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Cmd-Ctrl-Space (⌘⌃␣) for the character/emoji picker. Also, under Keyboard in preferences, check the "Show keyboard and emoji viewers in menu bar" option to get

Cmd-Ctrl-Space (⌘⌃␣) for the character/emoji picker. Also, under Keyboard in preferences, check the "Show keyboard and emoji viewers in menu bar" option to get it as a menu-bar icon. This also includes the keyboard viewer, which is handy to figure certain Shift-Opt-Whaterver combos for seldom-used characters. EDIT: Updated with the actual default command.

JadeNB 6y ago
> Ctrl-Opt-Space for the character/emoji picker. I think this may not be the default; it doesn't work for me. While speaking of the character picker, does anyone know a way to get less broken search in the picker? For example, I frequently find myself looking for math italic characters in Unicode. Despite the description being, say, "MATHEMATICAL ITALIC SMALL A", it doesn't come up when I search for 'small'. In this case searching for 'mathematical' or 'italic' works, but there are other cases where I just have to guess search terms randomly (or go look up Unicode tables elsewhere).
- GavinAnderegg 6y ago
  Oops! Sorry! I meant Cmd-Opt-Space here. Also, yeah, the search is pretty janky in my usage as well.
  - JadeNB 6y ago
    > Oops! Sorry! I meant Cmd-Opt-Space here. Also, yeah, the search is pretty janky in my usage as well. Indeed, I thought that might be what you meant … but that opens the Finder search window for me, so I think that that shortcut also is not universal. Probably some of these differ depending on whether you've got a fresh install or an updated system that may carry along shortcuts from an older release. EDIT: adsche (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24092377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24092377) suggests ⌘⌃␣, and that works for me.
    - elliekelly 6y ago
      If you go to the Edit menu in finder (or any application) all the way at the bottom of the dropdown menu you’ll see “Emoji & Symbols” and to the right it should tell you the shortcut keys.
    - GavinAnderegg 6y ago
      Yeah, looks like ⌘⌃␣ is the actual default command.
- adsche 6y ago
  It is ctrl+cmd+space for me and I don't remember changing it. Completely agree about the search. E.g., I sometimes want the cmd sign (⌘), which is named "place of interest". Sure, that makes sense from unicode and in other contexts but I would expect to find it as cmd or command in macos.
joombaga 6y ago
How do you close it? Cmd-W doesn't work for this type of window.
- christefano 6y ago
  Hit the same key combo that invoked the character picker (⌘⌃Space in my case).
  - crazygringo 6y ago
    Doesn't work for me. It opens the emoji picker, but doesn't close it. :( Tried in both Chrome and TextEdit.
- roryokane 6y ago
  I don’t know of a keyboard-only way, but I see that ⌘W does work after you focus the floating window by clicking on its title bar. Of course, you can also click the tiny red close button to close the window directly.
egypturnash 6y ago
This is so useful and I really hate that some chat clients use their own text input box where it doesn't work. There are a LOT more sets of characters available in the picker, hit the gear menu in the upper left and select "Customize List".
SPBS 6y ago
windows recently got this feature as well, it's Win + ;

JadeNB 6y ago

> Ctrl-Opt-Space for the character/emoji picker. I think this may not be the default; it doesn't work for me. While speaking of the character picker, does anyone know a way to get less broken search in the picker? For example, I frequently find myself looking for math italic characters in Unicode. Despite the description being, say, "MATHEMATICAL ITALIC SMALL A", it doesn't come up when I search for 'small'. In this case searching for 'mathematical' or 'italic' works, but there are other cases where I just have to guess search terms randomly (or go look up Unicode tables elsewhere).

GavinAnderegg 6y ago
Oops! Sorry! I meant Cmd-Opt-Space here. Also, yeah, the search is pretty janky in my usage as well.
- JadeNB 6y ago
  > Oops! Sorry! I meant Cmd-Opt-Space here. Also, yeah, the search is pretty janky in my usage as well. Indeed, I thought that might be what you meant … but that opens the Finder search window for me, so I think that that shortcut also is not universal. Probably some of these differ depending on whether you've got a fresh install or an updated system that may carry along shortcuts from an older release. EDIT: adsche (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24092377 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24092377) suggests ⌘⌃␣, and that works for me.
  - elliekelly 6y ago
    If you go to the Edit menu in finder (or any application) all the way at the bottom of the dropdown menu you’ll see “Emoji & Symbols” and to the right it should tell you the shortcut keys.
  - GavinAnderegg 6y ago
    Yeah, looks like ⌘⌃␣ is the actual default command.
adsche 6y ago
It is ctrl+cmd+space for me and I don't remember changing it. Completely agree about the search. E.g., I sometimes want the cmd sign (⌘), which is named "place of interest". Sure, that makes sense from unicode and in other contexts but I would expect to find it as cmd or command in macos.

joombaga 6y ago

How do you close it? Cmd-W doesn't work for this type of window.

christefano 6y ago
Hit the same key combo that invoked the character picker (⌘⌃Space in my case).
- crazygringo 6y ago
  Doesn't work for me. It opens the emoji picker, but doesn't close it. :( Tried in both Chrome and TextEdit.
roryokane 6y ago
I don’t know of a keyboard-only way, but I see that ⌘W does work after you focus the floating window by clicking on its title bar. Of course, you can also click the tiny red close button to close the window directly.

egypturnash 6y ago

This is so useful and I really hate that some chat clients use their own text input box where it doesn't work. There are a LOT more sets of characters available in the picker, hit the gear menu in the upper left and select "Customize List".

SPBS 6y ago

windows recently got this feature as well, it's Win + ;