BASTROP, Texas: Elon Musk has launched Grokipedia, a new online encyclopedia that he says will compete with Wikipedia.
Musk announced on social media that Grokipedia.com is now live, saying its goal is “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.” He has often criticized Wikipedia, calling it full of “propaganda,” and urged people not to donate to it. In September, Musk revealed that his AI company, xAI, was developing Grokipedia.
The Grokipedia website looks very simple, showing mainly a search bar for users to type questions. It claims to have 885,279 articles, while Wikipedia has over seven million in English. Like Wikipedia, users can search for information on topics such as Taylor Swift, the World Series, or Buckingham Palace.
However, it’s not clear how Grokipedia’s articles are written. Reports say it uses the same xAI model that powers Musk’s Grok chatbot, and that some content may have been adapted from Wikipedia.
The Wikimedia Foundation, which runs Wikipedia, said it is still trying to understand how Grokipedia works. The foundation also noted that Wikipedia’s content has been used to train AI chatbots, including ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and even Grok.
“Even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist,” the foundation said, adding that human-created knowledge is essential for AI systems.
Wikipedia has recently been criticized by some U.S. Republican lawmakers, who launched an investigation in August into alleged political bias in its editing process.
Wikipedia relies on thousands of volunteer editors and strict citation rules — almost every statement must have a reliable source, or it can be removed. By comparison, many Grokipedia pages have far fewer references. For example, its article on the Chola Dynasty of southern India lists just three sources, while Wikipedia’s version includes over 100 references and dozens of books.
Grokipedia’s page about Wikipedia claims that the site has “systemic ideological biases,” especially in favor of left-leaning political views.
In response, the Wikimedia Foundation said, “Unlike newer projects, Wikipedia’s strengths are clear — it has transparent rules, careful volunteer oversight, and a strong tradition of improvement. Wikipedia is written to inform billions of readers without promoting any particular point of view.”