First page

The Wikipedia Main Page

Welcome to the Wikipedia tour. My name is Denis, and I will be your guide. This trip will show you the diversity of the content on Wikipedia, some of its most unusual articles, the inner workings of the project, its policies and debates, and everything you need to know to become a contributor. Don't worry about getting lost - I will be with you during the whole trip.

What you see below is the Main Page of Wikipedia. You've probably seen it before, but pay a closer look. Much of the content below is updated daily by our open community of editors. The featured article, for example, is picked from the list of featured articles. These are pages which have undergone a community review process. The Did you know section in the lower right comes exclusively from our latest article additions. Also take a look at all the other languages Wikipedia is available in!

Welcome to Wikipedia

,

the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.

117,937 active editors
7,001,584 articles in English

The English-language Wikipedia thanks its contributors for creating more than seven million articles!
Learn how you can take part in the encyclopedia's continued improvement.

From today's featured article

Members of the victorious Blondie crew

The Boat Race 2018 took place on 24 March. Held annually, The Boat Race is a side-by-side rowing race between crews from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge along a 4.2-mile (6.8 km) tidal stretch of the River Thames in south-west London, England. For the third time in the history of the event, the men's, the women's and both reserves' races were all held on the Tideway on the same day. The women's race saw Cambridge lead from the start, eventually winning by a considerable margin to take the overall record to 43–30 in their favour. In the women's reserve race, Cambridge's Blondie (crew pictured) defeated Oxford's Osiris by nine lengths. The men's reserve race was won by Cambridge's Goldie, who defeated Oxford's Isis by a margin of four lengths. The men's race was the final event of the day and completed a whitewash as Cambridge won, taking the overall record to 83–80 in their favour. The races were watched by around 250,000 spectators live, and broadcast around the world. (Full article...)

Recently featured:

Did you know ...

Kitty Marion

... that Kitty Marion (pictured) was force-fed over 200 times during a hunger strike?
... that the North Korean destroyer Choe Hyon is the largest ship constructed for the Korean People's Navy?
... that after the release of High and Low, director Akira Kurosawa received telephone calls imitating his film that threatened to kidnap his daughter?
... that May Bradford Shockley is why Silicon Valley is where it is?
... that the conservation of a goat might endanger the survival of Aquilegia paui?
... that Joy Laking predicted in a school writing assignment that within ten years she would be making a living as an artist?
... that the Taiwanese restaurant chain Formosa Chang drew inspiration from McDonald's for its non-greasy atmosphere and corporate practices?
... that Haridas Mitra had his death sentence commuted after the intervention of Mahatma Gandhi?
... that "Steve's Lava Chicken" recently became the shortest song to enter the UK Top 40?

In the news

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o

Kenyan writer and activist Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o (pictured) dies at the age of 87.
In sumo, Ōnosato Daiki is promoted to yokozuna.
In association football, Liverpool win the Premier League title.
In motor racing, Álex Palou wins the Indianapolis 500.
In basketball, the EuroLeague concludes with Fenerbahçe winning the Final Four Playoff.

On this day

May 31: Dragon Boat Festival in China and Taiwan (2025); World No Tobacco Day

Bessarion

455 – Petronius Maximus, the ruler of the Western Roman Empire, was stoned to death by a mob as he fled Rome ahead of the arrival of a Vandal force that sacked the city.
1223 – Mongol invasion of Kievan Rus': Mongol forces defeated a Kievan Rus' army at the Battle of the Kalka River in present-day Ukraine.
1468 – Cardinal Bessarion (pictured) announced his donation of 746 Greek and Latin codices to the Republic of Venice, forming the Biblioteca Marciana.
1935 – A magnitude-7.7 earthquake struck Balochistan in British India, now part of Pakistan, killing between 30,000 and 60,000 people.
2013 – A tornado struck Central Oklahoma, killing eight people and injuring more than 150 others.

Albertino Mussato (d. 1329)
Joseph Grimaldi (d. 1837)
Dina Boluarte (b. 1962)
Mbaye Diagne (d. 1994)

More anniversaries:

Today's featured picture

Cucumis metuliferus, the African horned cucumber, is an annual vine in the cucumber and melon family, Cucurbitaceae. Its fruit has horn-like spines, hence the name "horned melon". The ripe fruit has orange skin and lime-green, jelly-like flesh. It is native to Southern Africa, where it is a traditional food. Along with the gemsbok cucumber and the citron melon, it is one of the few sources of water during the dry season in the Kalahari Desert. This photograph, which was focus-stacked from 25 separate images, shows two C. metuliferus fruits, one whole and the other in cross-section.

Photograph credit: Ivar Leidus

Recently featured:

Other areas of Wikipedia

Community portal – The central hub for editors, with resources, links, tasks, and announcements.
Village pump – Forum for discussions about Wikipedia itself, including policies and technical issues.
Site news – Sources of news about Wikipedia and the broader Wikimedia movement.
Teahouse – Ask basic questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
Help desk – Ask questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
Reference desk – Ask research questions about encyclopedic topics.
Content portals – A unique way to navigate the encyclopedia.

Wikipedia's sister projects

Wikipedia is written by volunteer editors and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization that also hosts a range of other volunteer projects: