“Not every app needs to bundle the universe”: This tiny notepad app shows why Windows has become so bloated
Former Windows engineer Dave Plummer has created a functioning notepad application in just 2,686 bytes—under 3KB—to illustrate how modern software development has prioritized convenience over efficiency. The tiny app serves as a stark counterpoint to the ever-increasing minimum system requirements that plague contemporary applications and games.
Plummer’s project highlights a fundamental shift in software development philosophy. Decades ago, developers operated under severe hardware constraints, forcing them to optimize every byte and carefully manage resources. Today’s abundant processing power and storage capacity have largely eliminated these pressures, allowing developers to ship applications laden with unnecessary dependencies, frameworks, and bloat without significant performance consequences.
While the video demonstrates that extreme efficiency is possible, the article acknowledges legitimate reasons why modern games and applications require substantial system resources in 2026. Complex graphics engines, advanced AI systems, and feature-rich frameworks genuinely demand more computational power than simpler predecessors.
Nevertheless, Plummer’s exercise raises important questions about wasteful development practices across the industry. The steady creep of minimum specs suggests that not all software bloat is necessary—some results from convenience, legacy code, bundled dependencies, and development shortcuts that would have been unthinkable in earlier eras. The takeaway is nuanced: while modern software complexity has legitimate causes, there remains significant room for efficiency improvements without sacrificing functionality or user experience.