Charity launches dog emoji keyboard

The UK's largest dog welfare charity has launched an all-canine emoji keyboard containing 23 of the most popular breeds in the United Kingdom to help raise awareness for dogs in need of a new home.

The Dogs Trust is hoping that by harnessing the power of one of the world's fastest growing languages, they will able to find homes for some of the hundreds of dogs that find themselves at their centres each year.

The idea for the keyboard - available to download as an app for free on iOS and Android - is to promote the dogs of the UK and to highlight ones that need new homes, with each emoji based on a dog looking for a new family.

Using its own data combined with pet population figures, Dogs Trust selected the breeds to be included in the app, allowing people to depict their own pets using the cartoon-like icons.

The motley collection of mutts ranges from smaller breeds like the pug and dachshund to mighty great danes and english sheepdogs. Even more exotic doggies like the shar-pei and husky are featured.

Adrian Burder, CEO of Dogs Trust, said:

The charity says that each character on the keyboard has been based on a real life dog searching for their "pawfect match" at one of 20 Dogs Trust Rehoming Centres in the UK and Ireland.

Unicode, which dictates the choice of official emojis, has previously announced a number of doggy additions as well as a more racially diverse human characters, but the charity says there are still only a handful of dogs in the current range to choose from.

Mr Burder added:

Emojis are rapidly becoming a major method of online communication, with some linguists arguing it has become the fastest growing language ever.

Dogs Trust Emoji is available to download for free on Apple iOS and Google Android