WordPress – remove emoji scripts

Add following few lines into your theme functions.php file:

remove_action( 'wp_head', 'print_emoji_detection_script', 7);
remove_action( 'wp_print_styles', 'print_emoji_styles');
remove_action( 'admin_print_scripts', 'print_emoji_detection_script' );
remove_action( 'admin_print_styles', 'print_emoji_styles' );

and you are all set

WordPress disable theme update

If you have made custom changes to a WordPress theme and don’t want to upgrade to a new version, that is offered to you, open style.css in theme’s directory.
At the top you will find a big comment with theme’s version, name, author information etc.
Change the version in this comment to a big number, e.g. 9.9

Before:

Version: 1.7

After:

Version: 9.9

Go to WordPress update screen and update for this theme will disappear.