Chinese character input is translated to emoji in WhatsApp When inputting a Chinese character "" on WhatsApp for Android version 2.20.47, it is rendered as the emoji  instead.

My first guess is the Unicode of the Chinese character and the emoji are the same? Is there any reason behind this?

FYI: The character is typed with ChangJie, and the input code is 竹人戈一弓 or HOIMN.
This is because WhatsApp uses Apple's emoji set, which essentially uses SoftBank mapping for backward compatibility in a Private Use Area (PUA), long before emoji was standardized in the Unicode.
The character &quot;&quot; (U+E409) is in the Basic Multilingual Plane's (U+E000 - U+F8FF) PUA. Since it is in the PUA, there is no standard definition for the character. While the character is supposedly rendered as , SoftBank (and Apple subsequently) apparently uses the PUA for their emoji, and U+E409 &quot;coincidentally&quot; renders .
Some other characters in the PUA that are rendered as emoji on WhatsApp (U+E400 - U+E40F):




Note that this is entirely WhatsApp's doing. This also affects WhatsApp Web and also WhatsApp on PC. However, other apps/OSes may render the character differently or otherwise, fails to render.