The Unicode Consortium has announced Unicode 18.0, the newest major update to the standard that handles text across operating systems, apps, websites, programming languages, and other software.
This update adds 13,007 new characters, raising the total in Unicode to 172,808. It also brings three new scripts, three new currency symbols, nine emojis, and several changes that affect how text is processed and displayed.
Most of the new characters are from the Seal script, which adds 11,328 characters. Unicode 18.0 also includes Jurchen and Proto-Cuneiform numerals, plus seven new Unicode blocks.
Another notable addition is support for three new currency symbols:
- U+20C2 RUFIYAA SIGN
- U+20C3 UAE DIRHAM SIGN
- U+20C4 OMANI RIAL SIGN
Unicode 18.0 also adds nine new emoji. As with past updates, these emoji will not show up everywhere right away because support depends on when operating systems, fonts, desktop environments, and apps update their Unicode and emoji data.
Besides the new characters, this release brings several changes that directly affect how software handles text.
Line-breaking rules have been updated for several characters, and text segmentation rules have also changed. The Unicode Collation Algorithm, which controls how text is sorted and compared, has received more updates too.
Moreover, Unicode 18.0 introduces UAX #60, a new Unicode Standard Annex that covers data for large East Asian scripts. It provides new data files for Jurchen and Seal, and also includes existing data for Nushu and Tangut.
Another update involves variation selectors. The specification now explains valid and invalid usage more clearly and suggests that software should show invalid sequences instead of hiding them.
Finally, this update also includes coordinated changes to related Unicode specifications, such as those for collation, security, internationalized domain names, emoji, and link detection.
For additional details, see the official announcement.
