Wikipedia says traffic is falling due to AI search summaries and social video

Wikipedia has long been hailed as the last good website in a digital landscape cluttered with toxic social media and unreliable AI content. However, recent data indicates that the online encyclopedia is not entirely insulated from prevailing trends; human pageviews have dropped by 8% year-over-year, as highlighted in a recent blog entry by Marshall Miller of the Wikimedia Foundation.

The Wikimedia Foundation is dedicated to differentiating between human traffic and that generated by bots. According to Miller, the decline observed “over the past few months” was uncovered following an update to Wikipedia’s bot detection systems, which revealed that “much of the unusually high traffic during May and June stemmed from bots designed to evade detection.”

What’s driving this traffic decline? Miller attributes it to “the influence of generative AI and social media on information-seeking behavior.” He notes that “search engines are increasingly employing generative AI to provide direct answers to queries, rather than directing users to sites like Wikipedia.” Furthermore, younger demographics are turning to social video platforms for information instead of traditional web resources. (Google has disputed the assertion that AI summaries are diminishing search traffic.)

Miller emphasizes that the foundation is open to “new methods for knowledge acquisition,” suggesting that this does not diminish Wikipedia’s relevance, as its content continues to benefit users—even if they are not visiting the site directly. Wikipedia has even commenced its own experiments with AI-generated summaries, although they halted the project following editor criticisms.

However, this shift poses certain risks, notably the potential for diminished public awareness regarding the provenance of their information. As Miller articulates, “With fewer visits to Wikipedia, there may be fewer volunteers to enhance the content and fewer individual donors to support our mission.” Some dedicated volunteers have demonstrated remarkable acts, such as disarming an armed individual at a Wikipedia editors’ conference last Friday.

Miller advocates that AI, search, and social media companies utilizing content from Wikipedia “must work to direct more visitors” to the encyclopedia itself.

The organization is also taking proactive measures, including the creation of a new framework for attributing content from Wikipedia. They have established two teams focused on expanding Wikipedia’s readership and are actively seeking additional volunteers to assist in this endeavor.

Miller also calls on readers to “support content integrity and creation” more widely.

“When searching for information online, prioritize citations and access the original source material,” he advises. “Engage in discussions about the value of trusted, human-curated knowledge with your peers. Help them recognize that the content fueling generative AI originated from real individuals who deserve our support.”