Ruffle (software)

Ruffle is an open source program that runs Flash content. It is written in Rust. The emulator can be ran on Windows, macOS, Linux or major web browsers.

Ruffle

Logo
Developer(s)	Mike Welsh kmeisthax Nathan "Dinnerbone" Adams Callum Thomson relrelb
Repository	github.com/ruffle-rs/ruffle
Written in	Rust
Type	Multimedia
License	MIT license, Apache License 2.0
Website	ruffle.rs

Background

Adobe Flash was very popular to use for many types of media, such as videos, games and interactive applications, in the 2000s and early 2010s.^[1]

HTML5, a version of HTML which does these things better, slowly made Flash less popular.^[2] From 2015, Adobe has openly said HTML5 is better because it is a full open standard.^[1] Flash continued to become less popular.^[2] In 2017, Adobe said they plan to retire Flash by 2020.^[3]

It is often not recommended to create Flash content now, but being able to run old SWF files has been a major digital preservation worry.^[4]

Google Labs closed Swiffy, which could convert Flash content to HTML5, in 2016.^[5]

History

In 2016, Mike Welsh started the project, which was named Fluster.^[6][7]

Ruffle is open source. Its source code is available on GitHub.^[8]

Websites using Ruffle

Some websites have said they will use Ruffle instead of Flash as early as 2019. For example:

• August 2019 - Newgrounds^[9]
• June 2020 - Coolmath Games^[10]
• November 2020 - Homestar Runner^[11]
• November 2020 - Internet Archive^[11]
• December 2020 - Armor Games^[12]
• February 2021 - Fur Affinity, a furry fandom art website^[13]

Support

Ruffle can run older Flash content, which uses ActionScript 1.0 or ActionScript 2.0. ActionScript 3.0 support will come.^[14][15]

Related pages

• Haxe
• Mozilla Shumway
• Lightspark
• HTML5