i-mode was NTT Docomo's internet service for mobile phones, launched in February 1999. It brought web browsing, email, ringtone downloads and games to the small screens of feature phones, and was the first service anywhere to make using the internet from a phone alone a mass-market habit.
Its real innovation was turning the phone from "a tool for making calls" into "a terminal for reaching information". i-mode sites were split into official ones, supplied by content providers that had passed Docomo's review, and unofficial ones outside that programme. The monthly subscription model opened up content businesses in ringtones, horoscopes, news and games; billing for content alongside the phone bill was an early precursor of the payment model later used by app stores.
i-mode email addresses (@docomo.ne.jp) sat at the centre of Japan's mobile messaging culture. Emoji originated with i-mode: Docomo designer Shigetaka Kurita created a set of 176 of them in 1999. That set was later taken into Unicode and became the template for the emoji used on smartphones around the world.
As smartphones spread, i-mode subscriptions fell, and Docomo closed the service on 31 March 2026 together with FOMA, its third-generation (3G) network, according to the company's own announcement. That brought roughly 27 years of operation, from February 1999, to an end. Because the shutdown was shared with FOMA, handsets that supported only 3G stopped working that day for voice calls as well, so anyone still using one had to move to a different device rather than merely change service. The ideas i-mode established - mobile internet, emoji culture and subscription billing - carried over into the smartphone services that followed. See the history of telephone devices for a look back at the i-mode era.