It is good news for avocado and bacon lovers the world over - the latest batch of new emoji has been released.

Unicode Consortium, the official body responsible for setting a standard of characters across the computing industry, has released 72 new emojis today - although it may take manufacturers a little longer to add them to handsets.

However, the update does not include a controversial rifle emoji, due to be included as part of the Rio Games section until, it was claimed, Apple and Microsoft complained.

The 72 new emoji: Unicode Consortium, the official body responsible for setting a standard of characters across the computing industry, released the new images today, although it may take manufacturers a little longer to add them to handsets.

But people with a phobia of clowns are in for a nasty surprise as the iconic circus clown face is also going to be included.

One of the concepts behind the scheduled update was creating gender pairs to fill existing gaps.

This means the dancing woman will be given a partner in the form of a dancing man, the bride emoji will be paired with a groom and a Mrs Clause will accompany the Santa emoji.

New hand gestures include the much-awaited fingers crossed emoji, a 'call me' signal, shaking hands and fist bumps.

Vain people across the world will be happy to see a selfie emoji.

Google announced this week that more than 200 million people upload images to the Google Photos application each month, and are responsible for an extraordinary 24 billion selfies.

A pregnant woman joins the ranks along with a facepalm and three more faces that look as if they are feeling a bit sick.

One of the concepts behind the scheduled update was creating gender pairs to fill existing gaps. This means the dancing woman will be given a partner in the form of a dancing man, the bride emoji will be paired with a groom and a Mrs Clause will accompany the Santa emoji

Popular foods considered missing are also on the list, with an avocado, paella, a pickle and a croissant making it to the shortlist.

New drinks include a glass of water, champagne and whisky on the rocks.

Animal lovers will be happy to know that the critters to be added to the list include an octopus, a rhino, an owl, a gorilla and a duck

Animal lovers will be happy to know that the critters to be added to the list include an octopus, a rhino, an owl, a gorilla and a duck