Chrome Dino
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Chrome Dino is a one-button endless runner: a pixel T-Rex, a scrolling desert, cacti and pterodactyls, and a score that only goes up until you crash. It was made by Google's Chrome team and shipped in 2014 as a hidden extra on the browser's offline error page — the idea being that if you've lost your connection anyway, you might as well have something to do. Development started under the codename "Project Bolan," after Marc Bolan of the band T. Rex, and the prehistoric setting was a joke about being stuck offline.
The whole thing runs on a 552x150 canvas in plain JavaScript, which is why it was easy for people to lift out of the browser and host on its own. This copy is exactly that: the original game, playable on its own page, with a theme selector that swaps in Olympic-themed skins alongside the original look. Google made the game; this site is just hosting a copy of it.
Chrome Dino was made by Google's Chrome team as a hidden extra on the browser's offline error page — the screen you get when there's no internet. Development started in early 2014 under the codename "Project Bolan," a nod to Marc Bolan, the lead singer of the band T. Rex. The joke was that having no connection felt like being sent back to the prehistoric age, so the player character became a lonely pixelated T-Rex. It shipped in September 2014, and the first version ran badly on older phones, so the team rewrote it and re-released it in December 2014.
It grew from there: pterodactyls were added as a second obstacle type in 2015, a day/night cycle in 2016, and score saving plus a birthday-cake Easter egg in 2018. Because it was built in plain HTML, CSS and JavaScript and lives in the browser, people copied the files and put it on the open web, which is how it turned into a standalone browser game that anyone can play without pulling their network cable. It's now one of the most-played games on the internet. This site hosts a copy — it didn't make the game.
You're a small dinosaur running to the right across a flat grey desert that scrolls forever. Cacti come at you in ones, twos and threes, and from a certain score onward pterodactyls start flying in at different heights. Press space or the up arrow to jump over what's on the ground, and the down arrow to duck. Hit anything and the run ends immediately — there are no lives, no checkpoints and no way to slow down.
The whole game is one input and one decision, repeated faster and faster. Your score ticks up as you run, and the scroll speed is tied to that score, so the game gets quicker every time you clear something. That's the entire difficulty curve. This copy also has a theme selector on the page — Original plus a set of Olympic-themed skins (hurdling, gymnastics, surfing, swimming, equestrian). You pick one and refresh the page to load it.
| Space / ↑ (Up arrow) | Jump — and start the run from the idle screen |
|---|---|
| ↓ (Down arrow) | Duck |
| Enter | Restart after you crash |
| Tap the screen | Jump on a phone or tablet |
I think Chrome Dino is one of the best-designed games of its kind, mostly because of how little is in it. There's no tutorial, no menu, no lives, and one thing to press. You understand it in about four seconds, and then you spend the next ten minutes finding out that understanding it and being good at it are completely different things.
It's worth playing in short bursts rather than long sessions. Because the speed scales with your score, a run doesn't get interesting until it's been going a while, and by then your hands are tense and you're about to lose anyway. A handful of back-to-back runs on a break is where it's at its best — and honestly, the fact that it appears on an error page is part of the charm. It's a game you're not supposed to be playing, which makes the first ten seconds of any run feel like getting away with something.
It's the little endless runner that Google Chrome shows on its offline error page when the browser can't reach the internet. You play as a T-Rex running across a desert, jumping cacti and ducking pterodactyls for as long as you can.
Yes. This version responds to touch — tap anywhere on the screen to jump. It's a small canvas, so it works fine on a phone, though the keyboard version is easier for really long runs.
No. It's an endless runner, so the terrain keeps generating until you hit something. Your score is how far you got, and the speed keeps rising the whole time.
Speed is tied to your score, not to a clock. Every obstacle you clear pushes the scroll rate up, so the game is designed to eventually outrun your reaction time. Nobody survives forever.
There's no official threshold, but a few thousand points is a genuinely good run — that's where the speed gets high enough that most players start clipping obstacles they'd normally clear.
Add Chrome Dino to any website for free — paste this HTML where you want the game to appear. No account, no key, no tracking script.
