List of Easter eggs in Microsoft products


Some of Microsoft's early products included hidden Easter Eggs. Microsoft formally stopped including Easter Eggs in its programs as part of its Trustworthy Computing Initiative in 2002.

Windows

, 2.0 and 2.1 all include an Easter egg, which features a window that shows a list of people who worked on the software along with a "Congrats!" button. Double clicking the list box further changes the background of the window to tiled smiley faces. The instructions for invoking the Easter egg vary depending on the version:
  • 1.xx: Press.
  • 1.01 and later: Hold then, release then, press twice then press.
  • 2.0 and later: Press,,, and in rapid succession.
Windows 3.0 has a developer credits page which may be accessed by setting the focus to the desktop then typing win30 followed by and in quick succession. This causes the developer credits to appear on the desktop in the form of the email names of the crew.
Windows 3.1 has two visible Easter eggs, both of which reference the Microsoft Bear, which was the mascot of the Windows 3.1 development team. One was the developer credits, where the Bear, along with Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, and Brad Silverberg, present the email aliases of the Windows 3.1 developers. bradsi, being in charge of Windows production, is listed first; the three other presenters, billg, steveb, and t-bear, appear together in "Special Thanks", the last section of the list. The other one was a reference to a fictitious file named BEAR.EXE in the properties window for the MS-DOS Prompt. Internally, there was another egg, where several internal system functions were exported from user.exe as BEARNNN in his honor and to discourage their use by third-party software developers. The user can also find the easter egg by opening the About Program Manager, holding down, and, double click one colored square of the Microsoft Windows logo, and then close the window. Open it again and do so with a different square. Keep repeating this until the Microsoft Bear appears in the window, as seen to the right.
Windows 95 has an animated presentation of its developers, complete with music. This page is accessed by renaming a folder on the desktop to "and now, the moment you've all been waiting for", then "we proudly present for your viewing pleasure", and finally "The Microsoft Windows 95 Product Team!". Additionally, a dialog with credits can be invoked from the Windows Help application.
During the development of Windows 95, the shell developers had several stuffed animals as mascots. In addition to the Microsoft Bear, there were two bunnies as well - the smaller 16-bit Bunny and the larger 32-bit Bunny. The bunnies' names referred to the fact that Windows 95 was the transitional OS. The Microsoft Bunny has an exported function named after him, BUNNY_351 in krnl386.exe. Also, the Bunny is the icon for the Microsoft Party Line in some pre-release versions of Windows 95. In the internet mail app, there is a hidden credits list that can be accessed by clicking Help, About, comctl32.dll, and typing MORTIMER.
Windows 98 has a credits screen Easter egg, which can be triggered by invoking weldata.exe with the argument "You_are_a_real_rascal" in the command line or a shortcut, or by clicking and dragging between the locations of Memphis, Egypt; Memphis, Tennessee; and Redmond, Washington on the Time Zone map.
A drawing of the Microsoft Bear was used as the icon for the SETDEBUG.EXE and JDBGMGR.EXE system files. The odd icon gave credibility to the jdbgmgr.exe virus hoax, which claimed that the files were part of a computer virus. See SULFNBK.EXE for a similar hoax.
The Pipes screensaver in Windows 95, 98, ME, NT 4.0 and 2000 will occasionally insert a Utah teapot as a joint between pipes when the screensaver is configured to draw multiple, traditional-style pipes with mixed joint types and a solid texture. Windows 2000 and Windows XP have an undocumented texture in the Pipes screensaver that makes the pipes red and white, similar to candy canes.
An Easter egg that displays the names of all the volcanoes in the United States can be found in the 3D Text screensaver on all versions of Microsoft Windows prior to Windows XP by setting the text to display to "Volcano". In Windows NT 3.5, setting the text to "I love NT" shows the names of the developers. "Rock" and "Beer" lists bands and breweries, respectively. In Windows NT 4.0, the phrase to view the developer credits was changed to "not evil". Setting the text to "I love NT" will instead simply display "good?".
Three images are embedded in the surface of Windows Vista's installation DVD. One of the images shows the faces of the members of Microsoft's anti-piracy team who worked on the hologram.
In Windows 10 build 16232, the "Windows is checking for a solution to solve the problem..." dialog that appears when a program crashes is replaced with "Windows is opening a portal to another dimension..."

Microsoft Office

MS Access 1.0

Access 1.0 had a simple animation showing a gun firing and killing two ducks. The story behind this is; one of the team members spoke with a strong accent and when referring to the main competition 'Paradox' it sounded like "Pair o' Ducks". The gun killing the ducks is something like what the earlier release date and ridiculously cheap pricing, did to Paradox. In truth the product was not truly ready for market at the time of the release of 1.0 and it was almost immediately followed up with a free copy of 1.1 for those that could produce evidence of their purchase of 1.0, but the damage had been done to Paradox. Paradox did eventually come to market, and probably with a better product, but by that time, people looking for an all encompassing, low level application and database development platform, were already using Microsoft Access.

Word for Windows 2

In Word for Windows 2, there is a simple animation involving a WordPerfect 'Monster', a fireworks display and credits roll in the About box. The user's name was appended to the end of the "Thanks" section of the credits.

Office 4.3

The tip of the day would sometimes display the following platitudes. They could also be viewed in the help file. This first appeared in Office 4.3, and also appeared in Office 95, and 97.
  • If you do your best, whatever happens will be for the best.
  • Things that go away by themselves can come back by themselves.
  • Plaid shirts and striped pants rarely make a positive fashion statement.
  • You should never dive into murky waters.
  • It's never too late to learn to play the piano.
  • You can hurt yourself if you run with scissors.
  • You should never look directly at the sun.
  • This is the last tip.

    Office 95

  • Microsoft Excel contained a hidden Doom-like mini-game called "The Hall of Tortured Souls", a series of rooms featuring the names and faces of the developers. The mini-game generated some controversy when chain emails made spurious claims and conspiracy theories accusing Microsoft—particularly Bill Gates—of hiding Satanic symbolism within its software.

    Office 97

  • Microsoft Excel contained a hidden flight simulator.
  • Microsoft Word contained a hidden pinball game. It also contained a hidden developer credits screen. The latter easter egg went undiscovered for 29 years.
  • Microsoft Access contained a hidden simulation of the Magic 8 Ball toy. This also works in Access 2000.

    Office 2000

Using Microsoft Excel 2000 and the Office Web Components, a small 3-D game called "Dev Hunter" is accessible. DirectX must be installed for this to work, and the egg is incompatible with certain service pack upgrades. On the roadway shown in this game, a list of comments appear, all capitalized:
  • WE ARE SPECIAL TOO
  • YOU WILL RESPECT THE RECTANGLES
  • DONT SKIMP ON THE DATA
  • WHAT DO THESE PEOPLE DO AGAIN
  • SO YOUR NAME IS MISSPELLED WHAT ARE YOU GOING TO DO ABOUT IT
  • CIRCLES ARE GOOD TOO BUT THEYRE NOT RECTANGLES
  • PIVOT PIVOT PIVOT CANT GET ENOUGH
  • MALICIOUS PIXIES
  • A CHART SAYS SO MUCH EVEN THOUGH IT DOESNT REALLY SAY ANYTHING BECAUSE IT CANT TALK
  • THANKS FOR SHARING
  • LAST BUT NOT LEAST BUT ALSO NOT COMPRESSED SPAM

    Office 2004 Mac

The game Asteroids is included in the Microsoft Office Notifications application.

Cortana

These features below were discontinued because Cortana is no longer available.
  • When asked if she likes Clippy, Cortana would answer "Definitely! He taught me how important it is to listen." or "What's not to like? That guy took a heck of a beating and he's still smiling." Her avatar then occasionally turns into a two-dimensional Metro-style Clippit for several seconds Similarly, you can ask "Do you know Clippy?" or "Where is Clippy?", and a response will also be given.
  • Asking Cortana "What does the fox say?" would make her respond with "Ring-ding-ding-ding-dingeringeding", a reference to the 2013 song The Fox
  • Cortana had several Easter Eggs referencing the Halo franchise including, but not limited to, the questions, "What is Halo?", "Tell me about Halo", "Do you love Master Chief?" and "How is Master Chief?"
  • Saying, "May the force be with you" to Cortana would make her reply "My ally is the force, and a powerful ally it is", a reference to the Star Wars franchise.
  • Asking, "What is the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow?" would make Cortana respond "What do you mean? An African or European swallow?", a reference to Monty Python.
  • Saying, "Up up down down left right left right B A start" to Cortana would make her say, "That it is the Konami Code, not the Cortana Code."
  • Asking Cortana, "Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?", would make her respond with "SpongeBob SquarePants!", a reference to the theme song of the 1999 animated series SpongeBob SquarePants.
  • Asking Cortana to do a barrel roll would cause her to respond with "How about a sausage roll?", "How about a swiss roll?", or "How about a spicy tuna roll?".