Meaning
A solid black square rendered at a smaller, medium-small size—the most compact of the black square options and useful when subtlety and precision matter. Despite its diminutive nature, it maintains the same pure black appearance and clean edges as its larger siblings, just with more restrained visual impact.
The medium-small black square shines in detailed pixel art, intricate patterns, and situations where you need to pack visual information densely. It's popular with retro gaming enthusiasts recreating beloved 8-bit and 16-bit aesthetics, where pixel-level precision matters. In messages, it can serve as a subtle marker or accent without dominating the conversation.
When stacked or arranged, these smaller squares create fine-grained designs that benefit from granular control. They're also useful for creating visual patterns that won't overwhelm mobile screens or make text hard to read. The size makes them feel more delicate and intricate compared to the heavier presence of medium and large variants.
Like other geometric shapes, the medium-small black square arrived as part of Unicode 6.0 in 2010 and joined Emoji 1.0 in 2015. It remains a specialized tool in the geometric toolkit, especially valued by pixel artists and those seeking to build detailed, intricate visual compositions in constrained spaces.
Common Uses
- • Creating detailed pixel art and sprites
- • Building fine-grained patterns and textures
- • Subtle accent marks in messages
- • Recreating retro gaming aesthetics
Popular Combos
Did You Know?
Pixel artists consider the three black square sizes (and their white counterparts) essential tools for recreating classic video game sprites and retro digital art with authentic proportions.
Keywords
Related Emoji
Technical Reference
Platform Shortcodes
:black_medium_small_square: :black_medium_small_square: :black_medium_small_square: Developer Codes
| HTML (decimal) | ◾ |
| HTML (hex) | ◾ |
| CSS | \25FE |
| JavaScript | \u25FE |
| Python | \U000025FE |
| Java | \u25FE |
| Perl | \x{25FE} |
| PHP / Ruby | \x{25FE} |
| Punycode | xn--7i6 |
| URL Encoded | %E2%97%BE |
| UTF-8 Bytes | 0xE2 0x97 0xBE |
◾️ in 28 languages
Names sourced from Unicode CLDR and emojibase.
| Language | Name |
|---|---|
| Bengali | কালো মাঝারি ছোট বর্গক্ষেত্র |
| Chinese (Simplified) | 黑色中小方块 |
| Chinese (Traditional) | 黑色中小型方塊 |
| Danish | halvlille sort kvadrat |
| Dutch | klein tot middelgroot zwart vierkant |
| English | black medium-small square |
| English (UK) | black medium-small square |
| Estonian | väiksem must ruut |
| Finnish | pienehkö musta neliö |
| French | carré petit moyen noir |
| German | mittelkleines schwarzes Quadrat |
| Hindi | काला मध्यम-छोटा वर्ग |
| Hungarian | kis-közepes fekete négyzet |
| Italian | quadrato nero medio-piccolo |
| Japanese | 黒四角中 |
| Korean | 중각 작은 검은색 사각형 |
| Lithuanian | juodas vidutiniškai mažas kvadratas |
| Malay | persegi sederhana kecil hitam |
| Norwegian | lite/mellomstort svart kvadrat |
| Polish | mały/średni czarny kwadrat |
| Portuguese | quadrado preto médio menor |
| Russian | небольшой черный квадрат |
| Spanish | cuadrado negro mediano-pequeño |
| Spanish (Mexico) | cuadrado negro mediano-pequeño |
| Swedish | mellanliten svart ruta |
| Thai | สี่เหลี่ยมเล็กปานกลางสีดำ |
| Ukrainian | менший за середній чорний квадрат |
| Vietnamese | hình vuông nhỏ vừa màu đen |