Frequently Asked Questions
Everything you need to know about edithistory.wiki and Wikipedia edit data.
What is edithistory.wiki?
edithistory.wiki is a free tool that visualizes the edit history of any Wikipedia article. It shows you who has edited an article, how often, when edits peaked, and whether the article has been caught in an edit war. You can search any article title and get a full breakdown in seconds.
Is this affiliated with Wikipedia or the Wikimedia Foundation?
No. edithistory.wiki is an independent project and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or connected to the Wikimedia Foundation in any way. We use Wikipedia's public API to fetch revision metadata, which is freely available and licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0.
What is the controversy score?
The controversy score (0–10) measures how frequently edits to an article are reverted — that is, undone by another editor. A high revert rate typically means editors are actively disagreeing about the article's content. A score of 0–3 is stable, 4–6 is moderately contested, and 7–10 indicates an active edit war. It is not a measure of an article's accuracy or quality, only of editorial conflict.
What is an edit war?
An edit war happens when two or more Wikipedia editors repeatedly undo each other's changes to an article, each trying to have their preferred version of the content published. Wikipedia has policies against edit warring (the "three-revert rule"), but disputes still occur frequently on politically charged, scientific, or culturally sensitive topics. Articles with many reverts in a short time period are flagged by our controversy score.
How far back does the edit history go?
We fetch up to 500 of the most recent revisions for any article. Wikipedia articles can have revision histories stretching back to the early 2000s, so for very active articles the 500-revision window may only cover a few months. For less-edited articles, 500 revisions can span years. The timeline chart reflects whichever window of data we retrieved.
How is data cached? Is it real-time?
When you first search an article, edithistory.wiki fetches live data directly from the Wikipedia API. The result is then cached in our database so subsequent lookups are faster and we don't hammer Wikipedia's servers with repeated identical requests. Cached results are periodically refreshed. For the very latest revisions on a heavily edited article, checking Wikipedia directly will always be most up to date.
What do the article quality ratings mean?
Wikipedia has its own quality assessment scale for articles. "Featured Article" (FA) is the highest rating, awarded to articles that are comprehensive, well-sourced, and well-written. "Good Article" (GA) is the second tier. Below that are A-Class, B-Class, C-Class, Start-Class, and Stub. These ratings are assigned by Wikipedia editors and reflect the article's depth, sourcing, and prose quality — not neutrality or accuracy.
Who are the top editors shown for an article?
The top editors list shows the Wikipedia usernames (or IP addresses for anonymous edits) that have made the most revisions to the article within the revision window we fetched. A high edit count from a single user can indicate either a dedicated expert contributor or, in contested articles, an editor engaged in an edit war.
What do the pageview charts show?
Pageview data comes from the Wikimedia Analytics Pageviews API and shows how many times the Wikipedia article was viewed over the past 60 days. Traffic spikes often correlate with news events, viral social media posts, or external links. Viewing pageview trends alongside the edit history can reveal whether an article is being edited in response to real-world events.
Can I use this data for research or journalism?
Yes. All data displayed on edithistory.wiki originates from Wikipedia's public API and is freely available. The underlying revision data belongs to Wikipedia's contributors and is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. If you publish work based on data from this site, we recommend citing the original Wikipedia API as your source. edithistory.wiki itself is an independent analytical tool and is not a citable primary source.
Does the site work for non-English Wikipedia articles?
Currently edithistory.wiki is optimised for English Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org). Support for other language editions of Wikipedia is something we may add in the future.
Is edithistory.wiki free?
Yes, completely free to use. The site is supported by non-intrusive display advertising. We do not require registration, email addresses, or any personal information to use any feature of the site.
How do I interpret the edit timeline chart?
The timeline chart shows the number of edits made to the article per month over the revision window. Peaks in the chart often correspond to breaking news, controversies, or major real-world events related to the article's subject. A flat or slow-rising timeline suggests a stable article with occasional maintenance edits, while sharp spikes indicate bursts of activity — often triggered by something in the news.
My favourite article has an incorrect controversy score. Why?
The controversy score is calculated from the revert rate within the last 500 revisions we retrieved. It is a statistical signal, not a human editorial judgment. Some articles may score higher than you'd expect because of past disputes that are no longer active, or lower because recent editing has been cooperative even if the topic is sensitive. The score is a starting point for investigation, not a definitive verdict.