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# Adding Icons to Folder Names in iOS
- URL: https://horrell.ca/2011/10/28/adding-icons-to-folder-names-in-ios/
- Published: 2011-10-28T19:10:48.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-03T16:50:34.000Z
- Author: Christopher Horrell
- Tags: iOS, iPhone, #Import 2024-10-01 02:36

The introduction of folders to iOS was a welcome addition to keeping your home screen tidy. Folders allows you to sensible group like applications and then give the folder a given name, like "Games" for all your game apps etc. In iOS 5, [Emoji](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoji?ref=horrell.ca "Information about what Emoji is on Wikipedia") support was added which means you can also use Emoji as icons in your folder names for added bit of flare, like this:

![iPHone home screen](https://horrell.ca/content/images/2014/Mar/2.png)

Cool huh?

So here's what you need to do to enable Emoji and then use it in a folder name.

First, enable Emoji support by going to *Settings* → *General* → *Keyboard* → *International Keyboards* → *Add New Keyboard* → *Emoji*

All done? Good! Now, touch and hold a folder you want to add an Emoji icon to and then touch it again and you'll see something like this:

![Edit folder name screen](https://horrell.ca/content/images/2014/Mar/3.png)

Cool, now touch the folder name (in this example *Games*) and you'll see something like this:

![](https://horrell.ca/content/images/2014/Mar/4.png)

You may have noticed the new globe icon on the keyboard. Touch it and you'll see something like this:

![Emoji Keyboard](https://horrell.ca/content/images/2014/Mar/6.png)

Tada, an Emoji keyboard!

From here, pick the Emoji you'd like to use, insert it into the folder name (I like to put them at the beginning), touch the globe icon again and then touch *Done*. The keyboard will then disappear and you can press the Home button to save you changes.

You may have noticed that I had an  icon for the folder in the top right, but that icon is not actually available via the Emoji keyboard. I used Neven Mrgan’s cool [Glyphboard (Glyphboard iPhone web app)](http://mrgan.com/gb/?ref=horrell.ca) to add it. From Glyphboard, I just copied the  icon and then pasted it in the folder name.