WillowOS In development · Release tracker

A desktop OS that keeps your life to yourself.

WillowOS is a new desktop operating system built for privacy and security from the first line of code. We're building it to run the Windows apps and games you already use.

We'll email you when early access opens. Nothing else.

Features

Built around you, not your data

Your desktop, in groups

Work, Games, Photos, Music: each group is a circle around the moon. Open one and its apps, files and media are together. A file can sit in two groups at once, and the line between them shows what they share.

Grove, coming after launch

A social network for WillowOS, with no ads, arriving after 1.0. Your feed shows posts newest first, with a For You tab that keeps news and politics balanced 50/50. Create or join groups for your hobbies, teams and games, each with its own chat, voice and video. Trending shows what people are liking, replying to and reposting.

Get paid for your data, only if you choose

Off until you turn it on. See exactly what each category shares before you opt in, watch what you've earned in your wallet, and stop or delete it anytime. Your Grove posts and messages are never part of it.

One window, many tabs

Apps join one window as tabs, like a browser. Click an app to bring it to the front, middle-click to open it behind. The title bar carries the time and a volume control for that app alone.

Control Center and a dock that gets out of the way

Click the moon for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, sound, brightness, running apps and security in one card. The dock is one slim row: search, your pinned apps, and a status button with the time and your connection that opens volume, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and weather. It slides away when you don't need it.

Private by default

No ads and no tracking. Apps get only the files and devices you allow, and one security dashboard shows every permission you've granted.

Under the hood

A new operating system, written in Rust

WillowOS isn't a Linux distribution or a reskin of Windows. It's a new operating system, written from the kernel up in Rust. Rust prevents the memory mistakes behind many of the worst security holes in older systems, so whole classes of attacks don't get a foothold in the first place.

Apps get only what you allow

Every app starts with no access to your files, camera, microphone or network. You grant each one, and you can take it back anytime from the security dashboard.

Full-disk encryption

Lock your whole drive behind a passphrase at startup, so a lost or stolen computer doesn't give away what's on it.

Hardened from the start

The system randomizes where programs live in memory and uses the processor's own protections to keep apps away from the core of the system. Drivers are moving out of the core, so a driver bug can't take the whole system down.

Signed updates that can roll back

Every update is signed and checked before it installs. If a new version won't start, your computer goes back to the one that did.

Try it

Try the desktop

Click the moon, open a group, or launch an app from the dock. This is an early concept, so some controls are placeholders.

Best on a computer or tablet.

A first look

How it looks and feels

WillowOS desktop: six groups (Music, Projects, Games, Documents, Photos, Starred) arranged around a central moon, with Control Center open on the right and the dock along the bottom.
The desktop. Your groups circle the moon; click the moon for Control Center.
The Music group open, showing albums with play buttons, tagged files, and apps such as Spotify, Bitwig Studio and Mixxx.
Groups keep related apps, files and media together.
A window with six app tabs. Spotify is playing, and the title bar's volume menu shows separate sliders for Spotify, Browser and Grove.
Apps open as tabs, each with its own volume.
Grove: groups on the left with voice chat counts, a chronological feed in the center, and trending topics on the right.
Grove, coming after launch: your groups, your feed and what's trending, with no ads.
Desktop in Green.Green
Desktop in Blue, with a mountain night wallpaper.Blue
Desktop in Violet.Violet
Desktop in Rose.Rose
Choose from ten color themes or create your own, in light or dark mode.
The dock: app launcher, search, pinned apps, and a status button showing Wi-Fi and the time, with quick settings open above it.
A slim dock. The status button opens quick settings.

Concept images based on the current design. Details may change before release.

Apps

Built in, from day one

Everyday

  • Browser
  • Mail
  • Calendar and Contacts
  • Photos
  • Music and Video
  • Notes
  • Recorder and screen capture

Work

  • Docs
  • Sheets
  • Slides
  • PDF
  • Editor
  • Data
  • Calculator

System

  • Files
  • Settings
  • Terminal
  • System Monitor
  • Security dashboard
  • Disks and Archives
  • Help

WillowOS services

  • Store, for apps, widgets and wallpapers
  • Wallet
  • Leaf AI, a private assistant that runs on your computer

Plus the Windows and Linux apps you already use, through built-in compatibility. Grove, the social network, follows after launch.

Games

Steam games

Steam support is being built now. Before launch we'll publish how much of the Steam library runs, and which of the most-played games we've tested, so you know exactly what works before you switch.

Contact

Talk to us

Questions, press and support

support@willowos.io
Progress: about 54% of the way to 1.0 Early access: waitlist first Estimated launch: March 2027 Pricing: to be announced Runs on: 64-bit PCs Written in: Rust