Faces made from plain keyboard keys only, so they never show as boxes and you can type them yourself.
190 faces. Tap a card to copy, ♡ to save. Faces marked “may not show on older devices” use rarer symbols.
What ASCII means here
ASCII is the basic set of characters on an English keyboard: letters, numbers and punctuation like ^ _ - ; ( ). A face built only from those keys is the safest text face there is. It never shows as boxes, and you can type it yourself on any phone or computer without copying.
Where they are the best choice
Old apps, SMS and forms that turn special symbols into question marks.
Usernames, game chats and fields that block symbols.
Places where you cannot paste, like some exam or work computers.
Code comments and plain text files.
Classic ASCII faces
(^_^) a simple smile.
(T_T) crying, with T shapes as tears.
m(_ _)m a deep bow, for sorry or thank you. The m letters are hands on the floor.
d(^_^)b a double thumbs up.
(-_-)zzz asleep.
On Discord, the underscores and stars in many ASCII faces can be read as formatting and change how they look. Use the Discord-safe copy for those.
Build your own
ASCII faces are easy to invent. Pick eyes from letters and symbols (^ ^, T T, o O, - -), put a mouth between them (_ . o), and close it with brackets. Add hands outside the brackets: m for hands on the floor, d and b for thumbs, a slash for a wave.
Questions
What is an ASCII face?
A text face made only from basic keyboard characters: letters, numbers and punctuation.
Why use ASCII faces instead of kaomoji?
They never break. Old apps, forms and name fields that block special symbols still accept them.
What does m(_ _)m mean?
It is a person bowing deeply with hands on the floor. It means sorry or thank you.
Are there faces with only letters and numbers?
Yes, though they are fewer. See the page on text faces with only letters and numbers.