Baidu Baike vs Wikipedia
Baidu Baike
baike.baidu.comWikipedia
wikipedia.orgSide by side
| Figure | Baidu Baike | Wikipedia |
|---|---|---|
| Price from | Free | Free |
| Free plan | Yes | Yes |
| Free trial | — | — |
| Open source | — | Yes |
| Web | Yes | Yes |
| iOS | — | Yes |
| Android | — | Yes |
| API | — | Yes |
| Self-hosted | — | Yes |
| Plans published | 1 | 2 |
| Spec score · Online Encyclopedias | 8.3 (#5) | 8.3 (#6) |
| Founded | 2000 | 2001 |
| Headquarters | Beijing, China | San Francisco, California, USA |
| Purpose | 百度百科 describes its goal as building a Chinese knowledge platform covering many fields through a shared knowledge community. | Wikipedia describes itself as a free encyclopedia. |
| Support | The privacy policy directs users to Baidu's personal information feedback channel and says it generally replies within 15 working days. | The Android app listing provides the support email [email protected]. |
Plans
In their own words
Baidu Baike
Baidu Baike is a free web knowledge platform focused on Chinese-language information across many fields. Its homepage provides a search field for encyclopedia entries, recommended articles, and trending searches. Readers can also browse video and visual sections such as V百科, 图解百科, and 秒懂百科, along with museum entries in the 百科博物馆计划. Baidu describes the service as a wiki with expert-compiled content, columns, and videos for people seeking knowledge. Its examples of columns include the Encyclopedia of Intangible Cultural Heritage, Digital Museum, and Recorder of History.
Users can create entries and edit existing ones to correct or expand content. The guidance calls for concise, objective Chinese prose, structured with first- and second-level headings, and supported by reliable publicly published references. Submitted versions pass system filtering and may become current after basic checks. New entries should be proper names of public interest and must not duplicate an existing full name, abbreviation, or alias. Editing does not require payment, though submissions must comply with inclusion rules. Baidu was founded in 2000 and is headquartered in Beijing, China.
Wikipedia
Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia available on the web and through mobile apps, with editions in hundreds of languages, including editions with over one million articles. Volunteer editors create and revise content, check facts, cite sources, discuss entries, and moderate the encyclopedia. The Wikimedia Foundation hosts and protects Wikipedia, while editorial decisions are made by volunteers. The Foundation says the service is available without advertising or paywalls and is funded mainly by donations, not advertising, subscriptions, or sales of users’ personal data. The official Android app supports searching articles, changing languages, saving reading lists for offline use, and adjusting themes and text size. Its listing says the app has no ads, does not track or collect data, and encrypts data in transit. MediaWiki provides a REST API for interacting with installations including Wikipedia. The Foundation publishes a privacy policy, says it prioritizes speed, reliability, and availability during traffic spikes, and publishes transparency reports twice a year. Its financial statements are independently audited annually. Wikipedia is free at free.