https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Home

Summary

As outlined in the Contributors Strategy, volunteers currently face a fragmented experience that provides limited guidance on how to navigate the many available contribution pathways and policies. Over time, both volunteers and Wikimedia Foundation teams have attempted to address this problem through dashboards and special pages, such as:

• The Newcomer Homepage (en)
• Special:PersonalDashboard
• Community-created dashboards and scripts
• Special:Contribute (en)

Active readers have also demonstrated interest in personalized experiences through products such as mobile feeds, the Android activity tab, and the annual Year in Review.

At the same time, internet users increasingly expect a central starting page on platforms where they consume content or contribute. Experiments with the Newcomer Homepage show that a centralized hub can significantly improve retention and constructive activation.
This Epic explores the creation of a unified personal homepage/dashboard that can support contributors across the journey from reader to experienced editor and moderator.

The homepage would function as the engine behind a contributor experience that supports:

• Discovering compelling opportunities to contribute
• Being equipped to act on those opportunities
• Having a rewarding experience where impact and next steps are clear
• Creating this cycle is critical to building long-term participation habits and improving contributor retention, especially given the decline in active editors across Wikimedia projects.

Because multiple use cases have emerged and experimentation requires flexible infrastructure, this Epic proposes establishing a new extensible architecture that supports homepage experimentation and modular dashboards across different contributor roles.

Objective: Deepen Engagement 1

We increase the number of retained editors by 30% by delivering a structured, progression-driven, and more meaningful mobile-first editor experience. This is a milestone on our way to doubling retained editors within two years.

Key Result: Deepen Engagement 1.3

By the end of Q2, achieve an x% increase in second-week retention for editors who are presented with interventions focused on editor progression through controlled experiments, compared to editors in the control group.

Context
This work advances a unified personal dashboard that supports the full journey from reader to contributor to moderator.
The initiative will:

• Integrate the Newcomer Homepage and the Personal Dashboard MVP into a cohesive experience
• Introduce a clear progression system that helps contributors advance beyond their first edits
• Strengthen onboarding pathways for moderation and cleanup work
• Help interested contributors take on more responsibility while reducing patrolling backlogs over time

Benefits

A centralized homepage or personal dashboard allows the platform to connect the dots for volunteers in ways that are currently difficult.
Key benefits include:

• Modular experiences that can be customized by wikis and individuals
• Personalized recommendations for impactful contributions
• Clear visibility of impact so contributors understand the value of their work
• Recognition and milestone experiences that celebrate progress
• A consistent entry point for discovering opportunities and returning to continue contributing

This approach can benefit multiple audiences:

• Readers who want deeper engagement with content
• New contributors learning how to participate
• Experienced editors seeking meaningful work
• Moderators managing community workflows

Use Cases

Reader experience

As a reader, I can engage with Wikipedia in a personalized way that helps me curate content and discover opportunities to contribute.
'''Supporting context'''

Language and localization contributors

As a translator, I can seamlessly integrate translation work with other types of contributions while understanding my overall impact.

New contributors

As a newcomer, I receive guided steps that help me:

• Learn how to contribute
• Find help when needed
• Understand the impact of my edits

Experienced editors

As an experienced editor, I can easily identify high-impact opportunities to contribute and track my contributions and impact.

Moderators and patrollers

As a moderator, I have access to a customizable dashboard that:

• Reduces fragmentation across moderation tools
• Makes moderation workflows easier to navigate
• Supports skill development
• Helps reduce community moderation backlog