The Top 25 Report
Most Popular Wikipedia Articles of the Week (June 26 to July 2, 2016)
edit← Last week's report – Next week's report →
Sports, anyone?: The dominant topic in Wikipedia traffic this week was sports, and more particularly football, with UEFA Euro 2016 in the top spot for third straight week. And Iceland's improbable team (#22) victory over England in UEFA Euro 2016 put that country's article at #5. Lionel Messi's (#4) defeat at the Copa América (#12) final, and his subsequent retirement announcement, was also big news. In other news, the hangover from Brexit (#25) kept the European Union (#9) in the top ten for a second week, and put Boris Johnson (#13) and Theresa May (#17) on the Top 25 as well. Game of Thrones also merits a mention, taking slots #2 and #3, and even placing its season finale episode article at #18.
As prepared by Milowent, for the week of June 26 to July 2, 2016, the 25 most popular articles on Wikipedia, as determined from the WP:5000 were:
Rank Article Class Views Image Notes 1 UEFA Euro 2016 
1,590,000 
A third straight week in the top spot, though with less than half as many views as last week. The Round of 16 commenced on June 25, and the Quarter-final rounds were underway when this week's report closed at the end of July 2. The final four teams are Portugal, Wales(!), Germany, and France, with the next match on July 6. 2 Game of Thrones 
1,126,688 
Last week the Season 6 article was #6, while this general series article was #16 (with 730K views). Why the switch this week? No doubt it is because the season finale on June 26 (The Winds of Winter) (#18) caused more general press coverage, prompting more people unfamiliar with the show to look it up on Wikipedia to see what they were missing. 3 Game of Thrones (season 6)
1,103,448 See #2. Numbers up slightly from last week. 4 Lionel Messi 
1,060,930 
Up from #21 and 564K views last week. The Argentine forward and "best footballer on the planet"TM faced Chile in the Copa America Centenario final on June 26, and lost on penalty kicks after a 0-0 draw. The 29-year-old Messi announced his retirement after the game. 5 Iceland
784,708 
Views spiked on the northern island country's article on June 27 and 28. On June 27, Iceland defeated England 2-1 in their UEFA Euro 2016 Round of 16 match. But alas, Iceland fell to France on July 3 and did not make the semi-finals. 6 Pat Summitt
764,584 
The longtime head coach of the Tennessee Lady Volunteers basketball team, who won a record 1,098 games in her tenure, died at age 64. She retired from coaching in 2012 after being diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's disease. 7 Battle of the Somme
757,121 
The 100th anniversary of the commencement of this First World War battle fell on July 1. The battle was intended to hasten a victory for the Allies and was the largest battle of the First World War on the Western Front. More than one million men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in history. 8 Independence Day: Resurgence
755,170 
The 20-years-later sequel to Independence Day premiered in the United States on June 24. As of July 4, its worldwide gross is $252 million; the film had a budget of $165 million. It has received mostly negative reviews, though I fully intend to see it. Down slightly from 810K views last week. 9 European Union
736,104 
Views spiked before this week on June 24 due to the Brexit vote, but traffic remained high (though declining each day) for this entire week as the aftermath of the vote began to be digested. Down from #3 and 1.97 million views last week. 10 Jesse Williams (actor) 
720,299 
At the BET Awards on June 26, this actor won a humanitarian award, and delivered a speech highlighting racial injustice, police brutality, and cultural appropriation, which drew press attention far beyond anything the BET Awards normally gets. (BET is an acronym Black Entertainment Television, the most prominent television network targeting African American audiences.) 11 Burger King (Mattoon, Illinois)
716,303 
Reddit learned last week, and I just learned five minutes ago, that "there's a Burger King in the town of Mattoon, Illinois which actually opened before the giant chain and registered as a statewide trademark in 1959. The Burger King chain isn’t allowed to operate within 20 miles of the original restaurant." 12 Copa América
686,991 
See #4. 13 Boris Johnson
651,193 
The primary proponent of Brexit was initially thought to be the primary contender to replace David Cameron as the British prime minister and Conservative leader. Yet, after being stabbed in the back by key ally Michael Gove who said he had come to the conclusion that Johnson "cannot provide the leadership or build the team for the task ahead,” Johnson declared he would not stand. This has now led to the more sedate and competent Theresa May (#17) winning the first round of the Conservative Party leadership election on July 5. 14 Michael Phelps
643,605 
The most-decorated Olympian of all time has qualified to compete in the 2016 Summer Olympics. Views peaked on June 30, the day after he officially qualified. 15 Deaths in 2016 
629,542 
The views for the annual list of deaths are remarkably consistent on a day-to-day basis, with close to 100,000 views a day. 16 List of Game of Thrones episodes
579,301 See #2. 17 Theresa May
533,278 
After the fall of Boris Johnson (#13), May went on to win the first round of the Conservative Party leadership election on July 5. May has been the British Home Secretary since 2010. A lot of comparisons have been made between May and Germany's Angela Merkel. 18 The Winds of Winter (Game of Thrones)
484,320 See #2. Game-of-Thrones-mania must be getting out of a control for an individual episode article to make the Top 25. 19 Finding Dory
482,185 
Down from #7 and 970K views. The film's worldwide gross is at $555M as of July 4. 20 Orange Is the New Black
476,222 
The fourth season of the women-in-prison TV series premièred in its entirety on Netflix on June 17. 21 Cristiano Ronaldo
462,619 
Playing for Portugal, the man sometimes called the world's most famous athlete is playing in UEFA Euro 2016 (#1). 22 Iceland national football team
462,094 See #5. 23 Hal Robson-Kanu
459,222 
On the Wales national football team, playing in the semi-finals of UEFA Euro 2016 (#1). 24 Bud Spencer
452,263 
The Italian actor and filmmaker, and Olympic swimmer, died on June 27 at the age of 86. 25 United Kingdom withdrawal from the European Union
451,039 
Down from #5 and 1.19M views last week. "Brexit" is going to be the news for a long time to come, and what will come is filled with uncertainty.
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- Just missing the Top 25: Nigel Farage (#26, 448,792); Mel Brooks (#27, 446,896); Gianluigi Buffon (#28, 435,474); Copa América Centenario (#29, 427,565); Zlatan Ibrahimović (#30, 412,919)
Exclusions
edit- This list excludes the Wikipedia main page, non-article pages (such as redlinks), and anomalous entries (such as DDoS attacks or likely automated views). Since mobile view data became available to the Report in October 2014, we exclude articles that have almost no mobile views (~2% or less) or almost all mobile views (~95% or more) because they are very likely to be automated views based on our experience and research of the issue. Since WP:5000 and WMF Topviews use different exclusion algorithms, articles that appear in one but not the other can also safely be excluded as false. Please feel free to discuss any removal on the talk page if you wish.
- Note: If you came here from the Signpost article, please take any discussion of exclusions to this article's talk page.