Editing April Fools' Day comics

Comics (or other happenings related to xkcd) that were put up on {{w|April Fools' Day}} (or shortly after) as an {{w|April Fools' Day}} joke. There have been an annual celebration of April fools' Day every year since 2007, with a comic celebrating it released  every year since 2011, except for 2017, where there was no celebration of any kind.
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{{incomplete|For some reason, there are two different lists of the same April fools' comics, each with info that the other one doesn't have. we're trying to merge them. A table might be useful. '''[[Talk:April fools' comics|Please see the talk page]]''', we're organising it there.}}
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==List #1==
In 2006, the first year that xkcd released in March and April, there was no comic released on April 1st and no April Fools' comic was released. The two comics before and after were [[83: Katamari]] from March 31st and [[84: National Language]] from April 3rd.

[[Randall]] first posted an April Fools' comic on Sunday, April 1, 2007.  This comic ("[[Syndication]]") was not numbered;  sequentially, it came between [[242:  The Difference]] and [[243:  Appropriate Term]].  It has not been preserved in the official xkcd archives<!--,

 FORUMS DEAD though it survives on a [http://forums.xkcd.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=3701 thread in the xkcd forums]-->.

For April Fools' Day 2008, Randall created [[404: Not Found]], which is a meta-comic, since it in fact doesn't exist. But that he considers it a comic is both made clear in the explanation for said "comic" and also since he links to it in his 2018 April fools' comic [[1975: Right Click]], from a fools' menu that links to all his comic alphabetically by title.

The comic for April 1st, 2009, had no obvious ties to April Fools' Day, but on that day Randall made an April Fool in another way. See the [[563: Fermirotica#Trivia|Trivia section]] for [[563: Fermirotica]], released that day.

For April 1st, 2010, Randall altered the site to mimic a {{w|Unix}} {{w|command-line interface}} and called it [[unixkcd]]. This happened wile [[721: Flatland]] was the newest comic, but it was released March 31st and had nothing to do with April Fools' Day. For more information, see its [[721: Flatland#Trivia|trivia section]].

Starting on Friday, April 1st, 2011 with [[880: Headache]], Randall has released a real April Fools' Day joke annually, except 2017. Although on several occasions these comics have been delayed because the project got out of hand and could not be finished in time.

Beginning with the second year in that row, with [[1037: Umwelt]], he moved the release day to Sunday April 1st 2012, and thus began the practice of releasing an April Fools Day comic on April 1st, notwithstanding [[#Release Weekday|what day of the week]] it fell on by shifting the comic's release to that day. Typically it would thus replace the next release day, so there would not be a comic on Monday the 2nd or 3rd of April, if April 1st fell in the weekend.

This worked for the next three years with [[1193: Externalities]] in 2013, [[1350: Lorenz]] in 2014 (first Tuesday release) and [[1506: xkcloud]] in 2015. But then the project became so complicated that in 2016, the release was delayed until [[1663: Garden#Monday 4th of April release|Monday April 4th]] with [[1663: Garden]].

The yearly trend thus continued until 2017, where no comics were released on April 1st. And the two comics around the date had nothing to do with such a joke. See more on this in the [[1818: Rayleigh Scattering#No April Fools' Day comic in 2017|trivia section]] of the first of these two, [[1818: Rayleigh Scattering]]. There was also no delayed fools' comic as has been the case in other years where the release of a fools' comic was delayed to later than April 1st.

Then from 2018 Randall once again began releasing April Fools' Day comic every year. In 2018 he again moved the release day from Monday April 2nd to Sunday April 1st with [[1975: Right Click]]. In this comic he both links to [[404: Not Found]] and [[unixkcd]], two of his previous comic April Fools' Day jokes. In 2019 April 1st was a Monday so a normal release day, and he released [[2131: Emojidome]], another user generated comic.

In 2020, he again had trouble and the release of [[2288: Collector's Edition]] was delayed two days for a [[2288: Collector's Edition#Trivia|Friday April 3rd release]]. Instead the planned Friday comic [[2289: Scenario 4]] was released on Saturday.

In 2021, [[2445: Checkbox]] was released on Thursday April 1st, making it the first April Fools' Day comic to be released on a Thursday. Only Saturday has yet to see a special release. It could have happened either in 2017 or 2023, but 2017 was the year without such a comic and 2023 was the most delayed fool's comic so far. See below.

In 2022, [[2601: Instructions]] was released on Friday April 1st, a normal release day. There was though an interesting fact related to this release. First of all it visually was similar to the previous Fools' comic, which had only a {{w|checkbox}} to begin with. Instructions only had a {{w|radio button}}. But more interesting, like last year, this comic had an audio part. Thus making it a recurring Fools' theme, and also making these two comics the, at that time, only [[:Category:Comics with audio|comics with audio]]. Although in Instructions the sounds was a vital part of the joke, which was not the case the year before. (Also both comics had a mute button, that could toggle the sound on and off. But the two comics similar buttons worked in reverse, so the mute button had muted sound in the first, but the audio on in the second of the two comics...)

In 2023, [[2757: Towed Message]] was released on Friday March 31st. The next comic, [[2758: My Favorite Things]], was released on the normal schedule on Monday April 3rd. So for a year the Explain xkcd community thought there was no April fools' comic in 2023. But it turned out that the actual "April fools'" project, [[2765: Escape Speed]], was so delayed that it was not released until Wednesday April 19, 18 days too late. There was some debate about if this was actually meant to be a fools' comic with so much delay and no mention of this (as with Garden). But then a link to this article [https://chromakode.com/post/xkcd-gravity-escape-speed/ Development notes from xkcd's "Gravity" and "Escape Speed"] by [https://chromakode.com/ Max Goodhart], aka Chromakode, was provided. Max was one of the developers of both Escape Speed and the earlier [[2712: Gravity]]. And he writes at the top of the article "On April 20th, xkcd published Escape Speed, the 14th annual April Fools comic we’ve made together". (In xkcd's archive it is listed as released on the 19th of April, but maybe that is just because then it was a Wednesday, and in Max's time zone it was already the 20th). This settles the debate, as it is now clear that this was meant to be the April fools' comic of 2023. See also the [[2765:_Escape_Speed#Trivia|trivia section]] of Escape Speed.

In 2024, [[2914: Eclipse Coolness]] appeared on April 1st without having any relation to April fools'. But four days later [[2916: Machine]]  came out on Friday 5th of April. This turned out to be that the year's April fools' comic, see the [[2916:_Machine#Trivia|trivia section]] for that comic. It is, however, the first time a release day has fallen on April 1st without Randall making any note of it on the day. Not since 2009 has there been a comic released on April 1st without it being an April fools' comic. But that year he found another way to make an April fools', thus making this year the first ever where a comic was actually released on April 1st without any mention of April fools'. First time such a delay happened Randall made several notes about this, see the section about [[Garden]] below.

In 2025, there was no comic released on April 1st; the two comics before and after were [[3070: Orogeny]] from March 31st and [[3071: Decay Chain]] from April 2nd. The April fools' comic finally came on Wednesday, April 9th, as [[3074: Push Notifications]], and was expressly acknowledged as an "April 1st (observed)" comic in its first message.

Randall discusses several April fools' comics in his talk at [https://vimeo.com/78912850 Øredev 2013].

==List #2==
Here is a list of the day of the week (and date) where the "real", and numbered in the xkcd archive, April 1st comic were released. This is thus not a list of all April fools' events Randall has made, but only of those comics that are part of the normal released comics. See above for other types of fools'. Those not on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, have been moved to hit April 1st; their day of the week is written in '''bold'''. There have been five comics where the release day has thus been moved as of 2025. The first to do so was [[1037: Umwelt]], which was planned to be released on Monday April 2nd but came out Sunday April 1st, 2012. The following comic, [[1038: Fountain]], skipped Monday and came out as normal Wednesday April 4th. Several comics have been delayed and thus not released on or even near April 1st. The first to do this was [[1663: Garden]] in 2016, which was then released on Monday April 4th instead of Friday April 1st. In all five cases, these have been released on a normal release day as of 2025. (Comics that weren't are displayed in '''bold'''.)

#2008 '''Tuesday''' April 1st:
#*[[404: Not Found]]
#*This was technically not a comic, but it did come out on April 1st, between the normal Monday and Wednesday release, making it an extra comic.
#**'''2009''':
#*There was [[563: Fermirotica#Trivia|no April Fools' Day comic]] in 2009.
#2010 April 1st:	
#*[[unixkcd]]
#2011 Friday April 1st:
#*[[880: Headache]]
#2012 '''Sunday''' April 1st:
#*[[1037: Umwelt]]
#*The next release was not Monday but Wednesday, so it replaced the Monday release.
#2013 Monday April 1st: 
#*[[1193: Externalities]]
#2014 '''Tuesday''' April 1st:
#*[[1350: Lorenz]]
#*This was the first Tuesday release, but the other two releases that week fell normally on Monday and Friday, thus it replaced Wednesdays release.
#2015 Wednesday April 1st: 
#*[[1506: xkcloud]]
#2016 Monday '''April 4th''':
#*[[1663: Garden]]
#*This comic was supposed to be released Friday April 1st but had technical problems and ended up being released on Monday April 4th. 
#*There where thus only two comics in the week before. See here regarding the [[1663: Garden#Monday 4th of April release|Monday 4th of April release]].
#*There was [[1663: Garden#April Fool's comic|no doubt]] that this was supposed to be the April Fools' day comic.
#**'''2017''':
#*There was [[1818: Rayleigh Scattering#No April Fools' Day comic in 2017|no April Fools' Day comic]] in 2017.
#2018 '''Sunday''' April 1st: 
#*[[1975: Right Click]]
#*The next release was not Monday but Wednesday, so it replaced the Monday release.
#2019 Monday April 1st: 
#*[[2131: Emojidome]]
#2020 Friday '''April 3rd''':
#*[[2288: Collector's Edition]]
#*This comic was supposed to be released Wednesday April 1st but had technical problems and ended up being released on Friday April 3rd, see the [[2288: Collector's Edition#Trivia|trivia section]] for that comic. 
#*The original planned Friday comic, [[2289: Scenario 4]], was then released on Saturday April 4th
#2021 '''Thursday''' April 1st: 
#*[[2445: Checkbox]]
#*The next release was not Friday but Monday, so it replaced the Friday release.
#2022 Friday April 1st: 
#*[[2601: Instructions]]
#2023 Wednesday '''April 19th''':
#*[[2765: Escape Speed]]
#*See above regarding this 18 days delay.
#2024 Friday '''April 5th''':
#*[[2916: Machine]] 
#*This comic was delayed four days and another comic [[2914: Eclipse Coolness]] was released on Monday April 1st.
#*This made people believe that there would be no April fools' Day comic in 2024. 
#**Which would have made it seem like it was two years in a row. Since it was first with this release that it was found out here on explain xkcd that there had indeed been an April fools' comic in 2023. See above 
#2025 Wednesday '''April 9th''':
#*[[3074: Push Notifications]] 
#*This comic was delayed 8 days.
#*Since delaying of the April fools' comics has become the norm, people was still hoping for a late fools' comic, and it happened again delayed for the third year running. 
#*It was the fifth time such a comic has been delayed since Garden in 2016.

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