A big dose of nostalgia is just a few clicks away. We've seen Windows 95 running on smartwatches and game consoles, but now you can run the 20-year-old operating system directly through any web browser.
The browser version of Windows 95 was created by developer Andrea Faulds and was recently discovered by The Next Web. Essentially, Faulds used the popular DOS emulator, DOSBox, to boot a copy of Windows 95, then compiled the DOSBox code into Javascript using a program called Emscripten.
Because the operating system doesn't run natively, it has some limitations. Starting certain programs, like Internet Explorer, will cause the emulator to crash. Additionally, starting and then closing Sound Recorder will also crash it.
The operating system itself also takes a long time to load. Be prepared to wait over 10 minutes for the classic Windows 95 startup sound to let you know that your "computer" is up and running.
As Faulds notes, the online version of Windows 95 may tread some murky legal ground, as the software remains Microsoft. Faulds argues that the site is strictly educational, is for non-commercial use, and should be used without fraudulent intent in the United States and for fair trade in the United Kingdom.
Why this matters: Running Windows 95 in a browser isn't a great scenario for everyday use beyond nostalgia, given its tendency to crash and the fact that the entire file system is lost as soon as the user closes the browser. But if you can tolerate the long boot times, it could be the most direct way to play a classic Windows game of Solitaire, without the ads and subscriptions that have been added to Microsoft.
