What you need to know
- An early version of the Windows 11 Bloom wallpaper has appeared online.
- The image appears more like a flower than the version that shipped with the operating system.
- A tweet shows light and dark versions of the background, though neither is available through Microsoft.
Windows 11 features a colorful Bloom wallpaper. As the default background of millions of PCs, the Bloom wallpaper is a recognizable image around the world. But the picture you see today when initially booting up Windows 11 wasn’t the first iteration of the design. Twitter user Windows Aesthetics recently shared light and dark versions of the Bloom wallpaper that differ from the final product.
Of course, it’s normal for companies to go through several designs and refine a graphic before releasing it. Microsoft shared a video breaking down the Bloom wallpaper last year around the launch of Windows 11. The company settled on the current background image, which fits in with the material designs of the operating system as well as the central idea of Windows 11, according to the designers.
The earlier version of the Bloom wallpaper appeared more like flower petals. That matches the concept of ideas and designs blooming (like a plant), but it doesn’t exactly fit in on Windows 11. It looks more like a pretty wallpaper than part of the OS’s core identity.
Microsoft’s designers also emphasized flexibility when discussing the Bloom image. The photos below don’t convey the flowing motion of flexibility as much as the final design Microsoft went with.
Early versions of Windows 11’s default Bloom wallpaper, light and dark respectively. It takes a more petal-like appearance here. pic.twitter.com/IvvmTQ6nG9October 17, 2022
Windows Aesthetics showed off the light and dark versions of the older wallpaper, but you can’t download either of them, at least from Microsoft. The light version is from an unleaked build. Ironically, the dark version appears within the Microsoft Store listing for the Calculator app, as pointed out in a follow-up tweet.
Twitter user FireCubeStudios shared an 8K version of the dark wallpaper through OneDrive (via Neowin). The first link does not work, but a follow-up tweet includes a working link at the time of publication.
