Communication · 2001

Wikipedia

Anyone can edit, and the largest encyclopedia in history is written by volunteers.

Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger launched Wikipedia on 15 January 2001 using wiki software. It grew to over 60 million articles across more than 300 languages, a free reference consulted billions of times a month, echoing Alexandria's ambition.

See it in the living tree Wikipedia

Arcs above join it to what it stood on, arcs below to what it led to. The bar places this stretch on the tree's whole timeline.

What it built on 1

World Wide Web 1991

Related measurements

The dashed line marks when it first worked.

Share of people online Latest: 73.6 % (2025) Source: Our World in Data

Literate share of the world Latest: 87.7 % (2024) Source: Our World in Data