---
title: "Which came first, Netflix or Windows?"
description: "Netflix 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/netflix-vs-windows/
site: "At One Place"
---

# Which came first, Netflix or Windows?

**Which came first, Netflix or Windows?: Windows**

1985 — 12 years before Netflix

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

## Side by side

|  | Netflix | Windows |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Year | 1997 | 1985 |
| Date | 1997-08-29 | 1985-11-20 |
| Category | technology | technology |
| What happened | Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph founded a DVD rental-by-post company. | Microsoft shipped Windows 1.0. |

## Netflix

Netflix was founded in August 1997, a year before Google, and posted DVDs for a decade before streaming launched in January 2007. The famous origin story — Hastings founding it after a $40 late fee on Apollo 13 — has been called a useful myth by co-founder Marc Randolph. Blockbuster declined to buy the company for $50 million in 2000.

## 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, Netflix or Windows?

Windows, by 12 years — 1985 against 1997.

### When did Netflix start?

1997. Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph founded a DVD rental-by-post company.

### When did Windows start?

1985. Microsoft shipped Windows 1.0.

## Related pages

- [Microsoft or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/microsoft-vs-windows/)
- [Microsoft or Netflix?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/microsoft-vs-netflix/)
- [Apple or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-windows/)
- [Apple or Netflix?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/apple-vs-netflix/)
- [the internet (ARPANET) or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-windows/)
- [the internet (ARPANET) or Netflix?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/arpanet-vs-netflix/)
- [email or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-windows/)
- [email or Netflix?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/email-vs-netflix/)
- [the Macintosh or Windows?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/macintosh-vs-windows/)
- [the Macintosh or Netflix?](https://atoneplace.net/which-came-first/macintosh-vs-netflix/)
- [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/)

## Sources

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