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Grokipedia

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Grokipedia
Home page in October 2025
Type of site
Online encyclopedia
Available inEnglish
Country of originUnited States
Area servedWorldwide
OwnerxAI
URLgrokipedia.com
IPv6 supportYes
CommercialYes
RegistrationOptional
LaunchedOctober 27, 2025 (2025-10-27)
Current statusActive
Content license
Some articles under Creative Commons BY-SA 4.0

Grokipedia is an AI-powered online encyclopedia developed by xAI. An early beta version was launched on October 27, 2025.[1] Entries in Grokipedia are created and edited by the Grok language model.[2] Many articles are derived from Wikipedia articles, with some articles copied nearly verbatim at launch.[3][4][5] Such articles are freely licensed and carry a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license, as is required for derivative works of Wikipedia articles.[5] As of October 28, 2025, the site claims to have nearly 900,000 articles.[6]

Although details of how it works are not currently known,[2] visitors to the encyclopedia can suggest edits via a pop-up form for reporting wrong information, but unlike Wikipedia and other wiki-based encyclopedias, they cannot directly edit articles. Businessman and xAI founder Elon Musk positioned Grokipedia as an alternative to Wikipedia that would "purge out the propaganda" in the latter.[7] Initial reception of Grokipedia focused on its accuracy and biases due to hallucinations and potential algorithmic bias.[3][8] Articles were described as promoting right-wing perspectives and Elon Musk's views.[9][10][11][5]

Background

Further information: Criticism of Wikipedia

Wikipedia is a free online multilingual encyclopedia written and maintained by a community of volunteers through open collaboration.[12]

Wikipedia has long been criticized for deficiencies in its factual reliability and alleged political biases.[3] Previous projects seeking to counter bias have included Conservapedia, launched in 2006 to counter perceived liberal bias,[13] and Ruwiki, forked in 2023 with content modifications widely described as favoring the Russian government.[14][15]

xAI is an American AI company founded by Elon Musk in 2023.[16] Its flagship product is the family of large language models called Grok.[17]

History

Disputes between Musk and Wikipedia

In 2021, Musk expressed affection for Wikipedia on its 20th anniversary.[18] In 2022, Musk argued that Wikipedia was "losing its objectivity".[18] In 2023, he said he would donate a billion dollars to the project if it was renamed "Dickipedia".[18]

In December 2024, Musk called for a boycott of donations to Wikipedia over its perceived left-wing bias, calling it "Wokepedia" in reference to the word "woke".[19] In January 2025, Musk made a series of statements on X denouncing Wikipedia for its description of the incident where he made a controversial gesture at president Donald Trump's second inauguration.[19]

Idea and announcement

In September 2025, Musk spoke at the All-In podcast conference with White House AI and crypto czar David O. Sacks about how Grok consumed data from Wikipedia and other sources to gain more complete knowledge of the world. Sacks suggested that its knowledge base be published as an artifact called "Grokipedia", saying "Wikipedia is so biased, it's a constant war."[18]

Following the conversation with Sacks, Musk announced in September 2025 that xAI was building a new AI-generated online encyclopedia by the suggested name of Grokipedia.[20][21] According to Musk's announcement, it would be an AI-powered knowledge base designed to rival Wikipedia by addressing its perceived biases, errors, and ideological slants.[22] Gizmodo compared the plan to the 2006 Conservapedia project, which it stated had right-wing bias and "is widely regarded as a joke by anyone who tries to wade through its ridiculous articles".[23]

Launch

On October 6, 2025, Musk announced that the early beta version of Grokipedia was scheduled for release later that month.[24][25] The project was postponed briefly in October to address content quality issues.[7] It launched on October 27, 2025, with over 800,000 articles.[7] Some articles are nearly identical to their Wikipedia entries, but the format of Grokipedia citations is different.[26] On the day of launch, Musk stated on X that "Grokipedia.com is fully open source, so anyone can use it for anything at no cost". Articles derived from Wikipedia carry a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license, but the license of other articles is ambiguous, and no publicly accessible source code repository of the backend has been released as of October 29, 2025.[27][28] Musk stated that he believed the 1.0 full release would be "10X better" than the 0.1 version.[29]

Reception

Grokipedia's article on Elon Musk

Shortly after launch, much criticism to Grokipedia focused on its accuracy and biases due to hallucinations and potential algorithmic bias.[3][30][8] In an article, The Washington Post highlighted entries that promote right-leaning perspectives or favor Musk's viewpoints.[10] NBC News noted that unlike Musk's Wikipedia article, his Grokipedia entry did not mention his controversial hand gesture made in January 2025, which many viewed as resembling a Nazi salute.[5] Grokipedia has also been criticized for relying entirely on AI. Forbes noted that "some articles on Grokipedia, such as those on the PlayStation 5, automaker Lamborghini, and chipmaker AMD, appear to be near-identical copies of the corresponding Wikipedia entries".[31]

Some content has been noted to align with Musk's personal views on topics such as gender transition and former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal.[30][10][5] PRWeek speculated on how Grokipedia could affect PR and marketing.[32] Indian popular historian, Hindutva revisionist, and economist Sanjeev Sanyal found several examples of Indian topics where he preferred Grokipedia's content to that of Wikipedia.[33]

Time magazine wrote that the Grokipedia article on Musk sometimes "describes him in rapturous terms while downplaying, or even omitting, several of his controversies". The magazine added that "Grokipedia includes more detailed descriptions of Musk's views, including the idea of a 'woke mind virus,' which Musk claimed 'killed' his estranged transgender daughter, who is alive". Time also criticized a section about Musk's health and lifestyle for including detailed personal information regarding his daily routine, content typically not found in an encyclopedia.[11]

Wired reported that "The new AI-powered Wikipedia competitor falsely claims that pornography worsened the AIDS epidemic and that social media may be fueling a rise in transgender people."[9]

A spokesperson for the Wikimedia Foundation commented that "Wikipedia's knowledge is – and always will be – human. ... This human-created knowledge is what AI companies rely on to generate content; even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist."[4][31] Sociologist and physicist Taha Yasseri argued in The Conversation that the encyclopedia may end up displaying biases just like Wikipedia (though acknowledging that Wikipedia's "infrastructure is designed to make that bias visible and correctable"), since large language models like Grok's reflect the political and other biases of their datasets.[3]

Larry Sanger, co-founder and noted critic of Wikipedia, responded to the launch of Grokipedia saying "The jury's still out as to whether it's actually better than Wikipedia. But at this point I would have to say 'maybe!'".[34] Sanger also noted that while the Grokipedia article on himself offered correct and interesting content not found in the corresponding Wikipedia article, it also demonstrated hallucination and contained errors.[35] Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales commented that the use of large language models would cause Grokipedia to contain "massive" errors.[36]

See also

References

  1. ^ "Elon Musk appears to have launched Grokipedia, a Wikipedia competitor". Business Insider. October 28, 2025. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  2. ^ a b "Elon Musk launches Grokipedia to compete with online encyclopedia Wikipedia". AP News. October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  3. ^ a b c d e Yasseri, Taha (October 15, 2025). "Grokipedia: Elon Musk is right that Wikipedia is biased, but his AI alternative will be the same at best". The Conversation. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  4. ^ a b Peters, Jay (October 28, 2025). "Elon Musk's Grokipedia contains copied Wikipedia pages". The Verge. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  5. ^ a b c d e "Elon Musk launches Grokipedia as an alternative to 'woke' Wikipedia". NBC News. October 28, 2025. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  6. ^ Bragg, Julianna (October 28, 2025). "Elon Musk's Wikipedia rival site live after crashing on launch day". Axios. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  7. ^ a b c Conger, Kate (October 27, 2025). "Elon Musk Challenges Wikipedia With His Own A.I. Encyclopedia". The New York Times. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  8. ^ a b "Elon Musk's takes on Wikipedia with AI-powered Grokipedia". euronews. October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  9. ^ a b Rogers, Reece. "Elon Musk's Grokipedia Pushes Far-Right Talking Points". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  10. ^ a b c "Elon Musk launches a Wikipedia rival that extols his own 'vision'". The Washington Post. October 28, 2025. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  11. ^ a b Jeyaretnam, Miranda (October 28, 2025). "How Grokipedia Describes Elon Musk". TIME. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  12. ^ "Wikimedia Projects". Wikimedia Foundation. Archived from the original on October 12, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  13. ^ Anderson, Nate (March 5, 2007). "Conservapedia hopes to "fix" Wikipedia's "liberal bias"". Ars Technica. Archived from the original on June 16, 2018. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  14. ^ Corfield, Gareth (July 12, 2023). "Russia launches Wikipedia rival in new censorship crackdown". The Daily Telegraph. Archived from the original on July 12, 2023. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  15. ^ Jankowicz, Mia. "Russia has launched its own version of Wikipedia, called Ruwiki, which is notably more sympathetic to Putin". Business Insider. Archived from the original on July 22, 2023. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  16. ^ Hammond, George (July 12, 2023). "Elon Musk launches xAI in challenge to dominance of ChatGPT owner". Financial Times. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  17. ^ Zeff, Maxwell (July 10, 2025). "Elon Musk's xAI launches Grok 4 alongside a $300 monthly subscription". TechCrunch. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  18. ^ a b c d Higgins, Tim (October 4, 2025). "Why Conservatives Are Attacking 'Wokepedia'". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on October 5, 2025. Retrieved October 6, 2025.
  19. ^ a b Leloup, Damien (January 29, 2025). "Why Elon Musk is calling for a boycott of Wikipedia". Le Monde. Archived from the original on August 29, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  20. ^ Gupta, Aman (September 30, 2025). "'Grokipedia': Elon Musk says xAI is working on a Wikipedia rival powered by AI". Live Mint. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  21. ^ Gucia, Wiktoria (September 30, 2025). "MAGA Melts Down Over Wikipedia 'Blacklist'". The Daily Beast. Archived from the original on October 1, 2025. Retrieved September 30, 2025.
  22. ^ Kan, Michael (September 30, 2025). "Elon Musk Plans to Take on Wikipedia With 'Grokipedia'". PCMAG. Archived from the original on September 30, 2025. Retrieved September 30, 2025.
  23. ^ Novak, Matt (September 30, 2025). "Elon Musk's Wikipedia Competitor Is Going to Be a Disaster". Gizmodo. Archived from the original on October 1, 2025. Retrieved October 2, 2025.
  24. ^ "What Is Grokipedia? Elon Musk To Unveil Wikipedia Competitor In Two Weeks". NDTV. Retrieved October 6, 2025.
  25. ^ "Elon Musk: 'Grokipedia' Arrives Later This Month". PCMAG. October 6, 2025. Archived from the original on October 6, 2025. Retrieved October 6, 2025.
  26. ^ Bell, Karissa (October 27, 2025). "X's Grokipedia is online after it briefly crashed out". Engadget. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  27. ^ "Elon Musk launches Grokipedia, says it's truthful, independent and open source". CNBC TV18. October 27, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  28. ^ "Elon Musk Launches Uncanny Wikipedia Rival". TheStreet. October 27, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  29. ^ "Elon Musk attacks 'legacy media' again, this time defending his AI-powered database Grokipedia". The Times of India. October 29, 2025. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  30. ^ a b "Elon Musk's Grokipedia Pushes Far-Right Talking Points". Wired. October 28, 2025. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  31. ^ a b Ray, Siladitya. "Musk Launches 'Grokipedia'—An AI-Generated Wikipedia Challenger". Forbes. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  32. ^ Sparrer, Curtis (October 28, 2025). "Wikipedia has a competitor. Why PR pros should care about Grokipedia". PRWeek. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  33. ^ Sanyal, Sanjeev (October 29, 2025). "Grokipedia vs Wikipedia: Sanjeev Sanyal lists 20 instances of Wiki's 'religious bias', cites Ram Mandir entry among others". Moneycontrol. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  34. ^ "Wikipedia founder Larry Sanger gives company a Grokipedia warning; Elon Musk replies: He should..." The Times of India. October 29, 2025. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
  35. ^ Baruah, Antara (October 28, 2025). "Is Grokipedia really a neutral Wikipedia? Elon Musk wants you to believe it". ThePrint. Archived from the original on October 28, 2025. Retrieved October 28, 2025.
  36. ^ Rosenbaum, Eric (October 28, 2025). "Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales isn't worried about Elon Musk's Grokipedia: 'Not optimistic he will create anything very useful right now'". CNBC. Retrieved October 29, 2025.
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