List of Super Mario 64 glitches

This is a list of glitches featured in Super Mario 64. For glitches found exclusively in the remake, Super Mario 64 DS, see List of Super Mario 64 DS glitches.

NOTE: Unless otherwise noted, all names are conjectural. Glitches marked with an asterisk (*) are fixed in the Shindō, PAL, North America, iQue Player, and Virtual Console releases.

Boo glitch
After collecting at least 12 Power Stars a large Boo appears in the hallway leading to the courtyard. The player should enter the Whomp's Fortress painting room and move to the far left side, then leave and head to the hallway. The Boo should be facing backwards, and the player must chase it out of the room.

Now the player must enter the basement and immediately return to the Boo, who is now facing forward. Performing the previous actions again will cause the Boo to seemingly disappear. However, the player either enters the door to the courtyard or manipulates the camera to see beyond the wall, the Boo can be seen floating behind the door.

Bubba death glitch
If Mario is using a Koopa Shell to surf on the water and gets eaten by a Bubba, the shell stays suspended in the air.

Doors and a cloud in empty space
Certain doors in Peach's Castle are visible from other rooms when the camera shows the space beyond the walls. This can be achieved by standing near a wall and using the first-person camera mode to look through it. The doors appear to be in empty space because the rest of a room is not rendered while Mario is in another area.
 * If Mario looks around in first-person view while standing on the left edge of the platform with the 70 Star Door, a door from the lower level is visible.
 * When using first-person view from the outside wall of the spiral staircase to the second floor, the 50 and 70 Star Doors are visible.
 * Another door can be seen when standing in the left edge next to the Whomp's Fortress painting.

Likewise, the reflection of Lakitu's cloud in the second-floor mirror room is always rendered. In several places, like the corners next to the room's door and the stairway to the second floor, Mario can enter first-person view to look through a wall and see the cloud.

Fly Guy size manipulation
If Mario runs back and forth underneath the Fly Guy in Tall, Tall Mountain, it begins to shrink. This is a side effect of the Fly Guy changing size to signal that it is preparing to shoot a fireball. The Fly Guy's size affects the starting height of a Spin Jump off of it.

If the glitch is repeated, the value for the Fly Guy's size eventually becomes negative, causing it to render upside-down and inside-out. Mario cannot interact with the Fly Guy while it has a negative size.

Frozen head*
After defeating Bowser in the Dark World or Fire Sea, he drops a key. In the Japanese version, if the player runs to where the key will land, presses and looks somewhere, Mario keeps looking that way during the key collection cutscene.

Ground Pound turn-around
When Mario ground pounds out of a Side Somersault, he turns around instantly in midair.

Instant Tower of the Wing Cap transition
When the Tower of the Wing Cap is unlocked, Mario has to stand right next to the sun carpet in the castle's main hall and look at the sun on the ceiling. Then, he has to leave the first-person view mode, quickly step onto the carpet, and press again. Mario enters the Tower of the Wing Cap instantly while the camera is still zooming in, instead of framing the ceiling as intended.

Invisible Bowser glitch
Bowser can teleport when battled in the Fire Sea, during which he becomes invisible. If Mario grabs Bowser while he teleports, Bowser stays invisible until he teleports again or is thrown off of the platform. The invisible Bowser cannot hurt Mario on contact, but is still able to attack as usual.

Invisible Mario
After performing the Portable Chuckya glitch to position Chuckya underwater, Mario should get grabbed. Normally Mario would be unable to move until being thrown, however the water takes priority and he is able to swim around while being invisible. If Mario now grabs Chuckya, he stays invisible while a copy of him holding Chuckya remains in the water.

The game tracks Mario using two different positions: his struct position which is controlled by the player and used for calculations, and his object position which is where Mario is seen. When grabbed by a Chuckya, Mario's struct detaches from the Mario seen in Chuckya's grasp. Grabbing Chuckya interrupts the process, so Mario remains invisible.

NOTE: Jumping on a slope near the Chuckya ends the glitch and turn Mario visible again.

Mr. I hovering around Mario
This glitch occurs in Lethal Lava Land only. The player has to get the Koopa Shell from the ! Block and set the camera to fixed mode, so that a Mr. I can be seen until Mario moves. Then, he has to defeat the Mr. I by circling around it, but due to it being offscreen now, its death animation cannot play. The defeated Mr. I's eyeball then hovers around Mario for a short amount of time and move in various ways.

Pitch conservation
When Mario is in a diving animation (normal diving, swimming, or flying), his angle is preserved in memory. This value is supposed to be reset between animations, but due to an oversight, sometimes it does not. For instance, if Mario exits the water while he was facing upwards and then performs a dive, the dive will start with the previous extreme angle as opposed to a normal dive. Despite this dramatic difference, the physics of the move are unchanged.

If an extreme angle is preserved and Mario starts flying, he will immediately face the preserved angle which will influence his trajectory. Several actions reset the conserved angle, including grabbing a ledge, shooting from a cannon, changing areas, and jumping while facing a slope.

Power Meter glitch
When Mario dies in a course, the Power Meter is typically set to one wedge for the cutscene where he is ejected from the course and the meter refills. However, when Mario is ejected from Hazy Maze Cave, Rainbow Ride, Bowser in the Dark World, or Bowser in the Sky, there is a delay before the meter is set to one wedge, so when Mario returns to the castle the amount of wedges in the Power Meter briefly carries over from death.

Below Mario in Bob-omb Battlefield
While using the Lakitu camera mode, If the player performs Wall Kicks to jump from the foot of the white slope over the seesaw platform, the camera focuses Mario from below the floor.

In the walls of Dire, Dire Docks
In the beginning area of Dire, Dire Docks, if the player swims into the wall above the tunnel leading to Bowser's Submarine, the camera moves out of bounds. Moving away from the wall returns the camera to a normal position.

Invisible cannon
After entering a cannon, if the player attempts to launch Mario as early as possible, the game gets confused. The viewfinder does not show up and the camera pans out of the cannon as if Mario was standing in that spot, revealing that both the cannon and Mario are invisible. The camera can be controlled and rotated around normally. This glitch ends when the cannon is fired.

Star/death camera glitch
When Mario collects a Star or dies and the platform he stands on moves away, he will warp to the next surface below him, which is often the death barrier. This extreme change in height is too much for the camera to track, resulting in Mario being far below the camera. The spinning platform around the volcano in Lethal Lava Land, Donut Blocks, and being pushed off a Magic Carpet in Rainbow Ride are common places to accomplish this glitch.

Stuck behind door
When Mario enters a door in the castle and then goes back through it quickly, the camera may briefly get stuck behind the door. This does not work on the doors in the main lobby.

Wing Cap camera glitch
If Mario lands on a slope on the same frame that he starts flying with the Wing Cap, the camera continues using the mode intended for flight. This can be achieved by Triple Jumping onto the fence past the first bridge in Bob-omb Battlefield, with precise timing. The camera follows Mario closely, and tries to stay behind him at a low angle. The buttons only move the camera temporarily.

The camera returns to intended behavior if:
 * Mario receives knockback, is thrown, gets squished, or gets set on fire
 * Mario initiates flight normally, rides a Koopa Shell, or leaves the course
 * Mario enters water, a cannon, or a tornado

Big Boo's Haunt music cut-out
In Big Boo's Haunt, the player should choose any mission other than Go on a Ghost Hunt, then defeat Big Boo in the Merry-Go-Round but ignore the Star. Instead the player needs to leave, collect a Vanish Cap and acquire 100 coins. After the Vanish Cap expires, the player should collect the 100-Coin Star. Now the background music does not play, though sound effects can still be heard, including ambient noises outside the mansion. Should the player wear the Vanish Cap again, the music restarts after the cap wears off.

Infinite cap music
NOTE: This glitch does not work in the Japanese version.

After selecting the second mission in Bob-omb Battlefield, the player should talk to Koopa the Quick while wearing the Wing Cap. While racing him up the mountain, the player must use a small alcove to warp higher up the mountain; the Wing Cap will seemingly disappear, after which the player should reach the flag at the summit and wait for Koopa the Quick to arrive. After talking to Koopa the Quick, the Wing Cap background music plays endlessly. Alternatively, the player can talk to King Bob-omb while wearing the Wing Cap, and then quickly warp using the alcove near the summit, achieving the same effect.

To end the glitch, the player can collect another Wing Cap and let it expire.

Japanese music cut-out*
In both Bowser in the Sky and Shifting Sand Land's pyramid, it is possible for the music to cut-out due to multiple glitches exclusive to the Japanese version of the game. While this glitch is in effect, any attempt to leave the course freezes the game. For Bowser in the Sky, just entering the stage the wrong way can cut-out the music. For the pyramid, collecting the fifth secret in an odd way sometimes cuts out the music.

Koopa Shell music glitch
If the player holds to crouch right as Mario touches a Koopa Shell, the music in the level will replay from the beginning as Mario dismounts immediately. Despite this, the shell remains and the glitch can be repeated.

Koopa the Quick warp music glitch*
In Bob-omb Battlefield, if Mario travels through a warp after starting a race with Koopa the Quick, the "Slider" music is replaced with "Super Mario 64 Main Theme". This glitch was fixed after the original Japanese release.

Loud Ukkiki
In Tall, Tall Mountain, even if Mario is very far away from Ukkiki, the monkey can be heard as if they were right next to him.

Yahoo paused sound pitch
If the game is paused just after Mario performs a Long Jump or Triple Jump, his voice can shift lower or higher in pitch than normal.

Attacking an uninitialized Monty Mole
Before popping out of holes to attack Mario, Monty Moles start out invisible and in predetermined locations. Only when Mario is within 1500 units of a hole will the Monty Moles be repositioned and behave as normally seen. Reaching a Monty mole in this uninitialized position and attacking it freezes the game.


 * In Tall, Tall Mountain, the player can use a 100-Coin Star to reach the uninitialized Monty Mole at the bottom of a pit, and attack it before Mario is ejected from the course.


 * In Hazy Maze Cave, the player must take a route that involves Backwards Long Jumping through the mesh wall in front of the Navigating the Toxic Maze Star. After clipping through the wall, the player must go down the elevator, enter the maze, and take the first right turn to get to the plateau with a Blue Coin Block. The uninitialized Monty Mole sits in the poison gas in front of said plateau.

Crash in Big Boo's Haunt
There is a corner of Big Boo's Haunt that crashes the game when Mario touches it. This corner can be accessed by entering the rightmost door on the first floor.

After positioning Mario on the thin ledge located to the left of a bright window, the player should jump and move Mario slightly away from the ledge until he begins to fall. Now moving towards the wall and pressing  to kick for some extra momentum, Mario should touch the wall and the game will freeze.

Dead Mario softlock
In Bob-omb Battlefield, the player should use the Wing Cap to fly Mario above the floating island such that falling would result in Mario's death. If Mario Ground Pounds the yellow ! Block, upon landing he will die as the Star is released. At this point Mario cannot move, exit the course, or complete his death animation. Similarly, if Mario dies and collects a coin to summon the 100-Coin Star at the same time, the game will softlock.

NOTE: Using the "Zombie Mario" glitch removes the need for precise positioning and timing.

Double Star softlock
If Mario collects a 100-Coin Star as he opens a Star block, this second Star may be released as Mario lands. Similar to the Dead Mario softlock, the overlapping animations of a Star dance and a Star being released confuse the game, resulting in a softlock.

Freeze while entering Vanish Cap Under the Moat
When entering Vanish Cap Under the Moat, if the player tries to move the camera around in Lakitu Mode while the screen is black, the game may freeze.

NOTE: This glitch only applies to the North American version.

Hanging Mario freeze
If Mario is pushed backwards off a hangable ceiling before completing the grabbing animation, the game freezes. This can be accomplished using a bloated Bob-omb to push Mario backwards, or a crate placed in a way that can push Mario off.

Long-distance Monty Mole defeat
When a Monty Mole is defeated from too far away, the game cannot choose the next hole for the Monty Mole to appear from, as every hole is too far from Mario. This unexpected result causes the game to freeze. The player can defeat a Monty Mole from a sufficiently long distance by throwing a Bob-omb.

According to Tyler Kehne, "When a mole is KO'd, the game runs a function to determine which hole the mole should go to next. The function cycles through all the holes to see which ones are eligible candidates, and then selects one of those at random. But if none of the holes are eligible, the function returns null. Throwing the Bob-omb at the mole allows the mole to be KO'd at a distance, something the programmers hadn't accounted for. Thus, Mario is too far away from all the holes for any of them to be eligible, and so null is returned, causing the game crash. TL;DR Long range mole KO's crash the game."

Monty Mole rocks filling memory
Due to a developer oversight, the rocks thrown by Monty Moles do not disappear if thrown off the cliff of Tall, Tall Mountain. Once approximately 200 rocks accumulate, there is no more space available to load new objects, freezing the game. This is similar to how the game handles the teleportation clones of Mario's cap.

As stated by Scott B. (alias pannenkoek2012) on YouTube, "... the game will eventually crash due to a continuously accumulating supply of pebbles. Pebbles deactivate when they are more than 4000 units away from Mario. Hence, a deactivated pebble won't hit the ground and unload, but instead just remain invisible and unmoving in midair. So by having Monty Moles continually throw pebbles off the edge, the pebbles will keep loading into object slots but never unload. Since the game only has 240 object slots, eventually all the slots become occupied and the game crashes."

NOTE: This glitch may not work on the Virtual Console release.

Physics
NOTE: These glitches result from how Mario and/or other characters and objects interact with the world.

1-Up Mushroom circles Mario
Mario can avoid a homing 1-Up Mushroom indefinitely by crouching. Despite its ability to move vertially, the mushroom instead attempts to reach Mario laterally, flying in circles above his head. This oversight was not fixed in the Nintendo DS remake.

Baby Penguin stuck in the chimney
In Cool, Cool Mountain, the player should pick up a Baby Penguin and bring it to the cabin at the summit. By letting go of the Penguin above the chimney, any attempt to reclaim the baby will result in Mario entering the slide area with the Big Penguin. Reloading the main area by either talking a bridge warp or exiting the cabin at the base of the slide will reset the baby Penguin's position.

Black room of death
A  (BRoD for short) refers to the spaces behind doors in the Peach's Castle, which are only meant for Mario to walk into during the animation where he opens the door. Nonetheless, certain exploits allow Mario to reach these spaces. Once inside these spaces, attempting to open the door will put Mario in the corresponding BRoD at the other side. Depending on the collision around the "rooms" in each loaded area, he may or may not be able to escape.

¹ This is inescapable.

Climb slippery slopes
While facing a slippery slope, the player must rhythmically switch between moving towards the slope and holding the control stick  neutral. This process allows Mario to climb the slope. Similarly, this can be accomplished in the remake by moving in the given direction without pressing  down.

NOTE: This trick does not work on all slippery slopes. Additionally, the slope shown was changed to a wall in Super Mario 64 DS.

Climb slippery slopes 2
While holding down, if the player runs  up a slippery slope and kicks  whenever Mario begins to slow down, he will scale the slope. This works in many areas including: the slope next to the basement door, the slope of the Toxic Maze in Hazy Maze Cave, Bowser's steep stair slopes, and the white slope in Bob-omb Battlefield.

Clip through walls
There are various tricks the player can perform to clip Mario through walls depending on the situation:

Clip with hyperspeed
When using a hyperspeed exploit to gain an immense amount of speed, Mario can clip through most walls. This exploit works thanks to how collision checks are processed.

, the game splits up each frame of movement into four "quarter frames"; for each quarter frame, the game checks for collisions by determining Mario's next position based on his velocity and seeing if it overlaps with anything. Notably the game does adjust for how fast Mario is going, so an exceptionally large speed will have large gaps between each position that is checked. These walls are typically not very wide, so with high enough speed Mario's position will never be inside the wall on a given quarter frame, effectively bypassing the wall.

Clip with objects
The following glitches involve Mario being pushed through solid geometry using either the push from an object or the backward force from throwing objects.

Chuckya clip
When Mario is held by a Chuckya, the Chuckya will ignore any collision it may swing Mario into. By luring a Chuckya to a wall and then having it grab Mario, it can throw Mario through walls or even out of bounds. Alternatively, if Mario has his back against a wall and throws the Chuckya, the action will push Mario through the wall.

Crate clip
After placing a crate next to a wall, the player should ground pound between the box and the wall. This will cause Mario to clip through the wall. Alternatively, if Mario has his back against a wall and throws the crate, they will briefly interact which will push Mario through the wall.

Penguin clips
In Cool, Cool Mountain both the Mother Penguin and the Baby Penguins can be used to clip through walls:

By grabbing Tuxie after reuniting with her mother, she can be lured to stand next to the cabin at the foot of the mountain. Mario can then clip into the cabin by jumping in between the wall and the Mother Penguin. Alternatively, Tuxie can be used to clip through the floor by guiding the Penguin to the peak of the mountain and jumping just past her. This glitch can be used to avoid collecting the coins above the chimney of the cabin.

Coin through the platform
Beneath the gray platform in Shifting Sand Land, Mario should run toward a Goomba and defeat it with either a dive, break dance, or slide kick. This should launch the Goomba away, and its coins may fly upwards and through the ceiling.

Death outside the boundaries
The boundaries that surround each course and the castle, referred to as out of bounds, are designed to never let Mario through, and are more effective than typical walls; anywhere that no floor exists below a space is out of bounds. However, certain interactions do not account for this restriction, allowing Mario to breach the boundary. As a failsafe, the game will always unceremoniously deplete Mario's Power Meter the instant his position is out of bounds.

NOTE: The death barrier is defined using a floor, so the large pits below certain levels are not out of bounds.

One method involves Mario lifting himself from a ledge. If Mario reaches the rightside corner of the castle roof, he can hang from the ledge right against an invisible boundary. The player can pull Mario back up onto the roof, where Mario will climb up past the intended boundaries and lose a life. For unusual reasons, he also loses his cap.

Alternatively the player can be pushed or placed out of bounds by Bob-ombs and Chuckyas respectively, or clip through using a crate. For example, if a player grabs a crate in Bob-omb Battlefield, Mario can crouch to place the box partially inside a slope at an edge of the level. Then by then performing a ground pound between the crate and the hill, Mario will temporarily clip under the slope despite the space being out of bounds. This is caused by the game using a stale reference for the ground that Mario was last in contact with, mistakenly assuming that the space Mario clips into is valid. However after being moved, the game updates this floor reference and Mario is killed from being out of bounds.

Death transfer
When Mario loses all his health and leaves the area through certain means, his dying animation can occur in the new area by exploiting instances where his health is preserved between areas. This transfer of health results in the game attributing the death to a different cause than whatever action brought Mario's health down. These glitches can be performed in the DS remake.

Burn into drowning
By leaving Vanish Cap Under the Moat with no health remaining, Mario can drown in the castle moat immediately after spawning there. One strategy is to let a Keronpa Ball burn Mario while at two remaining wedges of health, then running off the ledge. Mario will be warped to the moat with no health, thus he drowns and loses a life.

Burn into Lethal Lava Land
The player can deplete the Power Meter in the basement by burning Mario on the torches. If Mario is burned by a torch and enters the Lethal Lava Land painting such that he has no wedges of health, then upon landing in the course he will die.

Death exit
The player can deplete Mario's health to two wedges and enter the Tower of the Wing Cap. When the Wing Cap begins to wear out, they should aim to land on the edge of the central platform so Mario slides off while taking fall damage. Once Mario lands back in the castle lobby, he dies.

A more universal method involves taking small fall damage. While in a course, the player must take die from fall damage while not moving the control stick. As the health depletes, there is a brief moment when the player can pause the game and exit the course before the death animation plays.

Drown Twice
After completing the mission Board Bowser's Sub, a large opening leading from the second area of Dire, Dire Docks to the lake outside of Peach's Castle will become accessible. If Mario drowns while drifting into this opening, he will drown a second time at the other side.

Snufit into drowning
While Mario's health is low in the Cavern of the Metal Cap, the player must obtain a Metal Cap and have a Snufit chase Mario. When Long Jumping to the box Mario can be hit by the Snufit, causing him to fall into the waterfall and return to the castle moat. Mario will die as soon as he hits the lake.

Gentle squish
Inside the pyramid of Shifting Sand Land, if Mario is positioned at the edge of where the Spindel rolls, it will start to flatten Mario. However, being crushed will only do damage if Mario is squished a sufficient amount, so he will not lose any health. While gently squished the player cannot move until the Spindel rolls off of Mario. This effect can also be seen if Mario stands beneath elevator lifts in various levels.

Grinding
If Mario is positioned at the edge of ground such that he is facing slightly away from the ledge, falling off and immediately attempting to move back towards the ledge can make Mario rapidly switch between falling and standing. In this state the camera will shake, and if the player presses Mario performs a Double Jump.

This glitch is labeled  by analogy to a type of skateboarding trick.

Hyperspeed exploits
All of these glitches involve Mario being able to increase in velocity without limit, due to the lack of a speed cap on certain actions such as moving backwards and wall jumping. Mario can conserve this momentum into Wing Cap flight, abuse this speed to pass through walls, and traverse between Parallel Universes.

Backwards Long Jump
A Long Jump typically sends Mario forwards. However, if the player then holds the control stick back relative to Mario and continues to perform Long Jumps, Mario will begin moving backwards. On its own this isn't too remarkable, but if performed on a staircase, steep slope, riding up an elevator, or with some surface that holds Mario in place, he will land much sooner than on flat ground. When landing, the player can rapidly tap the button, causing Mario to zoom backwards at very high speeds. This is most famously used to reach the top of the endless stairs in the Peach's Castle. Normally when running up this staircase, the game repeatedly warps Mario back down to a lower section of the stairs to prevent access to Bowser in the Sky until 70 Stars are collected. However when the Backwards Long Jump is repeated in quick succession, Mario can reach enough speed to bypass the trigger that creates the illusion of the endless stairs. This same principle allows Mario to breach walls.

NOTE: This glitch was fixed in the Japanese Shindou edition re-release, the iQue Player release and the Super Mario 3D All-Stars port (which both are based on the Japanese Shindou edition re-release), as a speed cap was added for when Mario travels backwards. The glitch was also fixed in the DS remake as if when Mario attempts a backwards long jump, the camera goes behind Mario and he turns around.

Hyperspeed wall kicking
When Mario contacts a wall in the air, there is a moment where he can perform a Wall Kick. Normally this will set his speed to a fixed amount, however if the player presses the instant Mario contacts the wall, he will push away from the wall before the game can limit his speed. Done consecutively this can be abused to accumulate forward speed, although the process is slower and more precise than performing than abusing Backwards Long Jumps.

Hyperspeed walking
When standing on a slope and the edge of water, the backwards momentum Mario receives can build up. This can be abused to reach massive backwards speed if there is something to hold Mario in place during the process. Among these spots are:
 * In the castle grounds next to the waterfall where the water and the wall touch on the left side.
 * In Whomp's Fortress the corner next to the cannon and the brick wall in the pool of water.

Hyperspeed wind
In places including Tiny-Huge Island and Tall, Tall Mountain, when Mario is pushed upwards into a slope by wind, his speed steadily builds up.

Invisible walls
Due to how the game handles the positions of surfaces, Mario can collide with a wall, ceiling, or out-of-bounds area in places where this behavior is not intended. Despite these collisions being attributed to "invisible walls" the actual culprit is most often an exposed ceiling.

Lose cap in the ice
In Snowman's Land, Mario will lose his cap when blown off the icy bridge by the Snowman's Big Head. If the player is unfortunate, the cap may be sent towards the ice box into the section with a Star inside. This Star will prevent Mario from retrieving his hat from above. If the game saves at this point, Mario will remain capless unless the player abuses hyperspeed exploits to clip through the side of the ice box.

Overextended see-saw
NOTE: The following trick does not apply to the rotating platforms in Big Boo's Haunt.

See-saw platforms will rotate based on the side Mario is standing on. Typically they will not rotate more than 90° as Mario will begin to slide off. However, this restriction can be bypassed if the player performs the first method of climbing slippery slopes, allowing Mario to continue tilting the platform. If the platform is rotated more than 260° from its resting position, it resets as soon as Mario stops standing on it. Due to these types of platforms being offset from the pivoting axis, the whole platform will eventually be on the opposite side of Mario relative to the axis, making 270° the absolute limit.

Slide in place
Within courses there are certain locations where Mario can get stuck in a sliding or diving position. For many spots this prevents the player from escaping once stuck; the option to exit the course through the pause menu is not available in this situation.

Slide on dangerous surfaces
If Mario slides off a slope while sitting or performs a slide kick, the initial bounce will allow him to skim the surface of quicksand, lava, and freezing water without harm.

Stuck to lava glitches
It is possible for Mario to become stuck under objects while falling into lava, preventing him from bouncing away. Getting burnt by lava does not give Mario temporary invulnerability unlike running into an enemy, so in these situations he rapidly screams and dies near-instantly.

NOTE: If the player runs through a Spinning Heart before burning Mario, he can stay in contact with the lava for longer.

Crushed by moving platforms
In the Fire Sea, there is a section with the two platforms shifting across the lava. The player should jump into the lava when the platform is moving towards Mario so he moves to be under the base of the platform. If timed correctly, the platform crushes Mario while he is standing on lava, causing massive damage. Alternatively, if Mario landed very close to the platform, Mario is instead gently squished.

Rolling log in Lethal Lava Land
The player must grab a Green Shell in Lethal Lava Land, and head to the log near the caged area. After jumping onto the log to make it move, they should charge at the log as it rolls towards Mario. Upon contact, Mario loses the Green Shell and the log crushes him while he is repeatedly burnt by the lava, causing a near-instant death.

Tilting lava platforms
In either Lethal Lava Land or Bowser in the Fire Sea, the player should dive underneath one of the tilting pyramid platforms that float above the lava. If positioned correctly, Mario will be stuck to the bottom of the platform due to the ceiling, and so he rapidly gets burned and his Health Meter drains almost immediately.

Unreachable 100-Coin Star
Once Mario collects the 100th coin in a course, the 100-Coin Star will spawn a set distance above the player with no exceptions. If the 100 coins milestone is achieved close to a ceiling, the Star will be placed inside the ceiling where Mario cannot collect it. This oversight is commonly seen by collecting a Red Coin atop a bookshelf in Big Boo's Haunt and the highest Red Coin in Dire, Dire Docks, though it is possible to collect a coin from a defeated enemy and achieve the same result.

Wing cap momentum memory
When Mario touches the ground after a Wing Cap the game does not reset the variables affecting the direction Mario was turning towards. This means that if the player holds or  on the Control stick just before Mario touches the ground and then performs a Triple Jump to fly again, Mario suddenly jerks towards said direction.

Scripting
NOTE: These glitches abuse interactions that cause objects or displayed information to perform unintended behaviors.

Beached Bubba
Although Bubba cannot be defeated by conventional means, there is a way to beach the hungry fish. In Tiny-Huge Island, Mario should lure the Bubba to the rocky edge of the shoreline. If Bubba lunges out of the water and lands on the rocky surface, it will begin drifting across the island while facing downwards. Bubba will stop at walls and will still attempt to chomp at Mario in this state, albeit without being able to chase him. If Bubba falls off of the level, the fish can be seen resting on the death barrier.

Beat Koopa the Quick in zero seconds
In Bob-omb Battlefield, the player should don a Wing Cap and triple jump right in front of Koopa the Quick, then land inside the nearby cannon. At this point Mario can fly up to the summit and reach the goal flag, using another cannon to gain more height as necessary. Koopa the Quick will offer to race Mario once he lands, and by accepting Mario will immediately win the race, with the timer at zero seconds.

Similarly in Tiny-Huge Island, the player should defeat the Koopa so that a Koopa Shell rests on the beach. Then the player should triple jump right in front of Koopa the Quick, aiming to land on the shell. After riding to the goal flag and dismounting, Mario can immediately win the race.

Despite the race starting, Koopa the Quick never begins running to the goal flag, so the Star cannot be obtained in this way. Instead an invisible and silent Koopa the Quick remains at the start.

Bowser momentum glitch
During any Bowser battle, the player must first grab Bowser's tail and throw him off the edge. When Bowser jumps back, intercept him before he lands, grabbing his tail again, and throw him into a bomb. Rather than being blasted back onto the platform, Bowser will be sent flying off the edge of the stage.

Because Bowser fell off during the hit, he will eventually jump back to the center of the stage and the battle will progress as if he was never injured.

Broken big crate
If the player attempts to destroy a Purple Switch crate as it disappears, it will instead break as the Purple Switch is pressed again.

Broken bookshelf
During the mission "Secret of the Haunted Books" of Big Boo's Haunt, it is intended that Mario approach a bookcase and hit three of the books in a particular sequence, opening a path to the Star.

Once a book is hit, it will stay inserted unless the player does not apply the correct sequence or he exits the room. Due to an oversight however, Mario's progress in the sequence is remembered. This means that Mario can hit two of the books in the correct order, leave the room, and come back to hit the third book, which should play a jingle. If Mario now hits another book before the bookshelf opens up the game will be confused, as Mario has now both inputted the correct and incorrect code. The bookshelf will not move yet the books will not pop out to let the player try again.

Cap duplication
While Mario's cap is resting on the ground, if the player uses a warp and returns, a duplicate cap will be created in the same spot the original cap fell. This can be performed repeatedly to create a new cap on every warp, and a duplicated cap will adopt Mario's facing angle from the moment it was created.

Cap in hand
If the player strikes a Cap Block and lets it respawn to hit it again, two caps will briefly be collectable. If Mario picks up the first cap before it disappears and the second cap lands on him before he finishes, Mario will hold the special cap in his hands while still gaining the new attributes.

Alternatively the player can perform the cap duplication glitch to have multiple hats in the same spot. Attempting to pick up the hats will cause Mario to put them on one at a time. When Mario picks up the second, the cap on his head will disappear and Mario will keep holding the second cap in his hand rather than placing it on his head.

There are several aspects that are affected by performing this trick:
 * In this state Mario's hat cannot be stolen or blown off his head, though damage is still increased due to Mario not wearing the cap.
 * Talking to a Bob-omb Buddy will cause Mario to correctly put on the cap.
 * If the player used Klepto, then reentering Shifting Sand Land will show the hat still in his talons.
 * Saving and reloading the game, Mario will be without his cap.

Chain Chomp falls down
In Bob-omb Battlefield, if Mario frees the Chain Chomp from its post right as it lunges, its momentum will influence the Chain Chomp's trajectory and it may go over the fence as it hops around. This offset will cause the sequence to look very strange, as the Chain Chomp hits the wall at the bottom when attempting to break the cage that holds the Star.

Cloning
Every object currently on the screen takes a slot of the 240 slots available in the SM64 system. To save memory, when Mario moves near an object, it loads into a slot and appears on the screen. And when Mario moves away from an object, it unloads from the slot and allows more objects to take this slot.

The crate unloads after 30 seconds of inactivity and moves to its original position. And when Mario grabs an object regularly (either while standing still, or while walking), it takes two frames to send a signal to the object to prevent it from unloading while Mario is holding it. However, if the crate unloads during these two frames. Mario will be holding a vacant slot, which can be filled with any other object as they load as Mario approaches them. It is possible to hold a vacant slot by other ways including grabbing a Bob-omb as it explodes or grabbing a crate as it breaks.

If a coin loads into the vacant slot, he can collect the copied coin by throwing it. After that, Mario can move away from the coin's Spawning Point's radius and return to find all coins intact. The reason for that phenomenon is that the real coin had been moved to where the clone coin was placed and after Mario collected the clone, it did not send a signal for the loading point to not respawn the coin. Therefore, when Mario returns to the spawning point, the real coin will reappear as if it never was collected.

Cloned objects differ from normal objects. Most clones cannot be thrown far, attempting to throw a one will make it stuck in mid-air. After throwing one, Mario can interact with the clone once before it became unusable. For example: after cloning a Goomba, Mario can either be injured from the Goomba or bounce on it (it will not be defeated) before it became unusable. Platform clones cannot be stood upon. Also, clones do not unload, and do not disappear without Mario passing through a load point.

Due to how the game was programmed, explosions and dust (and basically anything on the screen except the HUD) are considered objects that can take vacant slots. This can alter which vacant slot Mario is currently holding. Also when objects unload, they move with their slots to the start of the vacant slots (i.e: If Mario is holding the vacant slot #3, and two objects unloads, Mario will end up holding vacant slot #5.) the opposite is untrue, objects load in the first vacant slot (i.e: If Mario is holding vacant slot #5, and a ring of eight coins loads, Mario will end up holding the fifth coin.)

Objects that can be cloned include a Goomba, a coin, a Chain Chomp chain part, a flat bubble, a water bomb, a Big Steely or even dust. Some objects are always loaded, thus it is impossible to clone them without a load point in the course. Those objects includes: Red Coins, Power Stars (outside box), Star Markers, the five secrets along with their coins (the secrets are separate invisible objects that can be collected) and more.

Spawning points themselves can be cloned, if the course has a loading zone. If Mario holds a Spawning Point clone, these thing will happen depending on when Mario lets go. If Mario were to let go of the spawning point when the coins it spawns are invisible, the coins in question would never appear as the spawner cannot send the proper signals for the coins to appear. However, if Mario lets go while the coins are in plain sight, the coins will not unload no matter how far away Mario moves from the point, as the spawner cannot send out the signals for the coins to disappear. If Mario collects the coins, the coins will attempt to notify the point that they have been collected, however, the copied spawning point will not receive these signals. Thus, when Mario leaves the loading point and returns, he can recollect the coins as the spawner has no memory of them being collected.

Coin counter rollover
If Mario collects more than 255 coins in a course, it will save a number less than or equal to 255 as the coin count record. For example, collecting a Star while the coin count is at 999 will record a coin count of 231 coins. The reason this happens is that the record's coin counter only saves the first byte of the level's coin data (which is stored in two bytes). The coin counter effectively rolls over while saving. If Mario collected 256 coins (or a number multiple of it, such as 512, and 768) in a level, it would be stored as 0.

NOTE: The maximum number of coins that can be collected while in a level is 999; collecting more does not affect the coin counter, except on the original Japanese release.

Delayed dialogue
Certain text boxes will automatically open when Mario is standing in proximity to Koopa the Quick, the Big Penguin, et al. These textboxes can be delayed to initiate the conversation from further away than intended. By performing a Triple Jump with one of the jumps being in the range of the speaker, the game will not begin the conversation until Mario lands for a long enough moment. If Mario wears a Wing Cap he can fly an arbitrary distance from the speaker, which can be exploited to beat Koopa the Quick in zero seconds.

Bye-Bye Bob-omb
In Tall, Tall Mountain the Bob-ombs were very poorly placed on the mountainside considering what AI they were programmed with. They frequently fall off the mountain all by themselves (and this falling Bob-omb can be seen very often next to the Mushroom Platforms). The Bob-ombs also seem to have a penchant for not reloading in the location where they normally spawn for this reason. Mario, however, can stimulate this artificially. The player should grab any Bob-omb and stand next to the edge of the mountain, facing off the ledge. Pressing the button or  button, the Bob-omb will now never come back when Mario returns to the area, until he exits the level. The reason the Bob-omb does not come back can be seen from the windy area near the Chuckya (if that is where the bomb was thrown from).

Bob-omb clip
For this glitch to work, Mario must go to Bob-omb Battlefield. There, he has to grab the Bob-omb near the Chain Chomp and manage to perform the bloated Bob-omb glitch by throwing the Bob-omb at the beginning of a double jump and immediately regrabbing it after landing and turning around. By using the backwards momentum the bloated Bob-omb provides, the player has to guide Mario past the Chain Chomp to the gate with a Star behind it. Once Mario touches the gate with its back, he has to throw the Bob-omb away, which allows him to clip through and collect the Star without having to free the Chain Chomp.

Crazy Bob-omb
In Course 1 of Bob-omb Battlefield, if the player climbs the mountain and finds the Bob-omb that is manning the water cannon, picks him up, makes Mario jump, and presses, the Bob-omb will be suspended in mid-air. It appears the programmers gave this Bob-omb special properties to keep it moving in place so as to appear to be controlling the cannon but unintentionally created a glitch through this change of behavior.

Hold bloated Bob-ombs
To perform this glitch, the player must grab the Bob-omb right while it exploding, whither it is by a bubble landing on one, or if the player tossed it and caught it again just as it hits the ground. If done correctly, Mario should be holding the Bob-omb in its "larger" form. Occasionally, Mario will start walking backwards uncontrollably until the Bob-omb explodes, in which case Mario will lose two sections of his Health Meter. The player can adjust directions by moving the control stick, actually moving will slow Mario's backward moving speed.

Another form of larger Bob-omb which can be held by Mario is the so-called Fake Bob-omb. This is a Bob-omb that has been dropped and regrabbed right as it exploded, so that Mario holds a bloated Bob-omb without a smoking fuse. It is called a fake, because, despite Mario holding it in his hands, the game recognizes the Bob-omb as exploded and unloads it, freeing up its object slot. As soon as a new object like a coin loads into this slot, the Bob-omb will transform into it, a process called cloning.

Bob-omb through the bars
In Bob-omb Battlefield, the player must be near the Bob-omb that is near the bars, then, dive and catch it, going in the bars' direction. When Mario hits the wall, the Bob-Omb will slide to the other side of the bars.

Bully blocker
The player should go to Lethal Lava Land and jump into the volcano, then go to the platform with the Bully. The player must make the Bully run after them and make Mario run into the corner of the platform with two walls around it. The Bully will ram into the player, but Mario will be unable to move, because the two walls are blocking him and the Bully is keeping Mario stuck in the corner. The Bully will keep ramming into Mario, making the player unable to escape. However, it is possible though very hard to jump away. This glitch was changed in the DS remake, where, if a Bully rams into the player, it will stand still for a few seconds before charging again, giving them a chance to escape.

Unboiled Bully
In Lethal Lava Land Mario must hit a Bully while on a shell in one of the last frames of animation of it boiling. If this is done the animation will stop and the Bully will be partially submerged in lava. If Mario makes contact with this Bully it will push him backwards with great speed until he moves away.

Chill Bully off platform
This glitch can be done in Snowman's Land. Head over to the Bully on the ice. Knock it back off the platform with a shell. If Mario hits the Bully onto too low of ground it sinks into it. The Bully can die on frozen ice, a small slope, a large slope, a wall, and freezing water.

Grabbed by dead Chuckya
When a Chuckya is dropped off a cliff and explodes right at the moment it grabs Mario, Mario will be stuck in midair, unable to move. The same thing happens when the Chuckya is dropped into a bottomless pit, Mario jumps after Chuckya and gets grabbed in midair.

Chuckya drop
This glitch happens in Bowser in the Sky. When Mario moves in a specific pattern on the platform with the moveable cube right after the start, he can manipulate the Chuckya on the huge platform above, so that it eventually falls down to where Mario is.

Being grabbed while holding a clone
If Mario holds a Chuckya clone and gets grabbed by the real Chuckya, he will throw the clone, which explodes and scatters its coins, but the Chuckya which held Mario will disappear, leaving Mario stuck in midair. This happens, because the clone replaces the real Chuckya as soon as it is thrown.

Holding a fake Chuckya
This glitch can be used for Cloning and the process is similar to grabbing a bloated Bob-omb. Mario has to grab a Chuckya, throw it and grab it right as it explodes. He will now hold a Fake Chuckya, which transforms into a new object, as soon as one loads into the Chuckya's now vacant object slot.

Portable Chuckya
This glitch works best in Wet-Dry World. To do this glitch, Mario should throw a Chuckya off a ledge and be position himself to get caught by it in midair before it touches the ground, making sure Mario does not get thrown in midair. The Chuckya will touch the ground and not die. The player should now raise the water level using a Crystal Tap. With the Chuckya being underwater, Mario should grab the Chuckya. When Mario carries this Chuckya he will be able to jump high and run at normal speed.

Heave-Ho on the water's surface
Usually Heave-Hos appear as soon as the water level gets lowered below the platform they are supposed to be and disappear when the water level gets raised above said platform. However, if Mario is near a Heave-Ho while the water level drops, the Heave-Ho sticks to the water's surface and sinks through the floor it should spawn on. By turning the camera around, the Heave-Ho can be seen driving around below the platform, unable to reach Mario.

Heave-Ho out of bounds
First, the player needs to do the Portable Chuckya glitch to be able to bring the Chuckya down to the lowest area with a Ho-oh and a block that can be pushed into the wall. By throwing the Chuckya while standing in front of the block, the player can make Mario clip through the block, so that he can push it out. Then, the Heave-Ho needs to be lured into the space between the block and the hole the block was pushed out of. By pushing the block back, the player can push the Heave-Ho out of bounds. It will fall down to the death barrier, and then respawn at the water's surface, analog to the result of the glitch above.

Periodically disappearing Heave-Ho
If the player uses a cloned Crystal Tap to set the water level so that it is at the exact same level as one of the surfaces with a Heave-Ho, the water level will repeatedly rise above said surface due to its natural oscillation. This causes the Heave-Ho to repeatedly appear and disappear, depending on the current water level.

Getting heaved while holding a clone
This glitch is pretty similar to the Chuckya glitch. The player has to clone a Heave-Ho first which can be done using the level's loading zone. Then, while still holding the cloned Heave-Ho, he must be thrown by the original one. This causes the clone in Mario's Hands to fall down and move around as usual, but the Heave-Ho which was about to throw Mario, disappears, leaving him stuck in midair.

Scuttle Bug raising
It is possible to raise a Scuttle Bug infinitely, even into vertical Parallel Universes. To do this, the Scuttle Bug first has to be placed in a specific way via Scuttle Bug transportation - it needs to be in a room that can be unloaded by entering a door and reloaded just by going close enough to the door, while its own activation radius must also be accessible from outside. Then, after placing the Scuttle Bug, the player has to leave the room through the door to unload it and to deactivate the Scuttle Bug. In deactivated state, the Scuttle Bug is always facing towards its home location, but turns towards Mario and attempts to start an attack if he enters the activation radius even if the room it is in is currently unloaded. Leaving the activation radius causes the Scuttle Bug to deactivate and to turn towards its home location. By going close enough to the door or wall not only the Scuttle Bug will activate again, the room will also load - and the Scuttle Bug will now do the attack it attempted to start earlier and jumps towards Mario. Mario has to leave the activation radius of both the Scuttle Bug and the room at the right time, this causes the Scuttle Bug to deactivate in midair so that it does not finish the attack and does not fall down, it only turns around to face its home location again. By repeating those steps over and over, the Scuttle Bug can be raised up infinitely, and will eventually end up in a Parallel Universe.

Scuttle Bug transportation
Like most enemies, each Scuttle Bug has a home location, patrols the area around this location within a certain activation radius and if Mario enters this radius, the Scuttle Bug will try to attack him. However, unlike most other enemies, the Scuttle Bug's home location can change location, because every time the Scuttle Bug hits Mario, its home location gets updated to the location where it was when the collision happened. By strategically luring the Scuttle Bug away from his home location and allowing it to hurt Mario, it can effectively be transported through the course, but if it tries to leave its native room, it will get stuck in the door.

Floor property inheritance
When Mario is standing on the edge of a surface with another floor below him, the game may incorrectly apply the properties of that lower floor to where Mario stands. For instance, Mario can sink into a Tox Box because of the quicksand directly below, or slide back as if the floor is steep.

Fly Guy disappears
In Snowman's Land, if Mario stands near a specific tree then a Fly Guy will fly towards the freezing water and will mysteriously die. It is believed that the freezing water physically extends beyond what is seen.

Frozen environment
These glitches cause the game to maintain a surreal state where most objects do not update when interacted with and many are unloaded.

A similar glitch is possible in New Super Mario Bros.

Mario's magic monkey*
At the section of Tall, Tall Mountain with a log, the player should dive at Ukkiki such that Mario lands in the water, swimming with Ukkiki in his hands. Note that Ukkiki has not spoken at this point, since the game waits for Mario to be standing on the ground. Sliding off of the geometry in the water and bouncing on the ground will allow the player to Ground Pound which drops the monkey without ever conversing. Mario is now in the surreal world of frozen time and unloaded objects. Once Mario retrieves Ukkiki and properly begins the conversation, the world will resume; coins released from various events will spawn, and enemies return to intended behavior.

In releases beyond the original Japanese version, Ukkiki's conversation will begin as soon as Mario is touching the ground for even a moment, making the last step of the setup impossible. Additionally, it is not possible to drop Ukkiki in midair, as pressing the button now does nothing in this situation.

Time-Freezing Cap Switch*
When Mario has just stomped on a Cap Switch, the game goes into a frozen state until the text box is closed. Similarly to the delayed dialogue exploit, if Mario jumps or slides off right when pressing the switch, the game will wait until Mario is next standing on the ground to initiate the text box. In this moment, Stars do not disappear when collected. The glitch ends when the text box appears or Mario exits the course.

Goomba drowns
At the foot of Tall, Tall Mountain there is a trio Goombas. The one closest to the water often gets stuck on unstable ground in the river. While in the water it will be fine, however if the Goomba touches the ground beneath the water it will die.

Hands free holding
Normally Mario's movement is restricted while holding an object. However, this can be circumvented with the following interactions:
 * 1) Grabbing an object with a dive and landing on a downward slope
 * 2) Holding an object and being pushed off a ledge
 * 3) Holding an object and soft bonking against a ceiling (e.g. the bottom edges of ! Blocks)

These actions put Mario in a state where the object is being held but he isn't occupied with physically holding it, hence the term "hands free". However, While Mario has his hands free, the game tries very hard to drop the object at this point; various actions cancel the glitch ranging from most ground movement, ground pounding and actions against walls, to interacting with poles, cannons, sources of damage, wind, shells or the owl, to being tosses, carried or blown away. Thus, Mario must be kept occupied constantly.

Despite the instability of this state, Mario can still punch, kick, jump, hang from ceilings, and fly without dropping the item. The player can turn Mario by butt-sliding down slopes or using rotating platforms. Regrabbing the object can be achieved by diving, entering water, trying to pick up something else, initiating a conversation, or a summoning a Star.

Hands free teleport
The start of this glitch is simple: Mario must go through a warp while holding an object hands free. When he arrives at the other point the object will be missing from his hands. The object will now be:
 * If it was a clone it will vanish from existence and will not affect the real object.
 * If it was a crate it will never come back even after thirty seconds of inactivity.
 * If it was a Chuckya it will come back through a loading point
 * If it was a Penguin the big penguin will show a text box but will give no Star for it.
 * If it was an Ukkiki it will repeatedly ask to be freed no matter what option is chosen.
 * If it was a Bob-omb smoke will start appearing from Mario when he approaches the location of where it was obtained. Diving or grabbing will put the Bob-omb back in Mario's hands, provided it has not been kicked yet. This suspended Bob-omb will destroy other Bob-bombs on contact and push Goombas around. Crates can be walked through, and if they cannot, they can be picked up only for a moment. The Bob-omb can be kicked only once, before or after this glitch. If this glitch is performed with a bloated Bob-omb it will be identical except for the fact that Mario will receive constant backwards velocity unless it is kicked.

Held Object's Last Position
The Held Object's Last Position, often abbreviated to "HOLP", is a location the game tracks when Mario holds most objects. What Mario holds is simply a visual copy of the original object, so once Mario releases this copy from his grasp, the original object is set to a particular location relative to the and inherits Mario's orientation; if an object is dropped by Mario it is placed at the height of Mario's feet and at the lateral position of the  with no velocity, and if Mario throws an object it will move to the  while inheriting his speed.

The is a global value used between all courses and save files, and defaults to (0,0,0) before being used. When needed, the game will update this value to match the location of Mario's hands, however it will only update when the game needs to render an object in Mario's hands. As such the will not update when: Mario is not holding anything, Mario is invisible from knockback, Mario is not within view of the camera, or the object being held is not visible in the first place. Exploits such as the Cap in hand glitch can be used to hold an object without updating the, allowing the player to remotely throw an object from wherever Mario last properly released an object. The only way to reset the is if the player resets or turns off the system.

Infinite Coins
Through various exploits it is possible to obtain an endless number of coins. However, the coin counter is limited to 999 coins maximum.

Bowser's fire
While battling Bowser, the fire he spews at Mario has a chance to drop coins. Through patience the player can collect these coins as these appear without limit.

Cloning
By cloning coins or their Spawning Points in courses with loading zones it is possible to obtain an infinite amount of coins; in courses without loading zones, the amount of coins which can be collected by cloning is limited by the amount of available object slots.

Disappearing crate
In levels with platforms such as Blocks, pushable blocks or Blue Coin Blocks, Mario should place a crate atop one of these objects. If the player walks away, the platform used becomes intangible and the crate falls until the two overlap. Right as the crate would despawn from inactivity, Mario must return to make the platform tangible again, breaking the crate and releasing its three coins. The game does not realize the crate was broken, so it will simply respawn and the process can be repeated.

Money Bags duplication
In Snowman's Land there are two Money Bags which disguise themselves as coins until Mario approaches them. If the player reapproaches a Money Bags just as it transforms back into a coin, it will duplicate into two Money Bags, one that transforms into a coin and another that hops away. This process can be repeated to collect an unlimited amount of coins.

Piranha Flower death trick
In the small version of Tiny Huge Island there is an area with 5 Piranha Flowers, which normally go limp and drop coins when defeated. While a Piranha Flower is shrinking back into the ground however, the player should attack it at the last moment possible. The Piranha Flower will play a death sound as it sprouts back up, and defeating it now will drop 2 coins as it vanishes. The game is tricked into thinking the Piranha Flower has not yet been defeated, so if Mario uses the Shrinker Pipe and returns, the plant will respawn and the process can be repeated to obtain more coins.

Downward teleports
Some events and interactions expect Mario to stay grounded, and if he somehow becomes airborne the game will send Mario to the next available floor as a failsafe:


 * Swimming into a ceiling such as the underside of the ship in Jolly Roger Bay, the game will move Mario out by sending him down until he no longer overlaps with said ceiling.
 * Jumping above a swinging pendulum while its ceilings are exposed.
 * Grabbing the tail of Bowser while it hangs off the edge of the arena will send Mario instantly to the death barrier below.
 * Being crushed while the platform Mario stands on moves out from under him.
 * Being electrocuted by an Amp while performing a Ground Pound.
 * Mario collects a Star while the platform he stands on moves out from under him.

In Dire, Dire Docks, the player should collect the 100th coin such that the 100-Coin Star overlaps with the path of the poles near the submarine. When collecting this star will hanging from a pole, Mario will suddenly drop to the bottom of the lake and celebrate as if he were standing on land.

On Cool, Cool Mountain, if the player heads to the top of the wooden lift and performs a Long Jump towards the Bob-omb Buddy's island, landing at the very edge of the island will cause Mario to warp down. He appears to be stuck in snow yet also in the air, but he actually rests on the death barrier. Once Mario frees himself, he loses a life and is ejected from the painting.

Upward teleports
Some events and interactions expect Mario to be at a specific height, and if he isn't the game will simply send Mario up this expected position:


 * Beginning to swim will set Mario to the water's surface, even if he wasn't at that height when entering the water.
 * Collecting a Star next to a ledge will briefly make Mario grab it before snapping him onto the floor above.
 * Jumping into the edge of a ceiling directly below a hanging grate, the game will incorrectly assume Mario grabbed the grate and warp him up. This effect can be seen inside the mountain of Tiny Huge Island by jumping into the ceiling above the exit, and in the Fire Sea by jumping into the edge of the pole base.

Koopa Shell glitch
Normally riding a Koopa Shell into water will cause Mario to simply surf across the surface. However, a glitch can be performed in the large version of Tiny-Huge Island which circumvents this restriction.

After reaching the beach, Mario should knock the Koopa Troopa away such that it slides towards the water when trying to retrieve its shell. When the Koopa is slightly submerged, the player can knock it away again and land such that Mario mounts the shell and enters the water at the same time. At this point Mario will be swimming with the shell inside him, propelling him forwards indefinitely. Mario's range of moves are no longer bound by the typical restrictions of a Koopa Shell; instead a different set of interactions will end the ride on top of what would break a shell:
 * Attempting to walk, use a cannon, or get lifted by wind
 * Receiving knockback, being burned, getting grabbed, or twirling

When attempting the glitch with a shell clone, Mario will not be propelled nor have a shell attached to him. Instead only the music will change and the shell clone can be reused. If Mario goes through a warp, the music will stop playing and the shell will be forever intangible.

Misplaced Coins
Various coins throughout the available courses are misplaced such that they float inside the ground and/or despawn instantly.


 * In Snowman's Land, there is a single coin that was placed inside the mountain, just below the wooden slope. This coin can be collected if Mario clips into the mountain.


 * The Mystery Goomba of Bowser in the Sky cannot be defeated due to being spawned on the death barrier and promptly unloaded, making the coin it holds impossible to collect.


 * In the small version of Tiny Huge Island, there are two slopes in front of the iron ball spawner, where a line of three coins lay: the first coin sits at the beginning of the slope, the second coin is slightly inside the ground but sticks out enough to be collected when running over the slope, and the third coin floating completely inside the island. This third coin can be collected if the player clips into the island, then jumps outn of the water towards the coin.


 * In the large version of Tiny Huge Island where iron balls roll, there is a line of four coins spawned by one Spawning Point. This particular spawning point is meant to create 5 coins that are set down to the nearest floor. The fifth coin is spawned halfway inside the ground due to the spawner being located beneath the slope, activating a failsafe which immediately unloads the coin. This makes the fifth coin impossible to collect.

NOTE: The reason for both of Tiny Huge Island's misplaced coins is believed to be a change of the level geometry during development to make the iron balls roll away from the fenced area, without adjusting the positions of the coins and coin spawner to compensate.

Mystery Goomba
The Mystery Goomba is a misplaced Goomba found in Bowser in the Sky. After climbing up the long Pole, Mario reaches a platform with a Goomba Spawning Point on it. Despite all Goomba spawning points spawning three Goombas, only two of them can be seen at this location. The reason for the missing Goomba is the spawner's placement, which causes the third Goomba to spawn off the platform, above a bottomless pit. Because Goombas always spawn at the closest available floor directly below them, this Goomba does not spawn in the air next to the platform; rather the Goomba spawns all the way down on the death barrier, where it gets deactivated only one frame later due to Mario being too far away. As such it can only be seen in that one moment.

Although it can be cloned, the Mystery Goomba cannot be properly defeated due to it being so far away from its spawning point - both the spawning point and the Goombas it spawns have their own activation radius, and Mario needs to be within both the Goomba's and the spawner's radius to activate the Goomba and be able to interact with it - because its own activation radius and the spawner's activation radius can never overlap.

Negative lives*
NOTE: This glitch only works in the Japanese version.

When Mario reaches a total of 1,000 coins in a given course, his extra life total will change to "" due to a developer mistake. The intended process was to set the coin total back to 999 coins if the player ever exceeded this limit. On the original Japanese release however, the game will instead set Mario's total lives to 999 when he has exceeds the coin limit. Since the life counter is only 8 bits, this overflows and reads as -25 (the display shows M25, with M representing a minus sign). Upon reaching -128 lives, the total underflows and then is set down to 100. The releases that followed corrected this issue.

Parallel Universe
The term "Parallel Universe" (PU for short) is an analogy that simplifies how the game interprets the playable boundaries to seemingly produce duplicate worlds. In reality these replicas are a byproduct of how the position of objects are read when performing floor collision checks; object positions are stored as floating point decimal numbers, however these values are typecasted to 16-bit integers for the collision checks. As a signed 16-bit integer can only store 216 values, ranging from -32768 to 32767, casting a higher or lower value to said integer will result in an overflow to the other end of the range. The floor collision check perceives this as objects being restricted to the normal boundaries, warping to the opposite side when going beyond these boundaries. From the object's perspective however, the floor collision of the map essentially repeats across the entire coordinate plane with boxes 216 units in size.

themselves are invisible, as this overflow only applies to the collision, not the visuals. Additionally, walls and water are missing, and most objects are not loaded in Parallel Universes, though there are exceptions such as loading zones, namely paintings in the castle, or Crazed Crates. Spawning a Star like a 100-Coin Star in a Parallel Universe softlocks the game.

NOTES:
 * This 216 range is much larger than the size of the courses, so the majority of space between each is out of bounds.
 * Attempting to enter a Parallel Universe on console will freeze the game unless the camera is in fixed mode.
 * Emulator releases allow to be traversed without fixing the camera.

Due to the immense distance between the valid spaces of Parallel Universes, the player must use hyperspeed exploits to even cross the gaps. However, simply building up enough speed to reach a single because the game checks each quarter step of Mario's movement to see if his next position is valid. This means Mario has to build up enough speed to travel at least 1 Parallel Universe a single quarter step, quadrupling the necessary speed. Without abusing slopes or diagonal movement, this almost constrains Mario to every 4 Parallel Universes, a grid denoted by Quadruple Parallel Universes or QPUs.

Permanently crushed
If Mario collects a Star while he is being crushed by an object, Mario will remain squished. In this state movement speed and jump height are decreased, and Mario will not die from slow quicksand. Additionally, pressing or  will do nothing.

Pokey gets segmented
Pokeys are normally made of four connected segments and a head. If Mario knocks a segment off it will disappear and the head will drop down, but after some time all segments will regrow. If a Pokey travels into the stone structure in Shifting Sand Land, the Pokey can split into two pieces. Now the head does not move downward when Mario destroys segments.

Skeeter gets confused
If the water level in Wet-Dry World is lowered when a Skeeter is in between two platforms, it will be unable to move correctly, constantly banging into the sides of each wall.

Spawning displacement*
In the original Japanese release, if Mario is standing on a moving platform (e.g. the falling blocks in Whomp's Fortress or the rotating platform in Wet Dry World) and suddenly loses contact, the platform will still influence Mario by shifting him once before he falls as normal. By dying or leaving a course through various means, this can be applied to Mario the moment he returns to the castle. Specifically, Mario will shift relative to the platform's position in the course he left, which is often far from where Mario is spawned in the castle. Due to this, rotational displacement is often larger than translational displacement.

If the platform Mario stands on is replaced in memory by another object in the castle, or if the shift in position would place Mario out of bounds, the displacement does not occur. If Mario exits a course standing on an object that is replaced by a moving platform in the next area, Mario will be displaced by the new platform.

NOTE: Spawning displacement will affect the demos that play after getting a game over. This will desync the intended behavior of the demo.

Star dance in the sky
There are several courses with large pits below the ground: Tiny-Huge Island, Tick Tock Clock, Whomp's Fortress, Rainbow Ride, Cool, Cool Mountain, Tall, Tall Mountain and Hazy Maze Cave. If Mario collects a Star above on of these pits, he will land on the death barrier below and perform his victory dance. Once Mario is done however, the level kicks him out as intended. It is easiest to perform this trick using a 100-Coin Star, as the position of the Star is based where Mario collects his 100th coin.

Suicidal Bowser
In any Bowser arena, Mario should lure or throw Bowser to the platform's edge. Then, Mario should be positioned on the same ledge far from Bowser so that he jumps towards Mario and narrowly misses the platform during his descent. As Bowser's fall was not a result of being thrown, he will not jump back to the platform, leaving Mario alone in the arena.

Water level manipulation
In courses with water, the surface naturally fluctuates slightly up and down from the median value. If the Mario moves through a loading zone in either Wet-Dry World or Dire, Dire Docks, the game will set the current water level as the median value, even if it is slightly higher or lower. By repeating this process, the water can be can either be drained or fully flood the course with patience. Done to its extreme, the player can set the water level such that it reaches the upper or lower bounds in its height, allowing it to oscillate between fully submerging the levels and draining them.

Yoshi falls off the roof
Once Mario has collected 120 Stars, Yoshi can be found atop the flat section of the castle roof walking between four different spots:
 * 1) Near the Cap Block
 * 2) Near the central spire
 * 3) Near the back-right corner of the castle roof
 * 4) In the center of these three points

Starting from position 1: if Yoshi turns counterclockwise walking to position 3, and then turns clockwise walking back towards position 1, there is a chance that Yoshi will step onto the slanted part of the roof. This offset interrupts Yoshi's path, causing him to pass the aforementioned spots and continue walking forwards. If Yoshi falls off the roof and Mario is away from his normal location, he will respawn. If the player tries talking to Yoshi on a slanted section, Yoshi may be unable to properly jump to the waterfall, resulting in a softlock. Similarly, if Yoshi is spoken to while he is steps off the roof, he will be blocked by the castle wall, unable to reach the waterfall.

Zombie Mario
This glitch can be done in any level that has a cannon or Bob-ombs, but is easiest to do in the Bob-omb Battlefield level. First, the player must forcibly reduce Mario's Health Meter to one or two sections by running into enemies. After this has been accomplished, the player must quickly grab a Bob-omb and then run in front of a cannon, so that Mario's back is facing the cannon. If done correctly, the Bob-omb explodes, and Mario falls backwards into the cannon, losing the remaining two sections of his Health Meter in the process. Mario does not die, however, and the player is then able to aim the cannon and shoot him out of it. In addition, if the player collects a Wing Cap before doing this, they are able to control Wing Mario regularly after firing him out of the cannon, despite having no health remaining. Flying into any coins does not refill Mario's Health Meter. It is not until the player touches back down on the ground again (or the Wing Cap runs out) that Mario loses a life.

This phenomenon also occurs if Mario falls in front of a door in the castle with only two sections of health left. When this happens, the remaining two sections are lost, causing Mario to enter the door, but then lose a life when he is at the end. This glitch was fixed in the DS remake as if the player depletes Mario's lives and goes into the cannon after depleting the last one, he just dies in the cannon.

There is another method that is more difficult than the previously mentioned methods in both preparation and execution. In order to perform this, the player must have all 120 Stars collected (to unlock the cannon in front of the castle). The player has to deplete Mario's health by at least half, then use the cannon to access the castle roof. The player then must acquire the Wing Cap there and fly down to the cannon again. Here, the player has to aim the cannon as high as possible at the castle tower. If done correctly, Mario is left standing on the sloped roofing under the tip of the tower (a platform that is not normally accessible in the game). Upon reaching this section of the tower, there are eight walls placed in octagonal fashion. The player must go for the wall that is facing in the direction of the waterfall to the left of the castle. This certain wall shares the same properties of the brick pillars in Shifting Sand Land, allowing Mario to climb the wall by simply running over it. This leads Mario to the very tip of the castle tower.

Afterwards, the player has to aim Mario towards the cannon, and run in that direction. If executed properly, Mario strangely slides down the wall, and the sloped roofing below him ricochets him airborne at a very low trajectory, covering a large amount of distance in the way.

This is where the actual glitch is performed. The player should steer Mario so that he lands right in front of the cannon. Mario hits the ground, loses all health, and the momentum causes him to tumble into the cannon. After successfully performing this, Mario is in the cannon, despite being technically "dead". Like mentioned before, if Mario still has the Wing Cap, then he is able to fly in midair regularly until he makes any contact with the ground.

NOTE: If the player aims Mario at a tree or pole, then Mario instantly lets go and loses a life.

Sequence breaks
NOTE: These glitches and exploits allow Mario to access areas through unintended methods.

Blast Away the Wall cannonless
In Whomp's Fortress, if Mario touches an exact spot on the wall which can be blasted away, he will do a ledge grab animation and collect the Star in the process. With the following setup this trick can be achieved consistently:

First the player should grab the wall so that Mario is between the log bridge and a Piranha Plant, with his left hand touching the bridge. After climbing up, the player must backflip onto the bridge, turn the camera left twice, and punch  once. Then, the player has to walk down, so that Mario walks to the bridge's ledge and grabs it. After pressing then  to reset the camera orientation, the player should climb up and immediately move  down again, so that Mario runs in an arc off the bridge, hitting the wall and collecting the Star.

Climb the castle without 120 Stars
From the right side of Peach's Castle, the player should perform a triple jump onto the grassy slope, moving slightly to the left during the second jump. If done correctly, Mario will begin sliding and the player can quickly jump to grab the castle roof.

Complete the game with 0 Stars
After starting a new file, the player should enter the castle and go to the stairs leading to the basement. A ledge near the ceiling can be grabbed to pull Mario into a space in the walls. There, multiple Backwards Long Jumps can be performed to build up speed. Once Mario has enough speed, he can redirect his momentum first towards the castle's entrance door, then up the stairs in the main hall, and finally through the 8 Star Door to reach Bowser in the Dark World. After defeating Bowser and receiving the first key, the player must head to the basement.

NOTE: Alternatively the moat door skip can be used instead to access the basement without beating Bowser in the Dark World.

Next the player should position Mario on a small set of stairs and face away from the 30 Star Door. Performing multiple Backwards Long Jumps here, Mario can clip through said door and past the entrance to Dire, Dire Docks with good positioning. After Bowser has been beaten in the Fire Sea, the player must enter Dire, Dire Docks and pause to exit the course, as otherwise there is no way out of the room. Now that Mario has access to the second floor of the castle, Backwards Long Jumps can be performed to breach both the 50 Star Door and the endless staircase.

Lakitu skip
Before crossing the bridge to enter Peach's Castle for the first time, Lakitu will stop Mario and begin an introduction. If the player performs a Long Jump on the edge of the bridge, the trigger can be skipped and Lakitu remains resting in front of the castle's entrance door, without his cloud. Lakitu will be gone when returning to the Castle Grounds.

Mario Through the Jet Stream without Metal Cap
In the Through the Jet Stream missions for Jolly Roger Bay or Dire, Dire Docks, Mario should swim to a jet stream. While the force pushing Mario back is strong, it is possible to swim against the current. The player must repeatedly and rapidly press while swimming into the jet stream, and eventually Mario will reach the Star without a Metal Cap.

MIPS clips
After grabbing MIPS for the first time, he can be grabbed again and carried around. When setting MIPS down, Mario moves forward a bit which can be exploited.

If the player walks into the corner of a door while holding MIPS and lets go, Mario can be pushed inside of the door. By crawling and turning around, MIPS can be grabbed while staying inside the door, and Mario can simply clip out the other side. Performing this trick on the wooden door in the basement and the 30 Star Door, Mario will gain access to Dire, Dire Docks and Bowser in the Fire Sea with less than 30 Stars. Mario can also use this glitch to enter to two different Black Rooms of Death.

Moat door skip
It is possible to enter the door inside the castle's moat while it is still flooded, though the full setup is too precise to be reliably performed in real time.

With 10 Stars or more, Mario can enter Vanish Cap Under the Moat by hyperspeed flying with the Wing Cap found atop the castle. With less Stars however, Mario can instead perform Backwards Long Jumps starting from near the pond to jump down through the grate and enter the course.

Once inside, the player should stand on a wooden lift and build up immense speed by performing many Backwards Long Jumps against the wall until Mario drops off the elevator into the abyss. This places Mario in the moat water, which conserves the built-up speed. Now by sliding on a slope outside the castle and navigating through Parallel Universes with precise angles, it is possible to redirect Mario so he is right next to the moat door but not swimming.

NOTE: This grants access to the basement without needing to defeat Bowser in the Dark World.

Pillarless through the top of the pyramid
Using a bloated Bob-omb, it is possible to enter the pyramid in Shifting Sand Land through the top without standing on the four pillars first. Grabbing the Bob-omb close to the level entrance at its largest possible size before it explodes gives Mario significant backwards momentum. From here the player should navigate up the sand dunes and dive while sliding to initiate the hands free holding glitch.

The sections of quicksand can be avoided with Ground Pounds so that Mario stays in the air for longer while being pushed. After passing over the fence and landing on the pyramid, the player has to rapidly press to scale the slope until Mario is around the same height as the Star Shining Atop the Pyramid. Performing another Ground Pound will clip Mario into the pyramid, entering it from above.

Underground lake shortcuts
The cavern where Dorrie swims in Hazy Maze Cave can be reached without riding the elevator located after the rolling rocks area.

Elevator clip
Between the rolling rocks section and the Red Coins area is an elevator. After stepping onto the elevator, the player should jump off and position Mario so he hugs the wall the elevator is connected to, then shimmy to the right. When the elevator descends, Mario gets pushed through the floor towards the island with the Swimming Beast in the Cavern Star.

Elevator room jump
Again in the elevator room leading to the Red Coins, the player can go over the walls by performing several Wall Kicks at the top. Starting with a Side Somersault or a Triple Jump can make the process easier, but eventually Mario will reach the underground lake from above.

Triple Jump off the block
First the player must reach the red mesh platform above the rolling rock pit, where a yellow ! Block can be found. Performing a Triple Jump with the third jump landing on the ! Block gives Mario enough height to pass over the cave walls, where he can fall into the underground lake.

Cartridge tilting glitches
Tilting a cartridge can interrupt part of the flow of data between the cartridge and the console, causing glitches that may not be possible with a stable connection. Cartridge tilting glitches are only possible on Nintendo 64 releases of Super Mario 64, as Nintendo DS and Nintendo Switch Game Cards cannot be tilted.

Effects of cartridge tilting on this game may include parts of Mario's body disappearing or rotating unusually, corrupted music and sound effects,, corrupted textures, clipping through collision, blurry graphics, and freezing or crashing the game upon certain interactions.

There is a glitch to make Mario lie sideways without disconnecting the cartridge, which is a common graphical result of cartridge tilting. In the American and European versions of the game, the player must go to the roof of Peach's Castle, get the Wing Cap, and go to the left of Princess Peach's image. Mario suddenly lies on the roof and briefly disappears after jumping. The glitch lasts until the console is turned off.