Harlem Shake
The 2013 bookmarklet that made any web page do the Harlem Shake. Dead for years. Now it isn't.
- Drag the button up to your bookmarks bar.
- Go to any other website (Reddit, Wikipedia, the news) and click the bookmark there.
No bookmarks bar? ⌘⇧B on Mac, Ctrl+Shift+B elsewhere.
Or click it to try it right here. Sound on.
On a phone, bookmarklets are fiddly; it's best on a computer. You can still tap it to try it here.
What's a bookmarklet?
A bookmark that, instead of taking you somewhere, does something to the page you're already on. This one makes it do the Harlem Shake: one thing starts dancing, then the drop hits and everything joins in.
Nothing happens until you click it, and it only touches the page you click it on. 247 KB, song included.
Step by step
- Show your bookmarks bar (⌘⇧B or Ctrl+Shift+B).
- Drag the red button onto it. It becomes a bookmark called “🕺 Harlem Shake”.
- Go to another website, ideally one with a bit going on.
- Click “🕺 Harlem Shake” in your bookmarks bar. Sound on.
Why it broke
Moovweb's original loaded its song and stylesheet from an S3 bucket that no longer exists. Many sites' security policies would block those loads anyway.
What changed
The song is inlined and plays through Web Audio, and the dancing runs on the Web Animations API, so it makes no network requests and needs no stylesheet. It also finds the site's logo to lead the dance.