Simple English Wikipedia
Same Wikipedia domain. Lighter gate. Value for AI and search.
Simple English Wikipedia is a full Wikimedia project written in plain English. It sits on the same wikipedia.org domain, feeds the same Knowledge Graph, and lives in the same corpus ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini read — but its community is far smaller, so it's often the realistic route when the main English edition would push back.
What you get
Simple English Wikipedia
Simple English Wikipedia (simple.wikipedia.org) shares the Wikipedia engine, domain authority and Knowledge-Graph signals — with a much smaller community and lighter editorial enforcement than the main English Wikipedia (the official policies are the same). A realistic route to a Wikipedia-shaped presence for brands the main edition would push back on.
- Same .wikipedia.org domain authority — feeds Google KP and LLMs
- Same official policies, lighter enforcement (a far smaller community)
- Often a viable alternative when EnWiki recovery is unrealistic
- Cross-links naturally with main Wiki / Wikidata for compound visibility
Starting price
€1,220 (company) · €1,000 (personal)
Typical timeline
3-4 weeks
Best for
- · Brands that lost or won't pass main-EnWiki notability review
- · Faster Knowledge-Graph footprint
- · Multi-edition strategies
Our services
What we manage on Simple English Wikipedia
We handle the full lifecycle of a Simple English Wikipedia presence — from first draft to long-term monitoring — with the same compliance discipline as a main English page.
Article Adaptation & Simplification
We take your existing English Wikipedia article and rewrite it to Simple English vocabulary and grammar rules, keeping the facts intact and the sourcing verifiable.
New Page Creation
Notable but without a Simple English page yet? We research, draft and submit a new article from scratch, built to the Simple English style guide from day one.
Translation Monitoring
We track your main English page for material updates and port the key facts over to the Simple English article, so the two never drift out of sync.
Compliance & Notability Check
We check your subject against notability (WP:N) and confirm the article meets Simple English's own style rules (WP:SIMPLE) before submission — not after a rejection.
Inter-Wiki Linking
We connect the new Simple English article to your main English Wikipedia page and, where they exist, other language versions — strengthening the whole wiki-network around your entity.
Page Monitoring & Vandalism Protection
Simple English pages get vandalised and drift factually just like the main edition. We monitor and revert continuously, so the page stays accurate.
What it actually is
An encyclopedia written for the widest readership
Simple English Wikipedia uses about 1,500 common words and short sentences — built for non-native speakers, students and anyone skimming for facts. Same foundation and software as English Wikipedia; its own, much smaller community.
- 282,000+
- Articles on simple.wikipedia.org
- ~1,500
- Core Basic-English words it's written in
- Since 2001
- A full Wikimedia Foundation project
- ~3,900
- Active editors (vs ~40,000 on English)
The honest difference
Main English Wikipedia vs Simple English Wikipedia
Differences that matter for AI visibility, search and editorial risk.
| Dimension | Main English Wikipedia | Simple English Wikipedia |
|---|---|---|
| Domain | en.wikipedia.org | simple.wikipedia.org |
| Domain Rating (Ahrefs, approx.) | ~96 | Shares the wikipedia.org domain (~97) |
| Language | Full English | ~1,500-word Basic English, short sentences |
| Article count | ~7,000,000 | ~282,000 |
| Notability policy | Significant independent coverage required | Same policy on paper |
| Editorial enforcement | Heavy — New Page Patrol, many reviewers | Lighter — far smaller community (22 admins) |
| New-page search indexing | noindex until patrolled (up to 90 days) | No equivalent patrol gate — can surface sooner |
| Feeds Google Knowledge Graph | Yes (via Wikipedia + Wikidata) | Yes (via the shared Wikidata entity) |
| In the corpus AI reads | Yes — #2 most-cited domain in AI answers | Same corpus; plain style fits AI extraction |
| External links | nofollow | nofollow |
| Our time to publish | 3–4 weeks | 3–4 weeks |
| Price — company | €1,930 | €1,220 |
| Price — personal | €1,300 | €1,000 |
Domain Rating is an approximate, dynamic Ahrefs backlink metric (≈DR 96–97 for the wikipedia.org domain, early 2026); there is no separate published DR for the Simple subdomain, which shares the domain's profile. All Wikipedia external links are nofollow — value comes from trust, entity signals and referral, not link equity.
For AI answer engines
Why this matters for ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini
AI doesn't read your website to answer questions about you — it reads a small set of trusted sources. Wikipedia is one of the most-read of all, and Simple English is part of that corpus, in the style models extract best.
It's in the data AI is built on
Wikipedia is oversampled in AI training — about 3% of GPT-3's weighted dataset despite being a sliver of the web — and across 100M+ analysed AI citations it's the #2 most-cited domain. Simple English is part of that same Wikimedia corpus.
Written in the style AI rewards
Research on AI visibility (the GEO study, KDD 2024) found that quotations (+43.8%), statistics (+34.2%) and cited sources (+29.0%) lift how often a brand is cited by AI — while keyword-stuffed prose hurt. Plain, declarative, citation-backed sentences are exactly what Simple English is built from.
A clean entity for machines to read
A Simple article linked to a language-neutral Wikidata item gives ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini a tidy, machine-readable fact record to corroborate — name, founding, leadership, sector — instead of guessing from scattered marketing pages.
See the bigger picture on AI visibility and why Wikipedia matters in the AI era.
For Google & search
Why this matters for search visibility
The authority that helps with AI also works in classic search — with one honest limit on how the value flows.
Borrowed authority, real visibility
simple.wikipedia.org sits on wikipedia.org — one of the web's most authoritative domains (Ahrefs ≈ DR 96–97). A well-built article ranks for your brand and long-tail queries and holds page-one positions without ad spend.
It can surface faster than a new English page
English Wikipedia keeps new articles noindex until a patroller reviews them — up to 90 days. Simple English has no equivalent patrol gate, so a new Simple page can become searchable sooner. (This is an editorial gate on English, not a Google speed difference.)
Feeds the Knowledge Panel
Google's Knowledge Graph is built largely on Wikipedia + Wikidata. With no Wikipedia or Wikidata entry there's often no entity box at all; a Simple page plus a Wikidata item is a legitimate way to establish one.
A Simple page pairs naturally with a Wikidata entity and the main English Wikipedia page for a compounding footprint.
Beyond a single article
A Simple page doesn't exist in a vacuum
It's an inter-wiki link, not a standalone asset — and that link carries signal.
How a Simple page adds value
Creating a Simple English version gives your entity a crucial inter-wiki link. It signals to search engines and to Wikidata that the topic is significant across different language-understanding levels, not just in one edition. It also functions as an educational resource in its own right — often cited by schools and language programs — which builds organic authority independent of your main article.
Crisis clarity
An unmanaged page is read during a crisis too
When a subject becomes urgent news, its Simple English page gets read alongside the main one — often by exactly the audience least equipped to parse a messy edit history.
Rapid, ethical and simple response
We monitor the page and make sure any new information is added simply, neutrally, and backed by reliable sources — the same editorial standard as the main edition, just in plain language. That keeps a stable, factual narrative available in easy-to-understand terms while a situation is still moving.
Ethical & transparent process
How we work with the Simple English Wikipedia community
Success here needs the same respect for editorial process as the main edition — just applied to a smaller, tighter-knit community.
Strategy & Notability Audit
We start with your goals and a thorough audit of your existing media coverage, to confirm you meet the core notability (WP:N) guidelines before we write a word.
The honest version
What Simple English Wikipedia is not
We're paid to tell you the truth — including the parts the rest of the market over-promises.
- It is not a backlink tactic. Every Wikipedia external link is nofollow — the value is editorial trust, referral traffic and entity recognition, not link equity.
- It is not a loophole for low-quality pages. The official policies are the same as English Wikipedia; pages still face deletion review. Enforcement is lighter, not absent.
- We don't claim AI "prefers" the Simple edition — there's no public evidence of that. The honest case is that it's in the corpus AI reads, written the way AI extracts cleanly.
- A Google Knowledge Panel is never guaranteed — Google's systems decide. A Simple page + Wikidata materially raises the probability.
Frequently asked questions
Simple English Wikipedia — what people ask
Simple English Wikipedia — what people ask
Is Simple English Wikipedia a real Wikipedia, or a workaround?
Does Simple English Wikipedia have the same notability rules as English Wikipedia?
How much does a Simple English Wikipedia page cost, and how long does it take?
Does Simple English Wikipedia feed Google's Knowledge Graph?
Will AI answer engines like ChatGPT or Gemini cite Simple English Wikipedia?
Can a Simple English page replace an English Wikipedia page?
Why not just run our English article through Google Translate into Simple English?
We already have an English Wikipedia page — why add a Simple English one too?
What is Simple English Wikipedia actually for?
Sources
Every claim on this page is checkable
- Simple English Wikipedia — articles, users, vocabulary
- Simple English Wikipedia — Notability policy
- Wikipedia — controlling search-engine indexing (noindex / 90-day patrol)
- Wikimedia — nofollow on external links
- Aggarwal et al., GEO: Generative Engine Optimization (KDD 2024)
- Semrush — most-cited domains in AI answers (Wikipedia #2)
- Google Knowledge Graph
Where to next
Pages readers open after this one
Wikidata & Knowledge Graph
The machine-readable layer that pairs with every edition.
Full pricing
Simple English from €1,000 (personal) / €1,220 (company).
Multilingual strategy
Which language edition to build first, and why.
Multilingual Wikipedia & Wikidata
One unified Wikidata entity, per-edition notability, market-led choices.
Wikipedia semantic SEO authority
How encyclopedic entities feed your domain's entity SEO.
Smart Wikipedia SEO Tactics
The full link-earning playbook — no red flags, real gains.
Not sure which edition fits? Send us your brand brief.
We assess notability against both main and Simple English standards in about 24 hours. If neither fits yet, we'll say so — and recommend a path that does. No obligation.