While players are going through The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim's main quest, they reach a point where they are tasked with joining the College of Winterhold to complete the Elder Knowledge quest. It's possible to skip this, but the vast majority of players will likely join the College of Winterhold to advance the story like normal. There's an entire questline with achievements and other benefits attached to completing the College of Winterhold, and it's definitely worth pursuing for magic users regardless.
In any case, to join the College of Winterhold in Skyrim, players have to travel to Winterhold and speak with Faralda. Faralda will then ask the player to perform a spell before she lets them in. It's safe to say that most Skyrim players simply perform the spell and gain access to the College of Winterhold the normal way (or use persuasion to skip the spell-casting bit), but some fans of the game are just now discovering that there's an alternate method to get inside.
During the Elder Knowledge quest in Skyrim, players will discover that they have a different dialogue option when speaking with Faralda. Skyrim players are given the option to ask Faralda if she would grant entry to the Dragonborn. She then asks for a demonstration of one of the Dragonborn's Shouts to prove they are who they say they are. After performing a Shout, Faralda will be convinced that the player will make a "superb addition" to the College of Winterhold and grants them the rank of Apprentice.
This was demonstrated in a video uploaded by Reddit user nomenmihiestaad, who claimed to have never known about this option despite having played Skyrim for nine years. Other users chimed in on the post, confirming that they too didn't know about this alternate method of joining the College of Winterhold.
The reason why many Skyrim players wouldn't know about demonstrating a Shout on Faralda to get inside the College of Winterhold is likely due to people ignoring the main quest in favor of heading straight to the college. If players haven't advanced to the Elder Knowledge quest, they will have to perform a spell for Faralda and they won't have the option to reveal to her that they are the Dragonborn.
Skyrim is full of small details like this where certain things can change depending on the order that players do things. This open-ended nature is part of the reason why Skyrim remains so popular a decade after its release.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim - Anniversary Edition is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.