Wikipedia bots
internet bots that perform tasks in Wikipedia
Wikipedia bots are Internet bots (computer programs) that perform simple, repetitive tasks on Wikipedia.
The first bot appeared in 2002.
Bots on Wikipedia must be approved before activation and adhere to a Bot Policy.
Activities
Computer programs, called bots, have often been used to automate simple and repetitive tasks, such as correcting common misspellings and stylistic issues, or to start articles, such as geography entries, in a standard format from statistical data. Additionally, there are bots designed to automatically notify editors when they make common editing errors (such as unmatched quotes or unmatched parentheses).
One prominent example of an internet bot used in Wikipedia is Lsjbot, which had created one million short 'barebones' articles across various language editions of Wikipedia by 2013. Bots have been most likely to tackle technical topics like space objects and chemical elements. According to Andrew Lih, the current expansion of Wikipedia to millions of articles would be difficult to envision without the use of such bots. The Cebuano, Swedish and Waray Wikipedias are known to have high numbers of bot-created content.
One notable development leading up to 2015 has been the use of bots to perform vandalism-fighting chores in place of human labor.
The public source identifies “Wikipedia bots” as internet bots that perform tasks in Wikipedia. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Wikipedia, bots and internet.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Wikipedia bots”, the useful work is to connect “internet bots that perform tasks in Wikipedia” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q85815517. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2002, 2013 and 2015.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Wikipedia bots”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Wikipedia bots primary sources, Wikipedia bots archive and Wikipedia research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Wikipedia bots” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.