Skip to main content

35 years ago, Steve Jobs launched an obscure operating system that changed everything

A NeXTcube computer running the NeXTSTEP operating system.
A NeXTcube computer running the NeXTSTEP operating system. Simon Claessen / Flickr

Today marks the 35th anniversary of the launch of NeXTSTEP, a computer operating system launched by Steve Jobs during his years away from Apple. Deeply obscure these days and long since discontinued, it’s nevertheless had a monumental impact on computing history and development — and has led to many of the things we take for granted every day.

The World Wide Web? It was dreamed up on NeXTSTEP. It paved the way for macOS and all of Apple’s other modern operating systems. And as we mentioned earlier, it was crafted at a company led by a certain Steve Jobs. You might have heard of him.

Recommended Videos

Put together, it’s hard to overstate the legacy of NeXTSTEP and its innovations, both large and small. It could be the most influential operating system you’ve never heard of.

Full of great ideas

The NeXTSTEP operating system.
The NeXTSTEP operating system poularized concepts like draggable app windows and full-color icons. Thomas Schanz / Wikimedia

The initial release of NeXTSTEP took place on September 18, 1989. NeXT Computer, the company that developed NeXTSTEP, was founded by Steve Jobs in 1985 after he was forced out of Apple. If Jobs couldn’t work on Apple computers anymore, he’d make his own, including the operating system they ran on.

NeXT made high-end workstation computers, a far cry from the consumer-oriented Macs that are Apple’s modern bread and butter. To run its devices, NeXT needed a powerful operating system, and NeXTSTEP filled that void.

It came with a wide range of tools and concepts that are still in use today, both for demanding pros and consumer users. Just a quick overview of NeXTSTEP’s features will show you how many of its innovations have stood the test of time. Here are a few things it was responsible for:

  • The macOS Dock
  • Large full-color icons
  • Drag-and-drop functionality across the operating system
  • Scrolling and window dragging
  • Properties dialog boxes
  • Keyboard shortcuts that are still in use today (such as Command-B and Command-I for bold and italic, respectively, or Command-W to close a window)

NeXTSTEP didn’t invent graphical user interfaces, but thanks to its implementation of them, they became much more popular across the computing sphere. Without it, today’s world would look very different indeed.

The innovation superhighway

The Electronic AppWrapper (an app store forerunner) running on the NeXTSTEP operating system.
The Electronic AppWrapper (an app store forerunner) running on the NeXTSTEP operating system. JohnWayneTheThird / Wikimedia

NeXTSTEP played host to the Electronic AppWrapper, the forerunner of the modern app store concept. This was a catalog of apps, music, fonts, clip art and more, and it handled the distribution, encryption and licensing of the software it contained. It was a big step up from traditional app distribution methods — typically using floppy disks or CD-ROMs — and although it was developed by a third-party group rather than by NeXT, the Electronic AppWrapper found its home on NeXTSTEP. Like many aspects of NeXTSTEP, it was well ahead of its time.

The app store was far from the only important tool created using NeXTSTEP. The operating system birthed a whole host of innovative apps, games and tools, many of which went on to change the world.

It was NeXTSTEP’s power that made it an excellent resource for programmers and app developers. It’s therefore unsurprising that it found its way to CERN, the nuclear research organization, and to Tim Berners-Lee, then a computer scientist at CERN.

Steve Jobs during his time at NeXT Computer.
Steve Jobs during his time at NeXT Computer. Distrito Medico Monterrey / Flickr

You might recognize Berners-Lee’s name — he is widely heralded as the inventor of the World Wide Web, the URL web address system, the HTML markup language, and the HTTP protocol. And it was the first of these, the World Wide Web, that Berners-Lee created using NeXTSTEP.

After a proposal for a hypertext system was presented to CERN management, a NeXTcube computer was bought for prototyping. As Berners-Lee’s collaborator Robert Cailliau put it: “Tim’s prototype implementation on NeXTSTEP is made in the space of a few months, thanks to the qualities of the NeXTSTEP software development system.” It was the perfect partner for a project with the scope and scale of the World Wide Web.

Berners-Lee also used NeXTSTEP to develop the world’s first web browser, which he named WorldWideWeb (not to be confused with the aforementioned World Wide Web, the information-sharing system that interacts with the internet). The browser only lasted four years before it was discontinued, but it introduced the world to WYSIWYG (“what you see is what you get”) HTML editing, among other innovations.

And it wasn’t just Berners-Lee who was hard at work inventing things using NeXTSTEP. The popular games Doom and Quake were created on the system, as was the forerunner of the Macromedia FreeHand vector illustration app. Such was the power of NeXTSTEP that it became a popular option for developers and coders in the nascent software world.

An epic legacy

A NeXTstation computer running the NeXTSTEP operating system.
A NeXTstation computer running the NeXTSTEP operating system. Felix Winkelnkemper / Wikimedia

Yet for all its lasting effects, NeXTSTEP never became a massive commercial success. NeXT was never very profitable, and it only ever sold around 50,000 NeXT computers — a tiny drop in the ocean compared to its rivals.

But despite the small sales numbers, NeXTSTEP had an outsized influence on computing. It was held up as a trendsetter for its many innovations, with other companies quickly moving to copy its ideas in their own systems.

An ailing Apple — deep in crisis and almost bankrupt — formally bought NeXT in 1997 for $429 million, bringing Steve Jobs back on board in the process. It was a move that famously revived Apple’s fortunes and paved the way for it to become a global rockstar of a company, yet this ground-shaking development has often overshadowed the fact that Apple absorbed NeXTSTEP too. The operating system was quickly merged with Apple’s existing software and eventually led to the first launch of Mac OS X, ending active development of NeXT’s operating system.

But its legacy lives on to this day, both in terms of software features that are still in use and the things that it was used to create. Though it remains relatively unknown, there are few operating systems that have impacted the world of computing in quite the same way.

Alex Blake
Alex Blake has been working with Digital Trends since 2019, where he spends most of his time writing about Mac computers…
Intel Arrow Lake: everything we know about the 15th-gen chips
A render for an Intel Arrow Lake CPU.

Intel Arrow Lake, or Core Ultra 200, is Team Blue's next generation of processors. The successor to its 14th-generation CPUs on desktop, Arrow Lake will debut in October 2024 and will be the first desktop processors to use the new Intel Core Ultra branding. It was initially thought that Arrow Lake may launch alongside a Bartlett Lake series of CPUs, but those are now rumored to debut in early 2025.

We've been languishing with leaks and rumors for the past year, but Intel has now spilled the beans and given us all kinds of juicy details. Here's everything you need to know about Arrow Lake.

Read more
Apple may have just killed this 16-year old Mac product
CD in a CD drive on a Macbook Pro.

After first going out of stock in the U.S. and later in every country in the world, people (and MacRumors) are beginning to assume the 16-year-old Apple SuperDrive isn't coming back. The company hasn't said anything about it officially, but many of its current customers probably don't know or remember that it exists or is still sold.

When the first MacBook Air launched in 2008, its big selling point was the same as it is now -- it's superthin and light. Getting the size down to fit in a Manila envelope meant removing lots of ports, and that included the disc drive. It felt like a pretty bold move at the time. After all, how would you download software? Or what if you needed to burn a mix CD for your high school crush?

Read more
Best Samsung Galaxy deals: S24, Buds, Watches and more
The Galaxy Z Fold 4's Cover Screen.

Samsung’s Galaxy lineup is made up of several different types of devices and you can often find them among the best headphone deals, the best smartwatch deals, the best tablet deals, and the best phone deals. With so many different devices among the Galaxy lineup — and with so many Samsung Galaxy deals available right now — we’ve tracked down what we feel are the best Samsung Galaxy deals to shop today. Reading onward you’ll find discounts on some of the best tablets, best smartwatches, and best wireless earbuds the Samsung Galaxy lineup has to offer, and if you’d like to shop more specifically within the Galaxy lineup you can start with Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5 deals, Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 5 deals, Samsung Galaxy Buds deals, or Samsung tablet deals.
Samsung Galaxy Buds 2 -- $110, was $150

If you're looking for headphone deals but you want an alternative to Apple's AirPods, you should consider the Samsung Galaxy Buds 2. The wireless earbuds have great battery life that's made even better with an included charging case. While some of the other Galaxy Buds out there include the Galaxy Buds Live, Galaxy Buds Pro, and Galaxy Buds+, but with the Galaxy Buds 2's active noise-cancelation you can block out unwanted sounds and keep your focus on whatever you’re working on, watching, or listening to. You can also control the headphones with touch controls on each earbud, and they connect easily to any Bluetooth device.

Read more