Commons:First steps

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Illustrating Wikimedia

A guide to contributing content to Wikimedia Commons

What is Wikimedia Commons?

With tens of millions of files, Wikimedia Commons is one of the largest online repositories of media files. Built from the works shared by thousands of volunteers, Commons hosts educational images, videos, and audio files that are used by Wikipedia and the other projects of the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation. All of the works on Commons are under a “free license.” That means they can be used and shared by anyone, for free, just by following the license rules – usually by giving credit to the author and preserving the license so that others can re-share the work as well.

The home page of Wikimedia Commons

Why contribute to Wikimedia Commons?

Imagine a world in which every single human being can freely share in the sum of all knowledge. Your contributions can be part of that. When you share your photos and other files on Commons and illustrate Wikipedia articles with them, your work might be viewed by thousands – even hundreds of thousands – of people all over the world. And you’re helping to build a common resource that reaches an even wider audience; media from Commons are used by educational websites, news media, bloggers, artists, filmmakers, students, teachers, and many others.

Ready to get started with

Wikimedia Commons?

Explore the project with our guided tutorial. Begin the tutorial