🏉 Rugby Football emoji

The Rugby Football emoji 🏉 was approved under Unicode 6.0 in 2010. On most major platforms, the emoji depicts a rugby ball made of brown leather with laces facing the viewer. The Google and Microsoft versions of the emoji depict a rounded ball, while other major platforms depict a ball with pointed tips. Depending on the platform, the ball is either depicted realistically or stylized.

The rugby ball depicted on most major platforms was used in the past but is not currently used in professional rugby play. One key difference? Few modern rugby balls have laces. However, the Twitter version of the emoji appears to depict a silver and blue rugby ball similar in appearance to rubber and polyester rugby balls currently used in modern rugby competition.

The sport of rugby is played in many countries around the world. On social media, the Rugby Football emoji 🏉 is often used by rugby fans from the United Kingdom, Ireland, New Zealand, and Australia, due to the sport’s higher popularity and frequent media coverage in those countries. Compared to other sports, rugby is not as popular in the United States, which means the Rugby Football emoji 🏉 is much less likely to be used by American social media users.