YouTube is rolling out Twitch-style custom global emotes for comments and live chats. Threeindependentillustrators created the first batch of emotes, which are focused on gaming, though it appears that they work on any type of channel. YouTube plans to develop emotes for other types of communities in the future.
To use the emotes, click on the smiling face icon in comments or a live chat. If you have a membership to a channel that offers its own custom emoji, you’ll see YouTube’s global emotes below those. As with Twitch’s emotes, you can start typing the name of a YouTube emote (such as :cat-orange-whistling: or :text-green-game-over:) in the chat and the autocomplete function will show the emote and emoji options. The first emotes also include a buffering icon and text reading “GG” (i.e. “good game”).
Twitch has long offered global emotes in chats. It might take a while before YouTube has emotes with the same level of cultural cachet as PogChamp, Kappa or ResidentSleeper, but it’s off to a decent start.
for the times where words just aren’t enough… introducing YouTube Emotes! 🥳
now everyone can join in & react to all the biggest Ws across streams w/ new emotes.
we’re starting with emotes for Gaming but more types of emotes to come, stay tuned👀
more: https://t.co/H2iZYffWASpic.twitter.com/rpTmVvnCtj
— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) December 5, 2022