Face holding back tears emoji meaning

The face holding back tears emoji shows a face with raised or furrowed eyebrows, slightly watery eyes, and a small, gentle smile. This combination of features makes it look as though the face is fighting back tears. The expression can represent a mix of strong emotions, such as holding in sadness, feeling touched, trying to stay composed, or experiencing overwhelming happiness. It is often used to convey moments when someone feels emotional but is attempting to stay strong, whether out of pride, joy, or bittersweet feelings. This emoji is versatile and can be used in many contexts where words might not fully capture complex emotions.

The face holding back tears emoji was approved in Unicode 14.0 and added in Emoji 14.0, see related proposal L2/20064