You can now run Windows 95 inside Windows (or Linux or macOS)

Github via Felix Rieseberg. Click for original.

Github via Felix Rieseberg. Click for original. (Image credit: Github via Felix Rieseberg)

Remember when the start menu was novel? When BSODs were a recurring nightmare? When Space Cadet Pinball was all we needed in life? If you want to relive the good old days of Windows 95 without using a 20-year-old PC, well, now you can. Windows 95 is now available as an app on Github.

It was compiled and uploaded by Felix Rieseberg, a Slack developer who apparently had a nostalgic itch to scratch. It's available not just on Windows systems, but also for Linux and macOS. The downloads range in size from 94.8MB to 129MB, depending on the platform you want to run it on.

As noted by The Verge, which drew our attention to the app, it doesn't consume much RAM—only about 200MB.

I briefly kicked the app's tires on a Windows 10 machine and, well, it's Windows 95 as I remember it. All the old applications are there, like Minesweeper, Solitaire, and Media Player, to name a few.

The question is, will Microsoft take issue with the app? In case you forgot, Microsoft acquired Github for $7.5 billion earlier this summer. Whether the app stays available remains to be seen. In the meantime, you can grab it here.

Paul Lilly

Paul has been playing PC games and raking his knuckles on computer hardware since the Commodore 64. He does not have any tattoos, but thinks it would be cool to get one that reads LOAD"*",8,1. In his off time, he rides motorcycles and wrestles alligators (only one of those is true).