Wikipedia began as an idea that seemed impossible: to create a free encyclopedia, based on the wisdom of the crowd, for all people around the globe. Twenty years later, Wikipedia has achieved remarkable milestones: over 300 languages, more than 45 million articles, hundreds of millions of monthly readers, and millions of contributors over the years.
Behind Wikipedia stands the Wikimedia Foundation, a nonprofit organization based in the United States. The foundation provides services such as server maintenance and technical support, but does not interfere with content management — editorial decisions are left entirely in the hands of volunteer editing communities.
Since 2001, Wikipedia has been a space for learning, public dialogue, and consensus-building around knowledge and facts. What once seemed improbable has become one of the most successful experiments in the history of the internet — all thanks to people. Edit by edit, Wikipedia continues to grow and evolve.
Wikipedia is written by real people from around the world who love knowledge: professors, researchers, students, professionals, and curious minds who contribute new content every day in over 300 languages.
People of diverse backgrounds, genders, and communities create Wikipedia content together. They discuss edits openly and make decisions transparently on article talk pages. You can access the full edit history of every article and see how it has developed over time.
Anyone can write and edit Wikipedia — but that doesn’t mean anyone can write anything they want. Wikipedia is a tertiary source: new information is added only if supported by reliable external sources. All content is reviewed, debated, and updated daily, according to policies and guidelines enforced by thousands of volunteers. Most instances of vandalism are resolved within minutes.
Wikipedia is devoted to free, reliable, and neutral knowledge. We are not against online advertising, but we will not run ads on Wikipedia. Commercial interests could jeopardize Wikipedia’s position as a neutral source of information.
The Hebrew version of Wikipedia was launched on July 8, 2003. As of April 2025, Hebrew Wikipedia contains over 372,000 articles and around 1,000 active editors. In October 2024, Hebrew Wikipedia ranked 36th globally in number of articles (around 363,000), and 18th in total edits (about 39.75 million). In terms of average edits per article, it ranked second worldwide — right after English Wikipedia.
Like in other languages, Hebrew Wikipedia allows any visitor to contribute by writing and editing. It is characterized by a high number of edits per article, strong community engagement, and lively discussions in talk pages. Google usually places Hebrew Wikipedia entries high in search results for Hebrew keywords, making it a key resource for Hebrew-speaking users
Over time, Hebrew Wikipedia has become an increasingly important knowledge resource for Hebrew speakers. A 2024 survey conducted by Wikimedia Israel revealed that 91% of Israeli internet users (both Jewish and Arab) use Wikipedia, and 59% visit the site at least once a week.
A significant portion of active Hebrew Wikipedia editors get to know each other through collaborative writing. Over the years, a vibrant social community has developed. Editors meet regularly at community events, guided tours, conferences, and edit-a-thons. Many friendships have formed, and it is not uncommon to find siblings, parent–child pairs, or even married couples among the editors.
In 2007, a group of active editors in the Hebrew community established Wikimedia Israel — a nonprofit organization designed to support the community and promote open knowledge initiatives throughout Israeli society.
Wikimedia Commons is the world’s largest free-to-use library of illustrations, photos, drawings, videos, and music.
Wikidata acts as central storage of structured data for Wikimedia projects. Structuring data into a machine-readable format makes it easier to view, search, edit, curate, use and re-use files.
Wikisource is a library of freely-licensed source texts and historical documents, including poetry, government documents, constitutions of many countries, and general literature.
Wiktionary is a free multilingual dictionary. The project aims to describe all words of all languages. It includes language resources such as a thesaurus, rhyme guide, and language statistics.
Wikiquote is an online collection of sourced quotations from notable people and creative works in over 75 languages. It also includes proverbs, mnemonics and slogans.
Wikibooks aims to build a collection of free e-book resources including textbooks, annotated texts, instructional guides, and manuals.
ויקימסע Wikivoyage aims to create the world’s largest free, complete and up-to-date worldwide travel guide.
Wikinews provides a free content alternative to commercial news sites with articles that are fact-checked and peer reviewed.
Wikiversity is devoted to learning resources, learning projects, and research for use in all levels, types, and styles of education.
Wikispecies is a species database for taxonomy that covers living and fossil representatives of Animalia, Plantae, Fungi, Bacteria, Archaea, Protista and all other forms of life.
Meta-Wiki is a project used as a central hub for various coordination and organization tasks, such as discussions affecting multiple wikis or planning upcoming events.
As a nonprofit organization, Wikimedia Israel depends on donations to continue its work. Your support helps ensure the sustainability of Wikipedia—the world’s largest free encyclopedia—train a new generation of contributors, and lead innovative projects that promote reliable, accessible knowledge. Every donation brings us closer to a world where knowledge is free and accessible to all. Your contribution matters!
