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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-06-03T07:10:16+00:00

Wikipedia’s URLs recently started adding #_ (appended or embedded) to the mobile version of

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Wikipedia’s URLs recently started adding #_ (appended or embedded) to the mobile version of the website.

  • What does this mean?
  • Why did Wikipedia start using this new convention?

I knew about shebang/hashbang (#!) but I am not sure I understand the purpose of Wikipedia’s new #_.

  • Is this also related to AJAX?
  • How does it work?

BTW, typing the URL into the browser’s address without the #_, results in auto-redirect to the #_-appended URL, which results in significant performance hit on my browser. There must be a good reason to use this new #_ scheme. I just don’t know (yet) what it is.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    It’s just a dummy value used as a kluge. The code that sets it was introduced on May 1 in a commit titled “fix jump to top”, with the following commit message:

    “currently clicking on the jump to top link has no effect. This is
    because opening a section sets the hash to the same as the jump to
    top link. By resetting it first we can get back the behaviour we want”

    If it’s really causing a performance issue in your browser, you should probably report it as a bug in MediaWiki. Actually, you should probably report it as a bug in your browser too.

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