# Ruffle

Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/ruffle/

27 people recommended Ruffle in Hacker News comments, 1 had mixed feelings and 7 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 9 of 12 months, in 15 threads. It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule.

**Verdict:** Open source emulator that plays old Flash games, animations and SWF files in browsers. Critics say compatibility is incomplete.

Summary written by Claude from 41 comments.

## Why people recommend it

- Preserves and revives old Flash content (7 comments in the sample): "Very glad to see that Ruffle + WASM has allowed the site to be resurrected nearly identical to how it used to look" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47030921)) "Ruffle is getting good enough where I think we might be properly archive all the Flash stuff." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49900178)) "many study materials that were made in Flash that came back alive with the help of Ruffle" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47259460))
- Good compatibility for most content (7 comments in the sample): "Ruffle is quite good now. I haven't found many applets that don't work with it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48549406)) "Ruffle[0] is a decent Flash replacement and compatibility is pretty good[1" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45810640)) "Ruffle has gotten quite good, and importantly the features are locked" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49796479))
- Runs Flash files without Flash plugin (6 comments in the sample): "Thanks to Ruffle, you can build flash games and they will even work on your iPhone" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50137344)) "Well technically you can still use Flash via Ruffle, a WebAssembly-based emulator" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46422396)) "They work in all browsers without flashplayer now thanks to Ruffle." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46874785))
- Free, open source Flash emulator (2 comments in the sample): "an open source Flash implementation. It's great!" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45808992)) "Open source flash player emulator" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47022131))

## What people warn about

- Incomplete compatibility with some files (3 comments in the sample): "Ruffle is not complete or comprehensive. In my test of a dozen swf ruffle could successfully display about half." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48535709)) "Ruffle failed to load the first game I tried" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48076597)) "Ruffle has not turned out as successful as I had hoped for, even after several years and many sponsors" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46859115))
- Bugs in specific features (2 comments in the sample): "seems to have a bug that causes the intro scene to skip ahead if you wait a while" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49945483)) "AMF serialization/deserialization in Ruffle has some definite issues" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47025645))

## The badge

A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged.

## Cite as

Hacker Approved, "Ruffle", https://hackerapproved.com/p/ruffle/ (27 recommend, 1 mixed, 7 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026).

Counts updated 2 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.