Apple's newest OSes hide a retro mascot

iOS 27, iPadOS 27, and macOS 27 Golden Gate contain a hidden Easter egg featuring Clarus the dogcow, a whimsical character from Apple's 1980s LaserWriter printer software.

Meet Clarus the dogcow

Clarus is a bitmapped creature with a cow's spots and a dog's head and tail. It originally appeared in page-setup dialogs to show how print settings affected text appearance on the page.

How to find the hidden dogcow

Open Settings, go to Appearance, then Liquid Glass. Scroll down repeatedly until the word "Moof!" appears in rainbow colors next to a modern rendering of Clarus by a pool.

Moof is the dogcow sound

"Moof!" is the sound a dogcow makes, blending "woof" and "moo" since it's part dog and part cow. The word appears in the Easter egg as a playful nod to the creature's hybrid nature.

“"Moof!"”

The dogcow's original purpose

Created in 1989, Clarus demonstrated how text would appear when flipped horizontally, flipped vertically, or reduced by 2 percent. It could do "flips like any talented dog" and "precision bitmap alignment like any talented cow."

“Like any talented dog, it can do flips. Like any talented cow, it can do precision bitmap alignment.”

Designer Annette Wagner created Clarus

Graphic designer Annette Wagner adapted a dog icon by Susan Kare from the original Mac's Cairo font. She modified it to show flipping and reduction clearly, despite initial marketing resistance.

“Everyone's going to think this is doggy software!”

Clarus faded from Apple's focus

A Clarus sculpture once stood prominently in Apple's icon garden before the spaceship campus was built. The mascot fell out of favor during Apple's many reinventions over the decades.

Clarus makes a modern comeback

The dogcow returned in 2022's macOS Ventura as a smoothly rendered figure in page-setup dialogs and continues in Golden Gate. It also appeared on the Apple Watch Series 11 Hermès edition last year.

Apple adds whimsy to modern software

The Easter egg was first spotted in beta versions and shared publicly on September 9th. Apple's decision to hide Clarus in the new OSes shows the company still values playful touches for longtime fans.

“It's fun to see Apple add a little whimsy to its software.”