‘I Feel Old’: The Emoji That Ages Even Gen Z

Did you know that double spacing is a highly generational habit?

Yep – in 2019, even the APA formatting style (formerly a “staunch defender” of double spacing) was forced to concede that it’s a bit of an outdated approach. While it made sense for typewriters, it isn’t needed for more modern word processing programs.

But, new Google data shared with the New York Times has proven that even when tech stays the same, the way we communicate with it still varies by age.

And one emoji (those little digital images like 😭 or 😂) appears to be ageing even Gen Z.

Using anonymous records from over 665 million emojis used on Google’s keyboard, Gboard, a wilting rose emoji (🥀) was found to be the 93rd most common choice.

It was the fastest-rising emoji on the list.

The information given by Google didn’t break down usage by age. But the New York Times used Reddit forums to form “imperfect proxies” that reveal “broad generational trends”.

They found that 🥀’s usage was almost non-existent in the comments of fora r/Millennials (born 1981-1996) and r/GenX (1965-1980). Members of r/GenZ (1997-2012), meanwhile, used it in about 2% of replies.

But that figure shot up in r/GenAlpha, a generation born from roughly 2013 onward.

Among this online group, 🥀 usage was almost at 8% – nearly four times as much as their Gen Z elders.

It’s apparently so obscure among those old enough for tax returns and driving licenses that Reddit users have dedicated entire posts to working out its meaning.

It’s often used in place of a heartbreak emoji (💔), the online trend explainer site KnowYourMeme shared. It can be invoked to suggest mock-earnestness about unserious topics, or as a genuine attempt to convey loss or sadness.

As for why it’s become popular, that’s unusually well-documented. In a 2025 TikTok, a poster shared: “💔 lowkey starting to become too mainstream… I might just start using 🥀”.

Subsequent social media videos discussed the irrelevance of the wilting rose’s older cousin, the heartbreak emoji.

Commenter after commenter on a Reddit post about the wilting rose said the trend made them “feel old”.

Still, take heart – not only are 25-year-olds apparently more baffled by the emoji than teens, but Merriam-Webster’s dictionary suggests that the dead battery (🪫) symbol is already nipping at 🥀’s heels.