Today, we’re excited to announce that we’ve expanded our representation options by adding the top three most requested assistive devices to Bitmoji and Snapchat: hearing aids, cane stickers, and wheelchair poses for Profiles. Now, in the latest version of Snapchat, our community can see themselves in 3D poses with a wheelchair on their Profile - or choose a hearing aid in a variety of colors, with flexible options to be worn on one ear or both. We’ve also added a selection of our most popular Bitmoji stickers featuring the avatar with a cane.
We made these updates with valuable guidance from our partners who share our commitment to this important work. During the development process, we worked closely with Disability:IN and consulted with people who have lived experience using assisted devices to ensure the full accuracy of representation in our new products.
Last year, we released stickers featuring a manual wheelchair after being in touch with our Snapchatters and broader community members. We’re excited to say that these stickers have been shared over 30 million times. Through the launch of these stickers, we’ve seen positive reactions and engagement with our products, and received additional feedback from people who wanted to see themselves in more parts of Snapchat.
Bitmoji’s mission is to be the world’s avatar, which also means that we want to ensure that all of our communities are reflected in our products. This is at the center of the work we do when designing new products and features, and we prioritize Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging, and Accessibility principles to improve the experiences of all Snapchatters on our platform.
We know that this work is only the start and we will continue to learn from our community and welcome feedback in order to improve representation in future products. We also encourage all Snapchatters to be a part of this ongoing conversation and provide direct feedback about how we can continue to improve our designs to better represent you. We couldn’t have done this without your insights about what makes your Bitmoji YOU!
Having trouble finding the new additions? Head to Bitmoji Support Site for help articles.
In the latter half of the year, we will be conducting research about how Snapchatters and Bitmoji users with disabilities would like to be represented online. If you are interested in participating, please sign up using this form. Your feedback will be used to improve the quality of our products and for an academic publication. We will not share your identity or attribute your feedback to you publicly. Participation in our study will be compensated.