I have released a 69.0MB version of Windows 7 x86
50 comments
·October 30, 2025thunderbong
happymellon
If it can't run Windows 7 software, is it really Windows 7?
bhaney
A question that will truly haunt philosophers for centuries to come
ronsor
It almost certainly can run basic CLI apps linked only to kernel32.dll
znpy
If this was a linux container, it would be a base image.
I wonder if this could be used to cobble together some duct-tape windows-7-based firecrackers vm thing.
larodi
Is a working top notch OS and you can do a lot with this bare minimum actually.
gdulli
There used to be a much bigger scene around custom Windows installs and I hope it gets resurrected if/when the ability to create local accounts goes away. The desire for a tiny install is pretty niche at this point but I could see demand going up to preserve local accounts.
Or perhaps that won't be necessary because certain enterprise customers will insist on local accounts and it will be easier for pirates to just tap into that install path? One way or another, if/when local accounts go away I hope there's some option to work around it.
mid-kid
It still exists, and it's gotten way more reliable than in years of yore. Check out ameliorated, and its derivative projects, reviOS and Atlas OS.
There's also projects that modify a system less deeply, like Sophia Script.
These days the default windows install is so garbage that I have little issue running semi-open source customizations like these.
sharkjacobs
I had a bootcamp partition with TinyXP installed on every Intel Mac that I owned.
ZiiS
Do any enterprise use local accounts? I guess for airgapped?
gdulli
I don't know, but I was thinking/hoping maybe the code for local accounts has to live on if at least any enterprise customers demand it.
tapoxi
Why not just invest in Wine?
ssl-3
Why even do that? I don't want a better Windows than Windows so I can run Windows programs on my not-Windows computer.
I want Linux software, instead.
(I'm old enough to have once had a "better Windows than Windows" experience, with OS/2 Warp -- ~30 years ago. It was a very nice system that completely failed to thrive, with many back then blaming its quite good Windows compatibility for that failure.)
ayaros
Or ReactOS...
gdulli
I use Linux daily as a server/VM and hate using Windows as a server, but I've never been happy enough with alternatives to Windows as a desktop when I've tried them.
alnwlsn
Reminds me of when I first started learning computers, there was a version of Windows 3.11 that fit on a single 1.4M floppy. Some of them fit even more stuff by uncompressing the floppy into a ramdisk.
You could even make your own, starting with the file manager from Windows 3.1 and some files from a Windows 95 CD (the installer for 95 ran a stripped down 3.1)
souenzzo
Windows 98 takes ~200Mb after a clean install Windows 95 takes ~50Mb after a clean install
cyberax
I remember paring down Win98 to 17Mb. And pretty much everything still worked!
janci
Is it just a minimal set of unmodified files and Windows will gracefully degradate to this? Or did he need to patch everything to be able to strip it down?
SoKamil
There is Recycle Bin and Folder icon. What a waste of space!
lazystar
Side note.... one thing I wish all cloud provider websites would provide is a recycle bin in the GUI. its far too easy to bulk delete resources, and the cost of a misclick/tampermonkey script bug occurring while doing so can result in a huge qmount of time spent on restoring your service.
anthk
If they use webdav just use rclone or cadaver.
brazukadev
They want you bulk uploading resources, not deleting.
bombcar
Pallet shifts save so many bytes!
asadm
Whats the barebones usable version of windows 7? Tiny7?
LeoPanthera
What's the smallest Linux distribution with a graphical desktop?
watermelon0
Tiny Core Linux at 23 MB
Grom_PE
I have experimented with Tiny Core Linux + Wine, that netted around 100 MB, would be a good starting point for running Windows software on a minimal OS. Certainly would run more software than any Windows cut and shrunk to that size.
shakna
Damn Small Linux is 50Mb, and comes with fluxbox, so already beats this version of Windows - but I expect there's some smaller distros.
anthk
wingmanjd
Assuming that one could get a functional networking stack up, could running `sfc /scannow` fix all the missing pieces, similar to a netboot deployment of Linux?
shakna
You'd probably need DISM.
DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealthronsor
I'm fairly sure you need Windows Update components for that
MaiSck
What would be a use case for this? Or is it for the challenge?
pizlonator
I think it's just a really cool flex
etaioinshrdlu
This is impressive and it also kind of demonstrates how bloated Windows really is. You can fit a ton more functionality into even 1MB.
From the thread [0] -
> This was more of a fun proof of concept rather than something usable. Virtually nothing can run due to critical missing files such as common dialog boxes and common controls.
[0]: https://x.com/XenoPanther/status/1983579460906487835?t=7jLSz...