A smiling face with tears, or 'Tears of Joy", was chosen as the most popular emoji globally, with 21.25 percent of reaches used on social media, according to a report released by Chinese tech startup Kika.

Based on internet user behavior across the world, the report "Emoji, the Rise of New World Language" shows that "Tears of Joy" ranked No 1 as used by netizens, followed by "Heart" in second place and "Love" in third.

The report also indicated that Chinese people check their Wechat 14.5 times on average and spend 48 minutes on social media per day. "Grin" is the emoji that Chinese used the most.

"Face with Tears of Joy" became one of the most frequently used "words" in 2015 and was also the word of the year as judged by the Oxford English Dictionary.

Like text messages, different emoticons represent different meanings and emotions. They are often more intuitive and simple than words, which is also the reason they have become so popular worldwide. Therefore, more and more people choose to express their emotions and ideas by using emojis.