The Unhappy Emoji List 😿 To Express Your Sad Emotions Creatively ☹️

Written by: Ortega
Modified: Jan 23, 2023

Sadness is a fact of life for most people. Whether we like it or not, there will be disappointing moments in our lives. We can’t escape those. When something bad happens, it’s perfectly natural to feel sad. It’s completely human to feel blue when things get hard. What’s important is — it should be expressed. Keeping it in will only lead to more problems. For some, that’s easier said than done. After all, not everyone wears their heart on their sleeve. If you’re like that, you have a hard time expressing negative emotions, leaning on an unhappy emoji or two will push you in the right direction.

Multiracial man sitting down on the floor, holding phone, looking shocked

Photo from Adobe Stock

 

Emoji Power

One can even argue, in some ways, emojis are more powerful than words. Take the 😥 Sad But Relieved Face emoji. In a single, relatively simple glyph, the emoji effectively conveys a complex emotional spectrum that would otherwise require several words to convey. Instead of saying, “I was asked to do something, I am glad it is over, but I felt like I did not do enough,” you can just share the 😥 emoji, and it will mean the same thing. Amazing, isn’t it?

Opening Up Through Emoji

Cheerful Black woman texting in the park with emojis popping out

Photo from Adobe Stock

Wearing our hearts on our sleeves is particularly useful in difficult situations, owing to the reason, when we’re sad, everything feels heavy. Have you ever felt like that? Your heart, our legs, our arms, our entire mind, and body feel so impossible to carry. We need to release our emotions, but it feels like too much effort!

This is where a perfectly placed sad face will come in handy. Instead of using words to express how we feel, which might feel like too much effort, being in such a fragile state, we can just send the friend or a family member we’re talking to an emoji.

When a person does this, he or she is one step closer to getting the social support he needs. As any psychologist will tell you, social support is an important and effective part of the recovery process from sadness and depression. It has the potential to reverse damaging isolation, influence a person’s life focus, and generate solutions for depression management.

 

The Unhappy Emoji Collection

Having said that, it seems pretty clear how sending and sharing unhappy emojis work as an effective force for people in a struggling state. With that in mind, if you want to be part of such an initiative we have put together a complete list of unhappy emojis available, along with their meaning, and a few tips on how to best use them online. So, go and take a dive in. You might help more than a few people in the process.

 

Disappointed Face Emoji

Disappointed Face emoji, Apple version of the Disappointed Face emoji

The 😞 Disappointed Face emoji shows what a disappointed face would look like in real life. It is made up of a yellow face with matching closed, downcast eyes, and a sad curve of a mouth. Very versatile, the disappointed emoji may be used to convey a number of intense feelings like disappointment, grief, hurt, regret or remorse.

It also connotes unhappiness and the sense of missing something or someone. When telling someone about something extremely unfortunate or bitter that happened, use this emoji. The disappointed face emoji may be used to express or react to a loss as well.

 

Crying Face Emoji

Crying Face emoji, Apple version of the Crying Face emoji

The 😢 Crying Face emoji shows a face with raised sad eyebrows and a slight frown, shedding a single tear from one eye down its cheek. It is used to show general feelings of sadness or pain.

Most people use the crying face emoji in situations or conversations where there is a sense of hurt or disappointment. If you’re tearing up about something and you just need to tell a close friend about it, before the tears fall from your eyes, make this unhappy emoji part of that message.

 

Crying Cat Emoji

Apple's Crying Cat emoji, unhappy emoji

This here’s for all cat lovers! This is the cat version of the 😢 Crying Face emoji. This emoji shows a frowning cat face, with a huge tear falling out of one eye. The cat has a tiny nose, sad eyes, and a pair of furrowed brows.

As such, the crying cat’s face illustrates various tones of regret, pity, remorse, and even shame, to a certain extent. It represents that precise moment when one is filled with so much emotion there is nothing else to do but break down.

That said, one of the most common ways to use the 😿 Crying Cat emoji is as a response to something that made you sad. It could be something you saw on TV, a post you read on social media, as long as it made you sad, you may use the emoji.

 

Downcast Face With Sweat Emoji

Apple version of the Downcast Face With Sweat emoji, unhappy emoji

The 😓 Downcast Face With Sweat emoji shows a yellow face with eyes and mouth both closed in a frowning expression. There is a single bead of sweat dripping from the left side of its forehead.

This emoji is often associated with negative emotions. First, it is commonly used to convey that the sender is feeling sad or low. It could also be used to express that they feel disappointed or frustrated over a certain issue. Feeling worried or helpless is also associated with this emoji.

People also use this to show that they are tired, which can refer to their physical or mental state. Lastly, some also use this to convey that they are about to undertake a difficult task, one that would require them to “break a sweat.”

 

Loudly Crying Face Emoji

Apple's Loudly Crying Face emoji

Out of all the unhappy emojis, the 😭 Loudly Crying Face emoji is definitely one of the most intense… just look at it! This very unhappy emoji shows a crying face, with tears streaming down their cheeks, eyebrows furrowed, and mouth opened in a wail.

This emoji is commonly used to convey that the sender is very sad to the point of crying. It is used to relate to emotions such as grief or disappointment. Unlike the other unhappy emojis in the list, this loudly crying face can often be shared to demonstrate positive emotions, as long as what happened causes the sender to cry loudly. An example of this would be shedding happy tears after a wedding proposal.

 

Sad But Relieved Face Emoji

Apple's Sad But Relieved Face

Send this emoji when you want to show concern to someone. The 😥 Sad But Relieved Face emoji is the best unhappy emoji to use to display empathy and sympathy. This sad emoji face comes with a slight frown and furrowed eyebrows. There is also a single drop of sweat dripping from its forehead.

When you want to empathize with someone’s struggles, send them this relieved emoji while letting them know that you can be a shoulder to lean on. You could also use this emoji when you want to express a feeling of sadness but with relief.

For instance, your teacher or boss gave you a task, and you had a hard time working on it. You did your best, but according to your boss or teacher, it was just not good enough. Even though that made you sad, a part of you is still happy it’s all over!

 

Tired Face Emoji

Apple's Tired Face emoji

You’ve had a long day at work, and maybe you feel like sleeping for a long time. If you want to let other people know that you do not have any more energy to spare, send them a 😫 Tired Face emoji.

This unhappy emoji displays a scrunched face with X-shaped eyes, crinkled eyebrows, and frowned open mouth. Its overall appearance shows frustration or fatigue as if it is yawning or groaning in exasperation.

However, this emoji is not only used for being physically tired. You can also send it to let others know that you are emotionally burnt out with someone, be it another friend, an officemate, or a romantic partner.

 

Weary Face Emoji

Apple's Weary Face emoji

If this emoji could talk, it would be saying “I can’t handle this!” You can definitely see it in his closed eyes, furrowed brows, frowning mouth, and overall sad expression. The 😩 Weary Face emoji is used to convey feeling weary or displeased by the conversation.

Overall, this emoji is best applicable to feelings of exhaustion, whether it’s physical, mental, or emotional. Adding it to your sentence highlights one major thing: you need a break. On a separate note, take extra care to not confuse this with the 😫 Tired Face emoji. Both emojis have similar designs, with a slight difference in the eyes, where the tired face is showing > < eyes.

 

Pensive Face Emoji

Apple's Pensive Face emoji

This one is for all those times you just want to be left alone. You just want to find a nice, quiet space to simply sit and reflect on past memories, or a difficult problem at hand.

As for its design, the 😔 Pensive Face emoji shows a yellow face with downcast, shut eyes, a mouth closed in a small line, and a set of furrowed brows. Some users also like to share this when they’re feeling apologetic or lonely for some reason or another. From time to time, this unhappy emoji may also be used to express anxiousness or being vulnerable.

 

Worried Face Emoji

Apple version of the Worried Face emoji

Bring all of that fear out with the 😟 Worried Face emoji! This emoji shows a face with raised or furrowed eyebrows and mouth open slightly in a frown. It can be used to convey concern, anxiety, disappointment, or sadness.

Use this emoji when informing someone about a concerning incident or situation. Another way to apply it would be as a reaction to anything dreadful you’ve recently seen, read, or watched, it could be something scary on the news, or a horrifying article in a newspaper.

 

Confounded Face Emoji

Confounded Face emoji Apple version

Express all that held back sadness, frustration, and anger with the 😖 Confounded Face emoji! if there was an emoji scale of negativity, this one would be quite extreme and therefore definitely up there.

This emoji features a scrunched-up face, zigzag mouth, and squinted eyes. It’s commonly used to convey holding back tears because of either intense frustration or anger. If someone did something so bad to you, and it took you by surprise, use this emoji to express your shock, anger, and disbelief.

 

Frowning Face Emoji

Apple's Frowning Face emoji

When things don’t go your way, show your displeasure with the ☹️ Frowning Face emoji! This emoji is composed of a yellow face with its mouth arched into a full frown. It is also known as the unhappy emoji face or simply, the frown emoji, for those who prefer a shorter version.

Meanwhile, others like to call it the frowning emoji, or frowny face emoji. Not to be confused with the 🙁 Slightly Frowning Face emoji, which also shows a sad yellow face, but with a smaller frown.

If you ever need to express discontent, sadness, or any other form of dissatisfaction, this frowning face is the one you should go for. Say, you’re having a bad day, you broke a nail, or you’re stuck in a traffic jam, and you just need to have a “casually heartbreaking,” conversation to let it all out, this emoji is the best one to finish your sentence with.

As such, it usually isn’t applied to anything really earth-shattering, overall. Simple yet direct in tone, this unhappy emoji is perfect to use when dealing with life’s little inconveniences.

 

Slightly Frowning Face Emoji

Apple's Slightly Frowning Face emoji

Take your displeasure down a notch with the 🙁 Slightly Frowning Face emoji. This emoji suggests emotions of anxiousness, sadness, disappointment, but all of lesser intensity than the ☹️ Frowning Face emoji. Design-wise, this slightly frowning emoji is fairly simple and straightforward, it shows a face with its mouth set in a frown.

Most of the time, it’s used to express feelings of either sadness, concern, or disappointment. For instance, if someone has just told you something sad and you’re not sure how to react, start with this emoji to slowly build up the emotion. Alternatively, users also share it to tell other people about a sad occurrence.

 

Anguished Face Emoji

Apple's Anguished Face emoji

When you’ve seen something horrible, and all you feel is confusion and shock, let the 😧 Anguished Face emoji do the talking! This emoji shows a yellow face with raised eyebrows and a downward-curved mouth. The face in this emoji is obviously in shock, but seems to be suffering from some sort of severe physical or mental pain, too.

When you’re feeling pain, of any kind or intensity, use the anguished face emoji to share how you feel. That’s not its sole function, though. In fact, the meaning of the anguished face widely varies, depending on the user’s intention and overall context. Sometimes, the emoji may also be used to convey feelings of sadness, disappointment, worry, shock, and concern.

 

Face with Rolling Eyes Emoji

Face With Rolling Eyes emoji

The 🙄 Face With Rolling Eyes emoji is used to express disgust, disapproval, frustration, boredom, or all of the above. You’ve got to be definitely unhappy with a person, event, or a particular situation when you use it!

If it could talk, it would probably say, “Ugh,” or “Yeah, whatever,” or a combination of the two. This emoji is made up of a yellow face, with a small, closed mouth, that is either flat or frowning, and large, white eyes that roll upwards.

 

Pleading Face Emoji

Pleading Face emoji Apple version

Make anyone’s heart melt with those sweet, sad, puppy dog eyes! The 🥺 Pleading Face emoji is often compared to the expression on a child’s face when they want something from their parents—along with “pretty please,” in every sentence, of course!

As for how it looks, think about that expression we just talked about, then turn it into an emoji, that’s pretty much it! It’s got a pair of wide, open, tear-filled eyes, raised eyebrows, and a tiny frown.

This one’s perfect for all those times you need to borrow something or ask a favor from a friend or family member even if you aren’t sure if they will be willing to assist you. You might already know what the answer will be based on how big the favor is. To present your case, share this puppy eyes face emoji!

 

Person Frowning Emoji

Apple's Person Frowning emoji

Turn the ☹️ Frowning Face emoji into a human being, this is what you’ll get! This emoji shows a gender-neutral individual with shoulder-length hair and a frowning face. It’s often used to convey sadness, nervousness, regret, and disappointment.

If you received bad news from a friend or relative, or read about it online, use this to react to it. Having a bad day or just a major case of the Monday blues? Tell a friend all about it, and once you’re done with your rant, place the 🙍 Person Frowning emoji at the end of your sentence as a finishing touch for added impact.

On a final note, like all other emojis with human appearance, the frowning person emoji appears in five skin tone variations available on multiple devices, apps, and platforms.

 

Man Frowning Emoji

Apple's Man Frowning emoji

The🙍‍♂️ Man Frowning emoji is the male variant of the frowning person emoji. It depicts a man with a frowning face and side-parted hair. This emoji is used in the context of being discouraged, sad, or powerless.

Many use the emoji to react to bad news they saw, read about or heard, too. Just like the person frowning emoji, the frowning man emoji comes in five different skin tones, allowing users to pick a variant to match themselves, or the individual they’re sending the emoji to.

 

Woman Frowning Emoji

Woman Frowning emoji Apple version

The 🙍‍♀️ Woman Frowning emoji is a female-gendered variant of the frowning person emoji. This emoji is used to give off a feeling of being sad, disappointed, weary, or heartbroken. The frowning woman emoji comes in five choices of skin tone too, to match the complexion of the sender or the recipient.

 

Person Facepalming Emoji

Person Facepalming emoji Apple version

Wordlessly express your frustration with the 🤦 Person Facepalming emoji! This emoji features a gender-neutral individual covering his/her face with his/her palm in dismay. It is most commonly used to express shame, frustration, or disappointment.

If this emoji could talk, it would say. “This is so embarrassing, I can’t believe this is happening.” In addition, the person facepalming emoji contains two gender variants, and five different skin tone variants to fit the ethnicity of the user, or the one the user is pertaining to.

 

Woman Facepalming Emoji

Woman Facepalming emoji Apple version

The 🤦‍♀️Woman Facepalming emoji shows a woman with a hand covering her face in a facepalming gesture. It is the female version of the person facepalming emoji. As such, the woman facepalming emoji is often used by ladies to convey a feeling of exasperation, as shown by its facepalming action. It can also refer to feelings of frustration or embarrassment depending on the context.

 

Man Facepalming Emoji

Apple's Man Facepalming emoji

Meanwhile, here’s the male variant of the person facepalming emoji! This 🤦‍♂️ Man Facepalming emoji shows a man doing the famous facepalm gesture. He is sporting short hair, with his hand covering his face.

The man facepalming emoji is typically used as a reaction to something so embarrassing you’d wish the Earth would open up and swallow you whole. If this emoji could talk, it’d say, “what the hell man, I can’t believe this is happening. I am dying of embarrassment!”

 

Broken Heart Emoji

Broken Heart Apple version

Feeling lovesick? In a loveless relationship? Now’s the time to share the 💔 Broken Heart emoji. This emoji is used to represent heartbreak, grief, and sadness. Send this emoji to someone if something they did or said caused your heart to break into pieces. Once you’re done with that, share the emoji again, this time, in the midst of talking about that same breakup with a friend or family member.

 

Black Heart Emoji

Apple's Black Heart emoji

Reveal the dark side of society with the 🖤 Black Heart emoji. This emoji displays a heart shape in the color black. It is used to indicate a heart that is cold, emotionless, or without blood. Netizens share it to express sadness, dark humor, and melancholy.

Most of the time, it’s used to demonstrate grief regarding a person’s loss or to express indifference over an issue or topic. In relationships, couples use this emoji when they are upset with their partner, but don’t want to break up or look too vulnerable.

 

Cloud With Rain Emoji

Cloud With Rain Apple emoji

If you feel down during a downpour, then the 🌧️ Cloud With Rain emoji is for you. This emoji features a blue, gray, or white cloud with a few, small raindrops under it.

Aside from its obvious weather-related connotations, the raining cloud caricature is also used to indicate someone with a sad or depressed mood. In addition, users place it in their emails, captions and conversations to describe a gloomy or mopey person who always rains on someone’s parade.

 

Mix And Match Unhappy Emojis

Now that you know how to use each emoji correctly, let’s see if we can be more creative with what we have, for instance, is it okay to put one unhappy emoji after the other in an email? How about putting one unhappy emoji after the other in a social media post, or chat conversation?

Since smileys are used to express feelings like disappointment or grief, or to communicate concepts such as surprise, please don’t put too many unhappy emojis on a post. You might look like you’re overreacting, or come off as too intense, which might scare off your people.

If you’re feeling two different emotions at the same time, for example, you studied all night for a test and you still failed, it’s okay to share the 😞 Disappointed Face and the 😫 Tired Face, one after the other. As long as you are being authentic AND respectful of the person you’re talking to, you’re on the right track!

What if you want to combine different forms of an unhappy emoji? Follow the same principle, then. Say, you’re watching an episode of your favorite TV series, and the lead character did something that exasperated you and made you fearful for her fate at the same time? Send the 🤦 Facepalming Person and the 😟 Worried Face to your friend who is also a fan of the show.

 

Conclusion

Be Kind To Yourself

As you open up to a friend or a family member, remember to give yourself a pat on the back! Talking about your feelings is a sign of personal strength. It shows you are able to take control of your life. You hold ownership of your actions! As such, you get to choose who to share your truth to. Open up only to people you trust. At the same time, don’t let fear of being judged keep you from sharing to people who care about you.

Sadness Fueling Creativity

Group of young students painting pictures on easels in art class

Photo from Adobe Stock

After talking to someone, here’s another way to put your non-positive emotions to good use. Many experts believe there’s some correlation between sadness and creativity. You heard that right, the unexpected power of sadness can fuel some of our best, creative work!

What’s even better, creativity is a skill we all have and can improve with regular exercise. Something as simple as combining and sharing unhappy emoji enhances one’s creativity. Creative self-expression means the assertion of one’s own creativity in the form of art, music, poetry, painting, or anything similar.

There’s a lot of other stuff you can do, too, to express your creative side, like write an article or a poem. Feeling bored with your surroundings and also feeling creative? Rearrange your room, clean up, and redecorate if you want! More and more people are being creative with makeup, you can do that way, too. Practice some new looks if you want, or try a new product. Makeup is never supposed to look one certain way! There are no rules with it.

On a final note, whatever you choose to do, try not to pressure yourself too much. Doing so would defeat the purpose of your intention. Following what was said above, being consistent about it, you’ll be feeling way better before you know it. Good luck!