In the digital age, preserving humanity’s written heritage is one of the most ambitious collaborative projects ever undertaken. While Wikipedia is household-name status, its sister project – Wikisource – is an unsung hero. Operating as a free, crowdsourced digital library of public domain and freely licensed source texts, Wikisource has quietly grown into a massive repository of human knowledge.

Launched in November 2003 (originally under the project name Sourceberg), Wikisource was created to host primary source texts. Unlike Wikipedia, which contains articles about historical events or books, Wikisource contains the actual texts themselves—novels, letters, speeches, legal documents, and historical archives. A recently published video shows how the number of text units changed across different language editions of Wikisource between 2003 and 2026. The development of the Polish-language edition of the project is particularly interesting.

Watch the full video:

What this visualization ultimately shows is not just numbers on a chart, but the power of crowdsourced labor. Behind every bar that rises, there are hundreds of volunteer proofreaders, archivists, and translators spending their free time formatting, scanning, and verifying texts line-by-line.

Whether it’s an ancient Sanskrit manuscript, a 19th-century French play, or a modern open-license document, Wikisource ensures that human knowledge remains free, digitized, and accessible to everyone, everywhere.

You can also check current number of Wikisource text units in various language versions: meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikisource

Milestones: 1K, 2K, 5K, 10K, 20K, 50K, 100K, 200K, 500K, 1M.

1K Wikisource Text Units

May 2004English
January 2005French
March 2005Romanian
June 2005Spanish
September 2005German
October 2005Sanskrit
November 2005Latin, Polish
December 2005Chinese, Croatian, Hebrew, Italian
February 2006Turkish
April 2006Russian
May 2006Portuguese
June 2006Arabic
July 2006Serbian, Swedish, Thai
August 2006Japanese, Multilingual
September 2006Finnish
December 2006Bosnian, Czech
January 2007Dutch
February 2007Greek
July 2007Icelandic, Telugu, Ukrainian
August 2007Catalan
January 2008Hungarian, Malayalam
May 2008Korean
June 2008Persian
August 2008Venetian
October 2008Armenian, Slovenian
November 2008Bangla, Indonesian
February 2009Limburgish
July 2009Azerbaijani, Yiddish
September 2009Vietnamese
April 2010Macedonian, Norwegian
July 2010Tamil
September 2010Danish
December 2010Breton
April 2011Esperanto
May 2012Belarusian
September 2012Gujarati
September 2013Estonian
October 2015Assamese
January 2016Bulgarian
October 2016Marathi
July 2017Kannada
June 2018Piedmontese
August 2019Neapolitan
December 2019Hindi
April 2020Lithuanian
August 2020Ligurian
December 2020Basque
March 2021Walloon
June 2021Odia
August 2021Balinese, Punjabi
October 2021Javanese, Welsh
October 2024Burmese
February 2025Georgian
June 2025Malay
November 2025Minangkabau
March 2026Urdu

2K Wikisource Text Units

October 2004English
March 2005French
October 2005Romanian, Spanish
January 2006Croatian
February 2006Chinese, German, Italian
March 2006Polish
May 2006Turkish
June 2006Portuguese, Russian
August 2006Multilingual
October 2006Thai
December 2006Finnish
January 2007Swedish
May 2007Czech
June 2007Hebrew
July 2007Arabic, Dutch, Latin, Serbian, Telugu
February 2008Hungarian
July 2008Persian
October 2008Japanese
February 2009Slovenian
March 2009Ukrainian
April 2009Greek, Limburgish
July 2009Korean
August 2009Malayalam
November 2009Yiddish
December 2009Vietnamese
April 2010Bangla
December 2010Azerbaijani, Breton
March 2011Macedonian
May 2011Sanskrit
September 2011Armenian
October 2011Catalan
May 2012Norwegian, Venetian
October 2012Esperanto
January 2013Gujarati
February 2013Tamil
April 2013Icelandic
September 2013Belarusian, Indonesian
June 2016Danish
December 2016Estonian
May 2017Bulgarian
September 2017Kannada
August 2018Piedmontese
August 2019Neapolitan
June 2020Marathi
August 2020Assamese, Hindi, Ligurian
August 2021Balinese
February 2022Welsh
March 2023Javanese
July 2023Walloon
October 2024Burmese
February 2025Georgian
April 2025Punjabi
November 2025Minangkabau
March 2026Urdu

5K Wikisource Text Units

March 2005English
January 2006French
February 2006Spanish
June 2006Chinese, Polish
September 2006Croatian, German
November 2006Portuguese
February 2007Italian
March 2007Romanian, Russian
July 2007Multilingual, Thai
September 2007Telugu
May 2008Hebrew
July 2008Czech, Persian
September 2008Hungarian
January 2009Arabic, Finnish
August 2010Bangla
November 2010Swedish
February 2011Vietnamese
March 2011Korean
April 2011Dutch
June 2011Slovenian
July 2011Turkish
February 2012Greek, Sanskrit
March 2012Catalan
July 2012Serbian
January 2013Norwegian
March 2013Armenian
January 2014Malayalam
November 2015Japanese
December 2015Gujarati
May 2016Ukrainian
June 2016Tamil
August 2016Azerbaijani
September 2016Breton
December 2017Kannada
December 2018Latin
August 2019Neapolitan
July 2020Esperanto
November 2021Hindi
December 2021Belarusian
May 2022Indonesian
October 2023Venetian, Welsh
September 2024Balinese
December 2024Marathi
February 2025Georgian
March 2026Urdu

10K Wikisource Text Units

September 2005English
March 2006French
April 2006Spanish
February 2007Portuguese
March 2007Chinese
June 2007German
July 2007Italian, Thai
September 2007Russian
December 2007Polish
July 2008Persian
February 2009Hungarian
March 2009Arabic
May 2009Hebrew
September 2009Czech, Multilingual
February 2012Swedish
May 2012Catalan
August 2012Korean
August 2013Slovenian
January 2014Malayalam
January 2015Romanian, Telugu
May 2016Bangla, Gujarati
July 2016Serbian
October 2016Sanskrit
May 2017Finnish
July 2017Greek
December 2017Ukrainian
January 2019Armenian
February 2019Vietnamese
March 2019Japanese
August 2019Neapolitan
February 2020Tamil
December 2020Turkish
September 2021Latin
March 2022Dutch
December 2022Belarusian
June 2023Azerbaijani
December 2024Welsh
March 2025Breton
September 2025Norwegian
March 2026Urdu
May 2026Esperanto, Indonesian

20K Wikisource Text Units

April 2006English
November 2006French
March 2007Spanish
July 2007German
October 2007Chinese
October 2008Portuguese
December 2008Russian
January 2009Italian
May 2009Hebrew
January 2010Arabic
September 2011Persian
December 2011Polish
May 2012Hungarian, Swedish
April 2013Catalan
June 2013Czech
January 2015Multilingual
February 2019Gujarati
January 2020Ukrainian
May 2020Serbian
October 2021Korean
December 2021Malayalam
May 2022Bangla
November 2022Tamil
January 2024Belarusian
July 2024Sanskrit
October 2024Telugu
January 2025Armenian
January 2026Dutch, Latin

50K Wikisource Text Units

March 2007English
March 2009Portuguese
April 2009French
September 2009Chinese, Russian
September 2010German
May 2011Italian
December 2011Spanish
May 2012Hebrew, Polish
September 2012Swedish
November 2014Arabic
August 2020Ukrainian
March 2021Czech
November 2022Multilingual
December 2022Gujarati

100K Wikisource Text Units

February 2008English
April 2010Chinese
August 2010Russian
November 2011French
May 2012German, Italian
November 2012Polish
September 2013Hebrew
February 2015Spanish
October 2022Ukrainian

200K Wikisource Text Units

March 2011English
February 2012French
April 2012Russian
May 2012German
May 2016Polish
May 2017Chinese
July 2021Hebrew
January 2024Ukrainian
July 2024Italian

500K Wikisource Text Units

May 2012English, French
February 2017Polish
April 2019Russian
December 2021German
April 2026Chinese

1M Wikisource Text Units

May 2012French
November 2013English
May 2022Polish
May 2026Chinese