Tech billionaire Elon Musk on Monday announced the launch of Grokipedia, a new online encyclopedia powered by artificial intelligence and designed to reflect what he described as “more balanced” political perspectives compared to Wikipedia, which he has frequently criticized as left-leaning.
Musk said the platform was built using Grok, the AI chatbot developed by his company xAI, and framed the project as an effort to challenge what he sees as ideological bias in mainstream information sources.
The billionaire revealed last month that he began developing Grokipedia after a suggestion from David Sacks, a friend, tech investor, and current AI and crypto adviser in the Trump administration.
Musk has repeatedly accused Wikipedia of being “woke” and of depending on “biased” media outlets such as The New York Times and NPR for references.
In a post on X, Musk wrote that creating an AI-generated encyclopedia is “super important for civilization” and a step toward “understanding the Universe.” He claimed that Grokipedia will eventually serve as a more objective, data-driven alternative to the community-led Wikipedia.
Grokipedia’s operating model diverges sharply from Wikipedia’s open-editing system. While Wikipedia relies on millions of human volunteers to write and edit articles, Grokipedia states that its entries are “fact-checked” by Grok itself.
Users cannot directly modify pages but can submit correction suggestions through a pop-up form. Early reviews of the site note that many Grokipedia pages mirror Wikipedia’s content.
A disclaimer appearing on several entries, including one for the Nobel Prize in Physics, reads: “The content is adapted from Wikipedia, licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License.”
Some pages, such as the entry for Monday, appear identical to their Wikipedia counterparts. Musk has said he aims to stop using Wikipedia material entirely by the end of this year.
Despite similarities, there are notable editorial differences between the two platforms. Grokipedia’s entry on Donald Trump, for example, omits references to his acceptance of a luxury aircraft from Qatar and his endorsement of a Trump-branded cryptocurrency, both of which are covered in Wikipedia’s detailed “conflicts of interest” section.
Similarly, Grokipedia’s profile of Musk does not mention a hand gesture at a January rally that many historians viewed as resembling a Nazi salute, a topic covered extensively on Wikipedia.
The Wikimedia Foundation, which operates Wikipedia, said Monday that it is studying Grokipedia’s structure and methods. “Wikipedia’s knowledge is — and always will be — human,” the foundation said in a statement.
“Through open collaboration and consensus, people from all backgrounds build a neutral, living record of human understanding — one that reflects our diversity and collective curiosity.”
“This human-created knowledge is what AI companies rely on to generate content; even Grokipedia needs Wikipedia to exist.” The statement added that attempts to create rival encyclopedias “don’t interfere with our mission.”
Grokipedia’s debut sets up a confrontation between the world’s richest man and one of the most visited websites on the planet. According to data firm Similarweb, Wikipedia ranks ninth globally in web traffic, far surpassing traditional competitors such as Encyclopedia Britannica.
Founded in 2001 by Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger, Wikipedia has long symbolized the open-web ethos of free knowledge built through public collaboration. The site operates as a nonprofit, remains advertisement-free, and continues to be maintained largely by unpaid enthusiasts.
Sanger himself, however, has grown critical of Wikipedia over the years, arguing that anonymous editors and what he sees as liberal editorial slants undermine its credibility. He repeated those criticisms last month in an interview with conservative host Tucker Carlson, which David Sacks later reposted on X.
Neither Sacks nor the White House responded to requests for comment.
As of launch, Wikipedia lists about 7.1 million English-language articles, while Grokipedia offers roughly 885,000 entries. The new platform is currently labeled version 0.1, signaling that Musk and his team plan significant updates ahead.
