---
title: "Which came first, Harry Potter or Windows?"
description: "Harry Potter vs Windows: Windows came first, by 12 years — 1985 against 1997. What happened in each case, and why the dates are often given differently."
url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/harry-potter-vs-windows/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, Harry Potter or Windows?

**Which came first, Harry Potter or Windows?: Windows**

1985 — 12 years before Harry Potter

Windows came first, by 12 years. Microsoft shipped Windows 1.0.

## Side by side

|  | Harry Potter | Windows |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 1997 | 1985 |
| Date | 1997-06-26 | 1985-11-20 |
| Category | media | technology |
| What happened | Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was published in the UK. | Microsoft shipped Windows 1.0. |

## Harry Potter

Bloomsbury published the first book in June 1997 with a print run of 500 copies, most of which went to libraries, after twelve other publishers had rejected the manuscript. The company's chairman gave the first chapter to his eight-year-old daughter, who demanded the rest. It came out the same year as Netflix was founded and a year before Google.

## Windows

Windows 1.0 shipped in November 1985, twenty-two months after the Macintosh, and it was not an operating system — it was a graphical shell running on top of MS-DOS, and remained so until Windows NT in 1993 and the consumer transition with Windows XP in 2001. Version 1.0 could not even overlap windows: they tiled, because Apple's legal position on overlapping windows was unresolved.

## Common questions

### Which came first, Harry Potter or Windows?

Windows, by 12 years — 1985 against 1997.

### When did Harry Potter start?

1997. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was published in the UK.

### When did Windows start?

1985. Microsoft shipped Windows 1.0.

## Related pages

- [Microsoft or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/microsoft-vs-windows/)
- [Apple or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-windows/)
- [Apple or Harry Potter?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-harry-potter/)
- [the internet (ARPANET) or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-windows/)
- [email or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-windows/)
- [the Macintosh or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/macintosh-vs-windows/)
- [Windows or the World Wide Web?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/windows-vs-world-wide-web/)
- [Windows or YouTube?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/windows-vs-youtube/)
- [Python or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/python-vs-windows/)
- [Java or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/java-vs-windows/)
- [JavaScript or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/javascript-vs-windows/)
- [Amazon or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/amazon-vs-windows/)

## Sources

- Wikidata — Wikimedia Foundation (https://www.wikidata.org/) [CC0 1.0]