Welcome to Wikipedia

,

the free encyclopedia that anyone can edit.

107,864 active editors
7,043,410 articles in English

From today's featured article

Dua Lipa

"Dance the Night" is a song by Dua Lipa (pictured) from the soundtrack to the 2023 fantasy comedy film Barbie. Lipa co-wrote the song with songwriter Caroline Ailin and its producers Andrew Wyatt and Mark Ronson. A disco, disco-pop, and synth-pop song with influences of dance-pop, it was inspired by a dance sequence in the film and is about always appearing perfect externally. Music critics overwhelmingly compared the sound of "Dance the Night" to Lipa's album Future Nostalgia (2020), which was viewed positively by some while others were disappointed. The song was nominated for the Grammy Awards for Song of the Year and Best Song Written for Visual Media. It reached number one in several countries, including the UK, and received multi-platinum certifications in others. The music video intersperses Lipa performing choreography with clips from a disco party in the film. The song was included as the primary musical motif in the film, and she performed it for the first time at the Royal Albert Hall in 2024. (Full article...)

Recently featured:

Did you know ...

Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat

... that Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat (pictured), Malaysia's first female chief justice, was dubbed "the only man in the Federal Court"?
... that Taylor Swift wrote a song that a critic considered to be a "piece of Ethel Kennedy fanfiction"?
... that Native American Ted Towendolly pioneered a fly-fishing technique that was independently reinvented in Europe fifty years later?
... that the Saskatchewan Highway Patrol once bought several firearms that it could not use?
... that cyclist Alexandra Yeung raced with one hand during the final 20 kilometres (12 miles) of a race in the Himalayas, and still finished in second place?
... that the Perth Panthers, a Scotland-based ice hockey team, were composed mainly of Americans and Canadians?
... that Undefeated's previous bassist was replaced by Lis Dunckel, who did not know how to play bass?
... that The Old Man and the Sea was one of Saddam Hussein's favourite books?
... that Baldwin, the first archbishop of Caesarea, allegedly confessed to faking a divine sign by carving a cross into his forehead?

In the news

Miguel Uribe Turbay

Colombian senator Miguel Uribe Turbay (pictured), a pre-candidate in the 2026 presidential election, dies two months after being shot.
Azerbaijan and Armenia sign a declaration to formalize a future peace treaty to end the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
American astronaut Jim Lovell, the commander of Apollo 13, dies at the age of 97.
A helicopter crash in the Ashanti Region, Ghana, kills eight people on board including ministers Edward Omane Boamah and Ibrahim Murtala Muhammed.

On this day

August 22: Madras Day in Chennai, India (1639)

America's Cup

1485 – At the Battle of Bosworth Field, Lancastrian forces under Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond, defeated Yorkist forces under Richard III of England, decisively ending the Wars of the Roses.
1711 – Queen Anne's War: A British attempt to attack Quebec failed when eight ships wrecked on the St. Lawrence River.
1851 – The yacht America won the race for the Cup of One Hundred Sovereigns (trophy pictured), later renamed the America's Cup, near the Isle of Wight, England.
1985 – A fire broke out on British Airtours Flight 28M at Manchester Airport, causing 55 deaths mostly due to smoke inhalation, and leading to changes to make aircraft evacuation more effective.
2003 – Roy Moore, Alabama's chief justice, was suspended after refusing to comply with a U.S. federal court order to remove a rock inscribed with the Ten Commandments from the lobby of the Supreme Court of Alabama building.

John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland (d. 1553)
George Herriman (b. 1880)
Kate Chopin (d. 1904)
Lautaro Martínez (b. 1997)

More anniversaries:

From today's featured list

Philip Seymour Hoffman

American actor, director, and producer Philip Seymour Hoffman's career on screen and stage spanned numerous films, television series and plays from 1991 to 2015. He made his screen debut on the police procedural Law & Order in 1991, and his film debut later in the same year by appearing in a minor role in Triple Bogey on a Par Five Hole. Hoffman followed this with supporting roles as a student in Scent of a Woman (1992), and a storm chaser in Twister (1996) before his breakthrough role as a gay boom operator in Paul Thomas Anderson's drama Boogie Nights (1997). Hoffman received the Academy Award for Best Actor, the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role, and the Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Motion Picture – Drama for his portrayal of writer Truman Capote in the 2005 biographical film Capote. In his New York Times obituary, he was described as "perhaps the most ambitious and widely admired American actor of his generation". (Full list...)

Recently featured:

Today's featured picture

Dua Lipa (born 22 August 1995) is a singer, songwriter and actress with British, Albanian and Kosovan nationalities. After a career as a model, she began a music career, signing with Warner Records in 2014. Her debut album, Dua Lipa (2017), peaked at number three on the UK Albums Chart and spawned the singles "Be the One", "IDGAF", and the UK number-one single "New Rules". Her second album, Future Nostalgia (2020), became her first UK number-one album and peaked in the top-three in the US. It contained singles "Don't Start Now" (another UK number one, which also ranked in the top five on the United States year-end chart of 2020), "Physical", "Break My Heart", and "Levitating". Lipa subsequently scored her third and fourth UK number-one singles with the 2021 Elton John duet "Cold Heart (Pnau remix)" and "Dance the Night" from Barbie the Album, the soundtrack of the film Barbie (2023), wherein she also made her acting debut. Her third studio album is Radical Optimism (2024), which again topped the UK Albums Chart and was preceded by the UK top-ten singles "Houdini", "Training Season", and "Illusion". Lipa's accolades include seven Brit Awards and three Grammy Awards. This photograph shows Lipa performing at the 2016 SWR3 New Pop Festival in Baden-Baden, Germany.

Photograph credit: Harald Krichel

Recently featured:

Other areas of Wikipedia

Community portal – The central hub for editors, with resources, links, tasks, and announcements.
Village pump – Forum for discussions about Wikipedia itself, including policies and technical issues.
Site news – Sources of news about Wikipedia and the broader Wikimedia movement.
Teahouse – Ask basic questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
Help desk – Ask questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
Reference desk – Ask research questions about encyclopedic topics.
Content portals – A unique way to navigate the encyclopedia.

Wikipedia's sister projects

Wikipedia is written by volunteer editors and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization that also hosts a range of other volunteer projects: