{"id":435115,"date":"2022-04-21T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-04-21T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now\/"},"modified":"2022-04-21T15:00:00","modified_gmt":"2022-04-21T12:00:00","slug":"what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now\/","title":{"rendered":"#What Happened to Winamp, and Can You Use It Now?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_85 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3dba7755cf0\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6a3dba7755cf0\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now\/#%E2%80%9CWhat_Happened_to_Winamp_and_Can_You_Use_It_Now%E2%80%9D\" >&#8220;What Happened to Winamp, and Can You Use It Now?&#8221;<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-2' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now\/#What_Happened_to_Winamp\" >What Happened to Winamp?<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/what-happened-to-winamp-and-can-you-use-it-now\/#Can_You_Use_It_Today\" >Can You Use It Today?<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"%E2%80%9CWhat_Happened_to_Winamp_and_Can_You_Use_It_Now%E2%80%9D\"><\/span>&#8220;What Happened to Winamp, and Can You Use It Now?&#8221;<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<div>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"type:primaryImage alignnone size-full wp-image-799085\" data-pagespeed-lazy-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/winamp-on-windows-11.png?width=398&amp;trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1 400w, https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/winamp-on-windows-11.png?width=1198&amp;trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, 400w, 1200w\" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/winamp-on-windows-11.png?width=1198&amp;trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"Winamp running on Windows 11.\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Twenty-five years ago Winamp was the future. Now it\u2019s a distant memory. What h<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a>ened?<\/p>\n<p>Winamp (Windows Advanced Multi<a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/social-mediaa\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"1\" title=\"Social Media\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">media<\/a> Products) came out on April 21, 1997\u2014back when listening to music on computers was a novel concept, and most people didn\u2019t know what \u201cMP3\u201d meant. Winamp wasn\u2019t the first PC music player, but it did make it easy to create a playlist: drag files over to the playlist window and start listening. This, combined with early file-sharing networks like Napster, changed the way people discovered and listened to music. Winamp rode that wave, growing until it had 90 million users, only to become irrelevant.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Editor\u2019s Note<\/strong>: We originally published this piece in 2018. We\u2019re republishing it in honor of Winamp\u2019s twenty-fifth anniversary on April 21, 2022. The first version of Winamp (version 0.20a) was released on April 21, 1997.<\/p>\n<p><strong>RELATED:<\/strong> <strong><em>Re-Live 90s Computing In Your Browser Right Now<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Hardly anyone uses Winamp these days. Where did it go? And could you use it today, if you wanted to? Let\u2019s dig in and see what we can find.<\/p>\n<h2 role=\"heading\" aria-level=\"2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"What_Happened_to_Winamp\"><\/span>What Happened to Winamp?<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Winamp was lightweight, customizable, and made listening to music easier than any player that came before it. It quickly became a hit, despite only having a four-person team behind it. Part of the appeal came from the community: a plugin and skin ecosystem allowed designers and developers to customize things in surprising ways, and music nerds loved having that kind of control.<\/p>\n<h2 role=\"heading\" aria-level=\"2\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-369299 \" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Screen-Shot-2018-09-25-at-11.01.39-AM.png?trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"Winamp application window.\" width=\"650\" height=\"325\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/h2>\n<p>Our story\u2019s ending begins with a buyout, like many other 90s tech stories. In June of 1999, AOL acquired Nullsoft (the company behind Winamp) for $80 million. That\u2019s quite the payout for a four-person team, but AOL never really knew what to do with what they bought. Page views to the Winamp website brought in a big chunk of ad revenue, sure, and thousands of people paid $10 for the Pro version of the software, but that was about it regarding revenue.<\/p>\n<p><strong>RELATED:<\/strong> <strong><em>RIP AIM, the Messaging App AOL Never Wanted<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>AOL, meanwhile, was still making ridiculous sums of money with its infamously sandboxed dial-up service. That massive revenue stream made it hard to prioritize other projects\u2014even those for which AOL paid millions. Eventually, AOL decided software like Winamp was a promotional opportunity for the dial-up service, and soon installing Winamp meant declining offers for \u201cfree\u201d AOL subscriptions.<\/p>\n<p>This was a major turnoff for Winamp users. Here\u2019s Cyrus Farivar, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/arstechnica.com\/information-technology\/2017\/07\/winamp-how-greatest-mp3-player-undid-itself\/\">writing for Ars Technica<\/a> in a very good feature about Winamp\u2019s decline:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>[Winamp\u2019s] primary users were music fans, geeks, and people who cared about what bitrate their MP3s were encoded at\u2014in other words, the key users of Winamp in the early 2000s were allergic to AOL as a company.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Bundling AOL software and offers with Winamp cheapened the software in users\u2019 eyes. Then something new came along.<\/p>\n<lite-youtube videoid=\"mE_bDNaYAr8\" style=\"background-image: url('https:\/\/i.ytimg.com\/vi\/mE_bDNaYAr8\/hqdefault.jpg');\">\n<button type=\"button\" class=\"lty-playbtn\"><br \/>\n<span class=\"lyt-visually-hidden\">Play Video<\/span><br \/>\n<\/button>\n<\/lite-youtube>\n<p>In 2001 Apple launched the iPod, and it caught on in a big way. By 2003 iTunes came out for the PC and that was the beginning of the end for Winamp. Everyone who bought an iPod switched to iTunes for listening to music, because iTunes was more-or-less required for loading up an iPod with music\u2014and a lot of people bought iPods.<\/p>\n<p>Even if you didn\u2019t own an iPod, iTunes was attractive. It could identify and rip your CDs in just a couple of clicks. The search was basically instant. And while Winamp\u2019s interface was a bit cluttered, the iTunes interface (at least at the time) was clean and easy to use. Winamp was made up of several windows; iTunes only had one. Winamp offered thousands of fan-created themes and plugins; iTunes wasn\u2019t really customizable at all.<\/p>\n<p>A lot of geeks preferred Winamp, but iTunes appealed to a much bigger audience who just wanted to rip a bunch of CDs and listen to them. Winamp tried to fight this by offering unofficial support for transferring music to an iPod, but it wasn\u2019t enough. Apple took the music player market and ran with it (and then spent 15 years turning iTunes into the cluttered mess we all hate today.)<\/p>\n<p>Winamp\u2019s userbase declined, and by 2013 AOL decided to shut it down entirely. That plan changed at the last second when Nullsoft was sold to Radionomy. Since then the <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.winamp.com\">Winamp website<\/a> has declared a new version is \u201ccoming soon,\u201d but five years later and we\u2019ve seen nothing. There are <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Ed_Rich\/status\/788650603383754752\">occasional developer rumblings<\/a> about new builds, but nothing substantial so far.<\/p>\n<h2 role=\"heading\" aria-level=\"2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Can_You_Use_It_Today\"><\/span>Can You Use It Today?<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-369302 \" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Screen-Shot-2018-09-25-at-11.28.36-AM.png?trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"Winamp window on desktop.\" width=\"650\" height=\"376\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p>So you might be wondering: can you install and use Winamp right now? The answer: sort of.\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.winamp.com\">The WinAMP website<\/a>, unchanged for five years, points to a <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/forums.winamp.com\/showthread.php?t=374929\">forum thread<\/a> when you request a download. This thread points to a <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/meggamusic.co.uk\/winamp\/Winamp_Download.htm\">simplistic website<\/a> where you\u2019ll find Winamp 5.666 for Windows. This software dates back to 2013, but it works.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-369301 \" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Screen-Shot-2018-09-25-at-10.50.53-AM-1.png?trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"Winamp installer window on Windows.\" width=\"650\" height=\"448\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p>I installed Winamp on a modern Windows 10 machine and quickly noticed a problem: nothing here is scaled properly on high-resolution displays. You can solve this in any modern skin by adjusting the Scaling settings, like this:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-369303 \" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Screen-Shot-2018-10-09-at-3.36.50-PM.png?trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"Choosing window scaling settings in Winamp.\" width=\"650\" height=\"578\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p>If you\u2019re using a classic skin, you can use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+D to double the size of the main window.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-369304 \" data-pagespeed-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Screen-Shot-2018-09-25-at-11.01.39-AM-1.png?trim=1,1&amp;bg-color=000&amp;pad=1,1\" alt=\"The Winamp application window showing a library, playlist, and equalizer.\" width=\"650\" height=\"325\" src=\"\/pagespeed_static\/1.JiBnMqyl6S.gif\" onload=\"pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\" onerror=\"this.onerror=null;pagespeed.lazyLoadImages.loadIfVisibleAndMaybeBeacon(this);\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Winamp once offered a vast directory of skins and plugins, but that died in 2013. Happily, <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/winampheritage.com\">Winamp heritage<\/a> offers a large collection, so check that out if you want to try out anything you remember from back in the day.<\/p>\n<p>I don\u2019t think Winamp has aged well. But it does work, and if nothing else is worth firing up for the nostalgia factor. Sure, it\u2019s a little buggy, and the UI looks pixelated on modern displays after you adjust the scaling. But it\u2019s Winamp, and that\u2019s worth something. Give it a spin and remember the early 2000s. Who knows? Maybe you\u2019ll even use it full-time.<\/p>\n<p><small>Photo credit: <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/drtran\/4423647110\/\">Al Pavangkanan<\/a><\/small><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><script>\n setTimeout(function(){\n  !function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n  {if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\n  n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\n  if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\n  n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\n  t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n  s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s) } (window, document,'script',\n  'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n   fbq('init', '335401813750447');\n   fbq('track', 'PageView');\n  },3000);\n<\/script><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. 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Now it\u2019s a distant memory. What happened? Winamp (Windows Advanced Multimedia Products) came out on April 21, 1997\u2014back when listening to music on computers was a novel concept, and most people didn\u2019t know what \u201cMP3\u201d meant. Winamp wasn\u2019t&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":435116,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.howtogeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/winamp-on-windows-11.png?height=200p&trim=2,2,2,2","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-435115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=435115"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/435115\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/435116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=435115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=435115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=435115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}