Products · Product
Wikipedia
Raised as a usability problem by 346 people on Hacker News over 19 years (2008–2026), in 198 threads.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
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Every issue, all time, most people first
Overly long text lines are hard to read at full window widthUnreviewed
20082026- Unbounded wide page width makes paragraphs too long to read comfortably2024-10-27
- Text is too small to read on mobile unless zoomed, causing eye strain2023-01-29
- Redesign looks bad at medium browser widths, wasting space2023-01-20
Language selector sits far up the page, adding scrolling and clicksUnreviewed
20082026- Available article languages are hidden behind a dropdown, requiring clicks and scrolling to see them2023-03-19
- Language selector moved far up the page, requiring extra scrolling and clicks to switch languages2023-03-19
- Language links now take an extra click to find after the redesign2023-01-28
First-time editors struggle to understand Wikipedia's processUnreviewed
20082026- Wikipedia's own search is worse at finding the right page than Google2023-08-06
- Hard to fix mistakes on Wikipedia, sometimes impossible2022-07-27
- Crafts communities find Wikipedia's contribution process frustrating and a waste of time2020-05-26
Previews pop up when scrolling moves a link under the cursorUnreviewed
20082026- Hover previews pop up by accident and interrupt the page the reader is on2024-12-07
- Preview pops up when the page scrolls under a stationary cursor, without the user moving it2024-12-07
- Hover previews pop up while moving the mouse and cause accidental clicks into links2024-12-07
Preview popups cover the text the reader is trying to readUnreviewed
20082026- Preview popups randomly appear and cover the text being read2024-12-07
- Preview popups keep appearing over the text the reader is trying to read2021-05-24
- Popup appears when opening links with Vimium and obstructs the text2020-09-24
Markup and templates are hard to learn, so casual editors struggleUnreviewed
20082026- Wiki markup editing is slow and clunky compared with the visual editor2019-12-04
- Editors must write a nasty quasi-markdown markup instead of simple HTML2018-07-24
- Wiki markup is confusing and terrible for contributors to use2018-01-19
Desktop users clicking links get the mobile site without redirectUnreviewed
20082026- Desktop users sent mobile links can't easily switch back to the full site2023-05-29
- Desktop Wikipedia is cluttered and hard to read, so users redirect to mobile2023-01-19
- Opening desktop Wikipedia URLs on mobile forces a redirect to the mobile site2022-04-19
Editing is hard, and community culture resists changesUnreviewed
20082026- Editing feels daunting, as if the commander is intruding on a closed editor clique2023-03-18
- Editing is very hard, and the community culture makes it difficult to change anything2016-05-23
- Good-faith corrections are an uphill battle because the editing system is bureaucratic and hard to navigate2015-01-25
Text is so large an article barely fits on one pageUnreviewed
20082026- Article text stays narrow, forcing users to hunt CSS to widen it2023-01-21
- Wide empty margins force excessive scrolling to read articles2022-08-04
- Text is so large that an article barely fits on one page2020-09-24
Collapsed sections hinder searching, oversized headings hinder browsingUnreviewed
20082026- Text search skips collapsed sections and there is no way to expand all at once2023-05-30
- Collapsed sections make it hard to share a section or find text on a page2021-08-25
- Collapsed sections hinder searching and oversized headings hinder browsing, giving little overview2020-09-23
Mobile layout wastes wide screen space and forces excessive scrollingUnreviewed
20082026- Desktop layout feels like a mobile page, putting off logged-out visitors2025-04-26
- Mobile layout is annoying in multiple ways for a large-screen user2023-01-18
- Mobile-style design wastes space, so less content fits on screen2021-12-06
Anchor links are stripped on redirect, landing at article topUnreviewed
20082026- Links jump to page anchors that no longer exist, leaving the reader stranded2026-01-17
- Links from one article redirect back to the same article, so the linked page can't be reached2022-07-27
- Going back from a link collapses the section and loses the reader's place on the page2020-05-10
Tables extend off-screen with no way to scroll themUnreviewed
20082026- Nested tables don't render well on mobile, so they are hidden2019-08-25
- Tables are low-density and most content is hidden by default, forcing scrolling and desktop switching2016-04-11
- Table runs off the right edge, so its content can't be seen on tablet2015-02-04
Scrolling zooms the graph instead of the page, requiring UI togglingUnreviewed
20082026- Scrolling zooms instead of moving the page, and pinch only zooms the page, so controls are confusing2026-07-18
- View jumps and zooms out after every click, disorienting the user2024-02-09
- Map zooms in on every click, disrupting exploration and feeling unintuitive2024-02-07
Less content visible and more clicking to reach drop-down menusUnreviewed
20082026- Navigating and scrolling is now slow, taking a second where it was instant before2023-01-19
- Less content visible without scrolling and more clicking to reach drop-down menus, slowing information finding2022-09-28
- Clicking section buttons triggers slow animations and fixed elements, making it hard to reach content2012-10-05
Scale indicator only shows while zooming, forcing repeated zoom back and forthUnreviewed
20082026- Hard to tell zoom level because map doesn't reload with zoom2024-02-08
- Scale indicator only appears while zooming, so users must zoom back and forth to see it2019-12-11
- Zoom is disabled and pictures are shrunk, so details can't be seen2015-10-14
Search box becomes unusable when the window is narrowUnreviewed
20082026- Search box is less convenient without styles2022-02-25
- Search box becomes unusable as the window gets narrow2021-12-06
- Search button looks unappealing and font size cannot be decreased2010-02-04
Fast typing and quick Enter press yields truncated or blank searchUnreviewed
20082026- Ctrl+Shift+F jumps to search on desktop but on mobile it doesn't let you type2014-07-24
- Pressing Enter does nothing; search only works by picking an autocomplete dropdown option2012-07-18
- Typing fast and pressing enter quickly yields a truncated or blank search2010-05-13
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Relies on device location, which is inaccurate at home, with no way to enter a place manually2026-10-23
- Can't find any way to share a link to a particular location2026-10-23
- Scrolling zooms instead of moving the page, and pinch only zooms the page, so controls are confusing2026-07-18
- Impossible to find what you need in this GUI2026-05-15
- Items look unclickable; grey text on dark background makes links hard to see2026-02-02
- Long load at startup, and reloading after leaving repeats the whole download2026-02-02
- Unwanted sidebars shown by default; some discussion pages can't be edited2026-01-19
- Links jump to page anchors that no longer exist, leaving the reader stranded2026-01-17
- New UI is more annoying to use after sudden redesign2026-01-15
- New UI is annoying and clumsy for power users2026-01-15
- Deletion review process is so complicated that users would rather rewrite articles2025-12-24
- Links to highlighted text inside collapsed sections don't scroll to the content on mobile2025-11-25
- Auto dark mode option exists but is not the default setting2025-11-23
- Donation banners cover the main page and require lots of scrolling to get past2025-10-28
- Full-screen and delayed popups repeatedly interrupt reading, every few days on every device2025-07-13
- Default light theme ignores the OS setting, forcing users to click extra to switch2025-06-02
- The link to keep the page in English is increasingly hidden, so users struggle to get the English version2025-05-26
- Greek and Czech speakers can't find their language where they expect it2025-05-19
- Dumps site is confusing to navigate at first2025-05-02
- Unclear which dump files are needed; dumps are hard to load and incomplete2025-05-02
- Desktop layout feels like a mobile page, putting off logged-out visitors2025-04-26
- Editing syntax is so complex it takes forever to fix simple details2025-04-26
- Automatic theme option exists but default is light, confusing users2025-03-16
- Hover previews pop up by accident and interrupt the page the reader is on2024-12-07
- Preview pops up when the page scrolls under a stationary cursor, without the user moving it2024-12-07
- Hover previews pop up while moving the mouse and cause accidental clicks into links2024-12-07
- Preview popups randomly appear and cover the text being read2024-12-07
- Unbounded wide page width makes paragraphs too long to read comfortably2024-10-27
- A modal appears every time a page is opened, interrupting reading2024-07-14
- Dumps are raw page markup needing extra tables and local wiki software to use2024-05-22
- Icon on the "51 more" button is unclear, so users can't tell it expands the language list2024-05-05
- View jumps and zooms out after every click, disorienting the user2024-02-09
- Hard to tell zoom level because map doesn't reload with zoom2024-02-08
- Map clustering, zooming and labels are clunky, and tapping places opens a new page2024-02-08
- Must open pin, wait for modal, scroll, then click to reach Wikipedia page2024-02-07
- Map zooms in on every click, disrupting exploration and feeling unintuitive2024-02-07
- Editing pages is extremely hard, especially on non-English editions2024-02-03
- Animations are distracting while reading, and no easy way to pause them2023-12-27
- Error says a page doesn't exist even though it clearly does, confusing the user2023-12-21
- Table of contents hidden in a hamburger dropdown, harder to reach2023-11-15
- Banner is annoying and lazy-loading shifts the page layout2023-11-08
- Table of contents hidden behind a hamburger button and blocking popout on mobile2023-10-26
- Can't find a navigable way to sign up when IP range is blocked2023-09-14
- Wikipedia's redesign made mobile browsing worse than before2023-09-07
- Wikipedia's own search is worse at finding the right page than Google2023-08-06
- Page layout is confusing, making the referenced paper hard to locate2023-07-17
- Scroll position is lost on reload because collapsed sections reset to closed2023-05-30
- Text search skips collapsed sections and there is no way to expand all at once2023-05-30
- Desktop users sent mobile links can't easily switch back to the full site2023-05-29
- Hard to notice the option to switch to the desktop version2023-05-29