How to get emojis on a Chromebook

Emojis have become an essential part of our conversations, and as such, it’s great to have easy access to them on all your internet devices. It can be a little trickier to use emojis on computers, including Chromebooks, than on phones. Here’s how to get emojis on a Chromebook.

Read more: What is a Chromebook, and what can and can’t it do?

Google’s emoji set is built into Chrome OS. So if you want to use emojis on a Chromebook, you don’t have to install a third-party app or anything of that sort. Emojis are relatively easy to access in Chrome OS compared to operating systems like Windows and macOS. There are three nifty ways to get emojis on a Chromebook.

Using your mouse/trackpad (right-click)

This is the simplest way to get emojis on a Chromebook. To get emojis on a Chromebook using your mouse or trackpad, move the cursor to the text field where you want to insert the emoji. Right-click the text field, and click emoji.

The emoji keyboard will pop up. Scroll to find the emoji you want to insert, and click it to use it. The emoji keyboard disappears after one click, though, so if you’re going to reuse it, you’ll need to follow the steps again.

The emoji keyboard also has a keyboard shortcut. To insert an emoji, move the cursor to the text field where you want to insert the emoji and click it. Press Search/Launcher + Shift + Space.

The emoji keyboard will pop up. Scroll to find the emoji you want to insert, and click it to use it. If you want to insert multiple emojis, you will have to press the keyboard shortcut every time to summon the emoji keyboard.

Also read: The best budget Chromebooks to get

Enabling and using the on-screen keyboard

This is the go-to method if you have a touchscreen Chromebook. It’s a better alternative to the other ways if you want to use emojis frequently. Chrome OS has an on-screen keyboard built-in, which is pretty much the familiar Google keyboard Gboard that we see on Android. You can enable this in one click, and it does not disappear after clicking one emoji, like the emoji keyboard we’ve used in the above methods.

To enable the on-screen keyboard, open the Settings app on your Chromebook. In the left navigation pane, click Advanced. Click Accessibility in the expanded advanced settings.

Click Manage accessibility features. Navigate to the keyboard and text input section, and click the toggle next to Enable on-screen keyboard.

Once you’ve enabled the on-screen keyboard, you will get the virtual keyboard button on the bottom right, near the time. Click it to open the keyboard. Click the smiley face emoji button in the bottom row, to the left, to switch to the emoji section.