---
title: "Which came first, Microsoft or Mario?"
description: "Microsoft vs Mario: Microsoft came first, by 6 years — 1975 against 1981. What happened in each case, and why the dates are often given differently."
url: https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/microsoft-vs-super-mario/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, Microsoft or Mario?

**Which came first, Microsoft or Mario?: Microsoft**

1975 — 6 years before Mario

Microsoft came first, by 6 years. Gates and Allen founded Micro-Soft in Albuquerque.

## Side by side

|  | Microsoft | Mario |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 1975 | 1981 |
| Date | 1975-04-04 | — |
| Category | company | media |
| What happened | Gates and Allen founded Micro-Soft in Albuquerque. | Mario debuted as "Jumpman" in the arcade game Donkey Kong. |

## Microsoft

Microsoft was founded in April 1975 to sell a BASIC interpreter for the Altair 8800 — a product they had demonstrated before writing all of it. It predates Apple by almost exactly one year. The hyphen was dropped in 1976 and the company moved to Washington state in 1979.

## Mario

Mario first appeared in Donkey Kong in 1981, credited as Jumpman, four years before Super Mario Bros. of 1985 made him a household name. He wears a cap because animating hair at that resolution was impossible, and dungarees because they made his arm movements legible against his body — the design is entirely a consequence of an 16×16 pixel sprite.

## Common questions

### Which came first, Microsoft or Mario?

Microsoft, by 6 years — 1975 against 1981.

### When did Microsoft start?

1975. Gates and Allen founded Micro-Soft in Albuquerque.

### When did Mario start?

1981. Mario debuted as "Jumpman" in the arcade game Donkey Kong.

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## Sources

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