter. It lands as skull and crossbones emoji or death emoji when the rest of the message supports that reading, and it is the surrounding words that do the deciding — so in a sensitive, professional or cross-cultural conversation, say the thing outright as well.
Common questions
About the skull and crossbones emoji
What does ☠️ mean in a text message?
A skull above two crossed bones, the warning mark for poison, death and mortal danger. Genuinely ominous, and the one skull that has not been softened by internet use. Where 💀 now means laughter, this one still means poison, danger or death.
Is ☠️ always positive?
Not always. Its usual readings are skull and crossbones emoji, death emoji, ☠️ meaning, and irony or the relationship between the people can flip any of them.
Why does ☠️ look different on another device?
U+2620 U+FE0F identifies the emoji; the picture is a font, drawn separately by Apple, Google, Microsoft and Samsung. Only the artwork changes, never the character.
How do I copy and paste the skull and crossbones emoji?
Use the copy button at the top of this page. ☠️ is a character, not an image, so it pastes into messages, captions and filenames as ordinary text.
When was the skull and crossbones emoji introduced?
Unicode’s Emoji Versions data first records ☠️ as emoji in Emoji 1.0, dated 2015. Early emoji version numbers can be retrospective, so this date describes its place in the standardised emoji set rather than the first-ever appearance of the underlying symbol.
For developers
☠️ in code
Every value below is generated from the character itself, so it stays correct even where a file encoding cannot hold the emoji directly.
| Format | Value | When to use it | Copy |
|---|---|---|---|
| Unicode | U+2620 U+FE0F | The standard reference. Use it to search a character map or a spec. | |
| HTML (hex) | ☠️ | For HTML and XML. Safe in files that are not saved as UTF-8. | |
| HTML (decimal) | ☠️ | The same reference in decimal. Both render identically. | |
| CSS | \2620 \FE0F | For the content property. Keep the quotes around the whole value. | |
| JavaScript | \u{2620}\u{FE0F} | A string-literal escape. Needs the u flag inside a regular expression. | |
| URL-encoded | %E2%98%A0%EF%B8%8F | Percent-encoded UTF-8, for query strings and API requests. |
Reference card
Emoji details
- Unicode
- U+2620 U+FE0F
- Category
- Symbols & Reactions
- Also known as
- skull and crossbones emojideath emoji☠️ meaningpoison symbol emoji
Put it in a message
When ☠️ is the right choice
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