“Face with tears of joy” emoji on different devices. 

A recent study by a German institute shows that the emoji commonly described as “face with tears of joy” is the most popular emoji used on social media platforms. It has been used 6.5 billion times on Twitter.

A report by the German communications agency Faktor3 said that the emoji was used billions of times in 2015 alone. The report pointed out that that number averages out to about one emoji per person on the planet.

Oxford University Press has chosen this emoji as Word of the Year for 2015 because it made up 20 percent of all the emojis used in the U.K. in 2015, as well as 17 percent of those in the U.S.

Twitter’s next most popular emojis were “heart eyes” (12 percent), “crying face” (8 percent) and “prayer hands” (6 percent).

An emoji is defined as “a small digital image or icon used to express an idea or emotion in electronic communication.” The term “emoji” is actually a loanword from Japanese, and comes from “e” (picture) plus “moji” (letter or character).

Emojis are no longer the sole province of texting teens; instead, they have been embraced as a nuanced form of expression—one that can cross language barriers.

“Face with tears of joy” emoji on Twitter and Facebook