Unicode 8.0 added the first skin-tone modifier characters for emoji.
Released in 2015, Unicode 8.0 introduced five Fitzpatrick-style emoji modifiers, covering light through dark skin tones. The modifiers were designed to follow certain human-form emoji and change their displayed skin color when a platform supports the combination.
The five modifiers are based on the Fitzpatrick scale, a dermatological classification system developed by Thomas B. Fitzpatrick. Emoji implementations generally pair the modifiers with eligible characters rather than treating each combination as an entirely unrelated character.
The system is sometimes described as having six tones because the default unmodified emoji is often shown with a yellow or neutral appearance. Unicode 8.0 did not make every person-related emoji configurable, and support depends on the base character and software. The later addition of diverse professions, families and gender options expanded representation beyond skin tone alone.