Winamp: from 805 skins
to tools for artists

Winamp.com in December 1998 puts the player on a black background, framed by dark red bars. The left menu takes the visitor from the player overview to documentation, new features, downloads, free music, Internet artists, the community, mailing lists, a FAQ and a shareware notice, all in a column narrower than the picture of the equalizer beside it. Winamp began in 1997 with Justin Frankel; by this capture, its homepage is explaining Winamp 2.05 and inviting visitors to register their copies.^[1]

The registration money arrived as paper checks. Rob Lord, who worked at Nullsoft, later told Ars Technica that the company was receiving $100,000 a month in $10 checks in the year before AOL bought it. The software kept working if you didn't pay. No locked features. That figure is Lord's recollection, and the homepage's polite request to register fits the arrangement he describes.^[1]

The navigation already gives customization its own numbers: SKINS (805) and PLUG-INS (66). Lower down that narrow column, the site recommends 800x600x16K for viewing. Across from it sits a picture of the player and equalizer, with room underneath for release notes and the team's long, jokey updates.

Winamp.com in 1999 keeps the dark red frame, while the featured download advances to Winamp 2.10. The other reason to come back is in the skins menu. A skin changes the look of the player; the gallery turns choosing one into a separate activity, with categories and staff ratings.

The February 1999 gallery's text lists 1,302 skins, including categories for anime, games, cars, music and universities. It also has 105 under Ugly. The one-star explanation reads One star means that this is a hideous skin. :) That is the one-star verdict. The staff's opinion is part of the interface.^[10]

The skins outlived this official catalog. Jordan Eldredge, the creator of the independent Winamp Skin Museum, says his collection passed 100,000 skins on July 30, 2024. It is a fan project with its own collection, so its total cannot be read as the later value of Winamp.com's counter. But the activity is familiar: keep looking until you find a player you want on your desktop.^[3]

Winamp.com in 2000 replaces the dark page with a pale, wide layout. A yellow Nullsoft Winamp logo sits above a compact menu, and the download shares the page with radio categories, a featured artist, a featured skin and a plug-in. The release panel still shows the familiar small player.

Why a llama? Asked in a 2006 WIRED interview, Frankel said he thought it started with someone who e-mailed Nullsoft: Winamp whips the llama's ass! He took it as a nod to the musician Wesley Willis. And then it just kind of went from there.^[2]

The llama also had a physical counterpart. In the same interview, Frankel described buying a roughly 300-pound llama sculpture made from barbed wire. Moving it injured people. The mascot that turns up in the website's jokes and later download graphics had become a very awkward object to carry.^[2]

In the 2001 and 2002 captures, Winamp.com contracts into a narrow white column with a red navigation bar. Some promotional images are missing, but the radio lists remain. The June 2002 page gives the classic player and the Winamp3 beta separate panels, both with download links, although only the beta screenshot renders, while the radio categories below run from Top Ten and Alternative to Electronic, Rock/Pop, Hip-Hop/Rap, Jazz and World/International. By June 2003, Winamp3 leads the page beside a player screenshot, a yellow download arrow and a feature list. The homepage can show two generations of the program without giving them two separate websites.

Winamp.com in June 2004 packs a gray-and-orange page around Winamp 5.03. A llama in a hat holds the download sign. Under it, skins, music, clips, plug-ins and news occupy small, tightly labeled boxes, with room for a star rating, the author, a review count, a download total and a red download button on a skin card; the browser title stored with this capture promises Now with 2% more widgets!

The missing version 4 gets an explanation in Winamp's official FAQ. It says version 5 combines the best parts of Winamp 2 and Winamp3, then supplies the arithmetic: Hence Winamp 2 + Winamp 3 = Winamp 5! The FAQ also jokes about Fibonacci numbers and the name Winamp 4 Skin. This is the site's own explanation, preserved in a December 2013 capture.^[4]

The June 2005 page promotes 5.09, with a poll, a featured skin and plug-in, and news panels below the player. In 2006 an AOL Music Now panel takes space in the left column. Each little box has its own invitation to click; a visitor can arrive for a download and leave with a different skin or a music recommendation. The unavailable embedded-media and advertising block is collapsed in the 2005 image, and the archived Flash feature is unavailable in 2006.

Winamp.com in 2007 gives the player a dark hero above the community panels. The yellow navigation strip stays, and a large download button is close to the version number. In 2008, a dark gray hero sits below the burgundy masthead. The 2009 hero is burgundy, with a larger player screenshot making the software the clearest object on the page.

The small boxes stay busy. The 2007 capture pairs a featured skin with reviews and a download count, offers a search choice between classic and modern skins, and puts a JetBlue card promotion in the neighboring column above music, clips, films and games. Farther down, SHOUTcast radio listings sit beside Winamp news. The compact application has become the subject of a much taller page.

The screenshots inside the hero change with the program: Winamp 5.35 in 2007, 5.53 in 2008 and 5.55 in 2009. The site keeps showing how the player looks, with the skin catalog below it. Choosing an appearance is still part of getting Winamp.

Winamp.com in 2010 returns to a white page headed by The Ultimate Media Player. An orange download button sits beside a media-library screenshot. Below it, skins and plug-ins get separate horizontal rows, so customization survives the cleaner layout.

The 2011 capture adds phones beside the desktop library and a column of social links, putting the large Windows library, the Android player, the free download, Twitter, Facebook and the newsletter into the same opening screen. In 2012, EXfm takes the right-hand promotion. In December 2013, the desktop-and-Android arrangement is still here, complete with the orange download button and an orange SHOUTcast Radio box. Parts of the 2010 image are missing, particularly in the lower rows.

A shutdown announcement sits outside what this December screenshot can prove. On November 20, 2013, Ars Technica reported Winamp's notice that the website, associated services and downloads would end after December 20. That was a plan for the services and distribution; it did not make an already installed player stop working. Our selected homepage does not show a readable farewell banner.^[5]

Winamp.com in June 2014 removes the crowded catalog from the opening screen. A grayscale llama stands in a field beside THERE'S MORE COMING SOON. Orange navigation offers GET WINAMP, SHOUTcast and notifications. The large orange strip below the photograph points to PC and Mac downloads.

Radionomy announced its purchase of Winamp and SHOUTcast from AOL on January 14, 2014. That gives the coming-soon page a concrete event behind it: the brand and its related radio service had a new owner after the shutdown announcement.^[6]

The selected 2015, 2016 and 2017 captures use the same grayscale-llama opening and coming-soon message. Lower sections vary: the 2014 image includes an Android promotion, while later images give more space to SHOUTcast. These four snapshots show a repeated opening, without telling us what every intervening month looked like.

Winamp.com in November 2018 makes the llama larger and puts it against an orange diagonal. The heading announces a download, while the first paragraph explains why it is available: A leaked version of Winamp 5.8 recently spread over the Internet. The company says it has revised that version and recommends this official copy.

The next paragraph adds a limitation. Version 5.8 is not an ongoing project, the site says, while work continues on a future Winamp. Below the download, the page asks visitors what features they want, then invites them to leave an email address for news. The survey and notification form now do work that the old community panels once shared.

The selected 2019 and 2020 pages retain this white-and-orange download layout, including the explanation about the leak. Farther down, another llama carries a sign promising that no llamas will be hurt. The old mascot remains available for jokes even as the surrounding homepage becomes much shorter.

Winamp.com in December 2021 puts Set the tone over an orange, purple and yellow gradient. A new white wordmark replaces the orange lightning-and-wordmark arrangement in the preceding capture. The small paragraph below the headline promises a rebuilt Winamp and a closer connection to artists; the selected June 2022 page keeps that opening.

By June 2023, Winamp.com has a dark purple homepage and three clear destinations: Player, Fanzone and Creators. A red Play button replaces the old download as the hero's immediate action. Below it, the product screenshot shows a music library and a pink-haired llama.

Winamp launched its new web player on April 13, 2023. The company's announcement also described Fanzone, where artists could sell content and access to fans through paid tiers. The new menu makes that change legible: the visitor might be a listener, an artist or someone paying to support one.^[7]

Winamp.com in September 2024 asks What's next! on a white homepage beside slanted photographs of listeners. The paragraph describes tools for artists to manage music and revenue. The 2025 capture keeps the question; in June 2026, the main heading is simply Winamp.

The classic Windows player's code made a much shorter appearance elsewhere. It was published in a public repository on September 24, 2024, but the repository had been removed by October 16. Ars Technica and The Register reported the release and its restrictive license, which made the code source-available, with restrictions on reuse and distribution. The September 12 homepage above predates that release.^[8][9]

The June 2026 navigation names the new audience directly: For Artists, with Login and Create Account at the right. Player still has a place in the menu. The first page in this rewind counted 805 skins and asked people to register a copy of their software. This one asks them to create an account to manage their music. The player stays in the name; the work offered around it has changed.