State of Wikipedia report for July 2026
In July, the Wikipedia Chaos Index ticked slightly upward to 88, keeping it at the same High range it has been through the first half of 2026. The platform remains highly volatile, so our advice remains unchanged: publishing new drafts, updating controversial content, or engaging in debates with editors is not recommended until activity slows down again.
Overall activity on Wikipedia was down slightly month-to-month, but recent trends are holding: new page submissions and sockpuppet investigations both saw healthy increases in June, reflecting continued levels of high activity from experienced editors and administrators enforcing policies and cracking down on low-quality contributions.
Although Article for Deletion nominations decreased in June, successful deletions were up for the month, as Wikipedia’s editorial community continues to crack down on pages that are considered “fringe” cases for notability.
In addition, the UK’s Online Safety Act continues to be a hot button topic globally, especially after Ofcom released its initial register of categorized services recently. According to the Foundation, Ofcom has notified Wikipedia it has been classified on a list of emerging platforms – avoiding the Category 1 status that would have imposed new, specific regulations, like strict identity verification, which the Foundation said would lead to malicious actors blocking unverified volunteer editors from correcting vandalism or misinformation.
Essentially, Ofcom’s designation places Wikipedia on a watch list of sorts, where it can be reassessed at any given time and given the dreaded Category 1 status. And with contentious legal battles already formed around the Online Safety Act’s definition and implementation requirements of things like content suggestions and sharing (for example, Ofcom considers Wikipedia’s New Page Feed as a “recommender system”), the still-young law is finding itself at a tricky intersection, especially on anonymous platforms like Wikipedia, where user privacy is not only considered a measure of safety, but a core part of the website’s very identity – which is precisely why the Wikimedia Foundation considers the designation a reprieve from the law, rather than a permanent victory, and something it will continue to defend itself from in the coming years.
Note: The Chaos Index Index is our proprietary metric for measuring turbulence throughout Wikipedia and tracking the community’s current sentiment towards corporate-related pages. The index measures community actions such as editing frequency, content deletion, message board posts, and many other activities that contribute to unstable
corporate page environments.
