Wikipedia has various contests from time to time -- for good writing, site and logo designs, or great images or media -- to encourage and recognize brilliant, unusual, or specially-targeted contributions.
Contests have also been run on various other Wikimedia projects, generally eliciting excitement and support; the Wikinews writing contest in March/April and the second German writing contest (part of the International writing contest) both attracted over 10 unusual prizes from the community to hand out to the lucky/skillful winners.
You can also add to Ideas for new contests if you have a good idea for a contest and you can use this Toolkit model to reduce the time it takes to set up your contest.
Contests[edit]
Writing[edit]
Competition | Version | Status | Duration | About | Signup, Results |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
International writing contest | - | Closed | ca March 2005 | A coordinated contest across a number of Wikipedias. | winners | on meta |
Deshipidian 2008 | - | Closed | ca 2008 | arranged by WikiProject:Bangladesh | |
WikiCup | 2007 | Closed | ca 2007 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2008 | Closed | ca 2008 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2009 | Closed | ca 2009 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2010 | Closed | ca 2010 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2011 | Closed | ca 2011 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2012 | Closed | ca 2012 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2013 | Closed | ca 2013 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2014 | Closed | ca 2014 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2015 | Closed | ca 2015 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2016 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2016 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2017 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2017 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2018 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2018 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2019 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2019 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2020 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2020 | Results | |
WikiCup | 2021 | Closed | 1 Jan - 31 Oct 2021 | Results | |
Bacon WikiCup | 2010 | Closed | Adding bacon-related content | Winners | |
Bacon WikiCup | 2011 | Closed | Adding bacon-related content | Winners | |
Bacon WikiCup | 2012 | Closed | Adding bacon-related content | Winners | |
Awaken the Dragon | 2016 | Closed | 1 Apr - 2 May 2016 | Contest run by WikiProject Wales | |
The West Country Challenge | 2016 | Closed | 8 Aug - 4 Sep 2016 | A contest/editathon aimed at improving the quality and quantity of coverage of Bristol, Somerset, Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly, Dorset, Wiltshire and Gloucestershire | |
The Great Britain and Ireland Destubathon | 2020 | Closed | March 2020 | ||
Wiki Loves Women #15Challenge Writing Contest | 2016 | Closed | 15 Jan 2016 - 31 Jan 2016 | 15 days to create (at least) 15 biographies on notable African women | |
Wiki Loves Women #16WikiWomen Translation Drive | 2017 | Closed | 20 Feb 2017 - 6 March 2017 | 16 days to make available biographies on 16 notable African women, in at least 16 languages | |
Wiki Loves Women #17African feminists | 2017 | Closed | 01 Nov 2017 - 30 Nov 2017 | Biographies about African feminists | |
Military history Contest | Ongoing | Rolling competition each month that awards points for improving articles | |||
WikiGrail | 2012 | Closed | Competition run by WikiProject Christianity | ||
Stub Contest | 2004 | Closed | |||
Stub Contest | 2013 | Closed | |||
Stub Contest | 2014 | Closed | |||
Stub Contest | 2015 | Closed | |||
Stub Contest | 2019 | Closed | 1 Oct 2019 - 31 Dec 2019 | Women in Red biographies | |
Tyop Contest | 2014 | Closed | |||
Wikimania 2005:Writing contest | 2005 | Closed | |||
Danny's contest | 2004 | Closed | Oct 2004 | ||
Danny's contest | 2004 | Closed | Nov 2004 | ||
The Core Contest | 2007 | Closed | 25 Nov - 9 Dec 2007 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | Mar 2012 | Closed | 10 Mar - 31 Mar 2012 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | Aug 2012 | Closed | Aug 2012 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2013 | Closed | Apr 2013 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2014 | Closed | 10 Feb - 9 Mar 2014 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2015 | Closed | 1 Mar - 14 Apr 2015 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2016 | Closed | 15 May - 30 Jun 2016 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2017 | Closed | May - Jun 2017 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
The Core Contest | 2021 | Closed | 1 Jun - 15 Jul 2021 | Improving Wikipedia's most important articles | |
9th ISCB Wikipedia Competition | 9th | Closed | 26 Aug 2019 - 15 May 2020 | Improving content relating to computational biology or bioinformatics | |
10th ISCB Wikipedia Competition | 10th | Closed | 1 Sep 2020 - 14 May 2021 | Improving content relating to computational biology or bioinformatics | |
Women in Asia contest | 2020 | Closed | 1 Oct - 31 Dec 2020 | Women in Red: New biographies of Asian women | |
11th ISCB Wikipedia Competition | 11th | On going | 1 Sep 2021 - 29 Apr 2022 | Improving content relating to computational biology or bioinformatics | |
Women in Red translation contest | 2022 | Active | 1 Apr - 30 June 2022 | Women in Red: translation of women's biographies from other versions of Wikipedia | |
CEE Spring | 2022 | Future | 15 April - 31 May | Central en Eastern Europe (in broader sense), subtopic: language Esperanto, related to human rights |
Media[edit]
- Wikimania competition
- An extended media contest, combining a contest for media gathered while at or en route to Wikimania, with a general contest for all content produced this year.
- Wikipedia:US Banknote Contest/2019
- A contest focused on images of United States banknotes
- commons:Category:Photography competitions
- Various photography competitions on Commons, including Wiki Loves Monuments and Wiki Loves Earth
Abandoned contests[edit]
[edit]
- Wikipedia:The Great Wikipedia Dramaout, for 5 days, starting July 18, 2009, Wikipedians are being asked to voluntarily refrain from editing all non-article areas of Wikipedia, and instead dedicate themselves to creating, cleaning up, and building articles.
- Wikipedia:The Great Backlog Drive
Organizing contests[edit]
The Wikimedia Foundation (WMF) advises [1] that although there is no problem in general with third parties running contests on Wikipedia, contest organizers should note the following:
- The contest should not be presented as if it was being organized, sponsored or endorsed by the WMF. This includes using the Wikipedia/WMF logos, which are trademarked and may only be used with the permission of the WMF (see Wikipedia:Copyrights), or implying that the WMF has any involvement beyond hosting the platform being used. (If you are unsure about your contest in this regard, please contact liaison
wikimedia.org.)
- Contributors are liable for their own contributions, which include the people running such contests.
- Organizers may wish to obtain advice on contest law before attempting to run a contest, on-wiki or elsewhere.
- Organizers can save time by copying this Wikipedia:Contests/Toolkit/Template model to set up a contest, based on a successful contest which produced nearly 3000 articles in one month.
See also[edit]
- m:Learning and Evaluation/Evaluation reports/2013/On-wiki writing contests - an attempt to evaluate the impact of contests
- Wikipedia:Reward board