Migration from Miraheze

On June 15, 2023, Miraheze announced it would "not be in their best interest to continue long-term operations". On June 19, they announced they are "not shutting down after all".

Despite the good news, we continue to welcome any Miraheze wikis who wish to move to MyWikis. Please read the following information about how to migrate from Miraheze to MyWikis.

Health and stability of MyWikis

We wish to reassure anyone wishing to move their wiki to MyWikis that you will be joining a platform proven to work reliably and consistently since February 22, 2012.

Our financial state is extremely sound. We have been profitable for nearly 10 years, continuously, and we paid off our last debts in late 2013. We have several staff members who are paid to provide technical support and develop our platform. In a worst-case scenario, we have enough cash reserves to run MyWikis in "keep the lights on" mode without any additional revenue for at least the next 10 years. We also sponsor open source initiatives, both financially and through code contributions, to improve the MediaWiki ecosystem for companies, institutions, government agencies, and organizations hosting their own instances of MediaWiki, such as Canasta.

Comparing MyWikis and Miraheze

Why choose MyWikis over Miraheze?

• We've been around much longer. Miraheze was founded in 2015, while we were founded in 2012. We began turning a profit in late 2013, and have been profitable every month since.
• We're run by professionals. Miraheze is ran by unpaid volunteers from their community. The community also governs itself, creating a complicated set of rules and restrictions. MyWikis is a registered company whose focus is to provide you with the best quality support, not to make decisions about what you can and can't do. Our software engineers have degrees in computer science from the top computer science universities in the world. We also pay all of our employees a fair market wage.
• We run on consistent revenue streams. While Miraheze has to hope every year that donations will cover all of their operating expenses, and has very few assets, MyWikis has consistent annual revenues—magnitudes larger than that of Miraheze, a healthy balance sheet, and capable of sustaining continued, carefully-planned investment in infrastructure improvements and professional software development.
• We have more resources than them. Miraheze admits to struggles with expanding their infrastructure due to budget constraints. For instance, they have publicly stated they can't install CirrusSearch due to the cost. These concerns simply don't exist at MyWikis, where not only can we pay for our server bills, we're able to make investments for the future.
• We have fewer restrictions. Miraheze places a large list of restrictions, often hidden to the wiki owner until they do more research and realize they can't run their wiki the way they want to. At MyWikis, we try to avoid restrictions whenever possible, and always try to find you better alternatives or work to make it work when we find out something won't work.
• We create your wiki instantly. Miraheze requires wikis to be approved before they are created. This means not only do you not get immediate access to your wiki, your wiki might also never be created, and is at the mercy of community-appointed volunteers.

To sum it up in one word, MyWikis is stable.

How to move to MyWikis immediately

You can request an XML dump from Miraheze. They have committed to making image dumps available too if you contact a steward via their Discord (because they say the Phabricator requests backlog is very long). Once you have done so, you can sign up for the appropriate personal use plan at https://www.mywikis.com/createawiki. Once your wiki is created, you can follow the steps on the Migrate to MyWikis page.

We support MediaWiki 1.35 and 1.39. Wikis are currently created on MediaWiki 1.35 for maximum compatibility purposes, but you can request an upgrade to MediaWiki 1.39 via the Client Panel once your wiki is created.

Not all extensions used on Miraheze are currently available on MyWikis. We are working on making as many of them available as possible.

MyWikis Self Service is our in-house equivalent of Miraheze's ManageWiki interface. It is currently available for wikis running on MediaWiki 1.35. We are currently working on making it available to wikis running on MediaWiki 1.39.

MyWikis offers standard migration for free as part of your plan. We aim to waive migration fees for larger wikis whenever possible. However, if it takes our staff a significantly longer time to import your wiki, we will inform you whether a migration fee is required.

If you cannot afford a MyWikis plan

MyWikis recognizes that Miraheze provided wikis for free and it is not feasible for all Miraheze wikis to migrate to MyWikis at our current price points, despite offering the lowest rate in the MediaWiki hosting industry.

We are actively considering a plan that would allow Miraheze wikis without the means to sign up for a regular MyWikis plan to sign up for a special plan at a lower price point. This plan is not guaranteed to materialize. It would also have fewer benefits than the MyWikis plans currently available.

We currently do not intend to make this plan available until after Miraheze ceases operations and they only allow for downloading the wiki dumps. Therefore, in order to ensure continuous availability of your wiki, we strongly encourage you to sign up for a MyWikis plan today with the steps listed in How to move to MyWikis immediately.

Again: if you have the means to sign up for a standard MyWikis plan today, you should do so now. We are still considering the viability of offering a special plan and it is not yet guaranteed to happen.

Frequently asked questions

Is it easy to move to MyWikis?

Yes, it's very easy. Create a wiki with us, visit Migrate to MyWikis, and follow the steps there. You'll only need to download an XML dump from Miraheze via a special page on your wiki. You can also contact a Miraheze steward to request an image dump.

New: Please also see the data privacy section for one additional step to follow.

Does a migration cost extra?

In general, no. For most wikis coming from Miraheze, it's free and included with your plan. Only if the number of pages and files exceeds a certain limit. Please see Migrate to MyWikis for more information.

Can I leave MyWikis whenever I want?

Yes, you are free to leave at any time. You will be able to retrieve the latest XML dump of your wiki at any time, as well as all of the media files on your wiki. Of course, we hope you stick around!

Can I migrate to either MyWikis.com or MyWikis.eu?

Yes, you can! If you are based in the European Union or representing an EU entity, we encourage you to sign up for MyWikis.eu, where all data is stored at rest within the boundaries of the European Union.

Data privacy

Does my wiki need to follow any additional steps for migrating to MyWikis from Miraheze?

One special step for Miraheze wikis moving to MyWikis.com instead of MyWikis.eu: because Miraheze stores its data in the United Kingdom, you must provide an attestation on your Client Panel ticket that there is no personal data contained in the XML dumps, or if there are, you are the data subject and you consent to your data being stored at rest outside of the European Union and the United Kingdom. Personal data is defined at the MyWikis Europe GDPR info page. (If you do not wish to store your data outside of the EU, you should sign up for MyWikis.eu instead.)

Why is there an attestation required for moving to MyWikis.com but not MyWikis.eu?

This is because Miraheze data is stored in the United Kingdom, so a data transfer to the EU should not encounter any data privacy concerns in almost all cases.

If your XML dump contains any personal data (as defined at the MyWikis Europe GDPR info page), you may not migrate it to MyWikis.com unless it is first removed from the XML dump, but you may migrate it to MyWikis.eu instead. The only exception is if you are able to gain the express consent of all data subjects (i.e. to whom the data are associated) that their data will be moving outside of the United Kingdom and the European Union into the United States.

What is an example of personal data being in an XML dump?

If your wiki has articles containing personnel records, private political opinions, private religious beliefs, or anything else defined at the MyWikis Europe GDPR info page, that would be considered personal data being in the XML dump.

Well-known public information about political and religious opinions, such as "Barack Obama is a member of the Democratic Party", are not considered personal data.

For further questions

Please contact us at mywikis.com/contact for any questions you may have about this migration.