Ribbons Screensaver_
What is the Ribbons screensaver?
Modes
How to use as a screensaver
Keyboard shortcuts
Related searches
Guide — the Windows flowing ribbons, fullscreen
Four presets, four colour schemes and sliders for ribbon count, width, speed, length and glow. Translucent ribbons brighten where they cross, drawn on an HTML5 canvas with nothing to install.Choose Classic, Silk, Neon or Calm, or press 1 to 4. A preset sets every slider and the colour scheme in one go and starts fresh ribbons.
Switch between Rainbow, Neon, Ocean (teals and blues) and Sunset (reds, oranges and pinks). The ribbons recolour at once without restarting.
Set Count from 1 to 10, Width from 20 to 160 and Length from 20 to 120 trail points. New Ribbons or N starts fresh ones at random spots.
Drag Speed (1 to 10) and Glow (0 to 10; at 0 the soft halo is off). Each ribbon turns in slow waves and steers back to the centre near the edges.
Press Enter Fullscreen, click the animation or press F. Move the mouse to show Exit Fullscreen and Pause; Space pauses, R resets, Esc leaves.
Presets and shortcuts
- 1 Classic
- 4 wide rainbow ribbons, glow 3
- 2 Silk
- 9 thin rainbow ribbons, longer trails
- 3 Neon
- 5 neon ribbons with a strong glow
- 4 Calm
- 3 very wide, slow ocean ribbons
- F
- Fullscreen on/off
- Space
- Pause / resume
- N
- New ribbons
- 1–4
- Switch preset
- R
- Reset to Classic
- Esc
- Leave fullscreen
- TV / monitor
- Open the page, press F, leave it running
- screen sleep
- The page does not keep the display awake: set your sleep timer to Never while it runs
- OS screensaver
- A web page can’t register as one; use fullscreen instead
The Ribbons screensaver, explained
What is the Ribbons screensaver?
Ribbons is one of the screensavers Microsoft introduced with Windows Vista in 2007, alongside Bubbles and Aurora. It stayed in Windows 7, where many people know it from, and is still in the screensaver list of Windows 10 and 11. Long, translucent ribbons of colour weave across a black screen and brighten where they overlap. This page recreates the effect on an HTML5 canvas with adjustable count, width, speed, length, glow and colours.
Is this the real Windows 7 Ribbons screensaver?
No. It is an original browser recreation inspired by the Windows Ribbons screensaver: tapered, translucent ribbons on black that glow where they cross. It is not affiliated with Microsoft and uses none of its code. Because it runs in the browser, it works on any current device, including Macs, tablets and phones, without the Windows software.
How do I run this fullscreen as a screensaver?
Click the animation, press Enter Fullscreen in the sidebar or press F. The canvas is redrawn at the full size of your screen with fresh ribbons. Move the mouse to show the Exit Fullscreen and Pause buttons, which hide again 2.5 seconds after the mouse stops, or press Esc. Where a browser blocks the fullscreen API, the animation fills the browser window instead. The page does not keep the display awake, so set your screen’s sleep timer to Never if it should keep running.
Do I need to download or install anything?
No. The ribbons are plain JavaScript on an HTML5 canvas, so there is nothing to download or install. It works in any current browser on Windows, Mac, Linux, iOS and Android.
Can I change the ribbons and colours?
Yes. Set the Count (1 to 10), Width (20 to 160), Speed (1 to 10), Length (20 to 120) and Glow (0 to 10), and choose the Rainbow, Neon, Ocean or Sunset colour scheme. The Silk preset runs nine thin ribbons, Neon adds a strong glow and Calm drifts three wide ocean ribbons slowly.