Community Resources/Reports/Community Funds Distribution Report 2024-2025
 Previous report for 2023−2024
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Executive Summary
[edit]During the 2024-2025 funding year, the Wikimedia Foundation awarded 417 Community Fund grants to affiliates, other mission-aligned organizations, and people around the world, totaling $18,232,260 USD. 2024-2025 marked the fourth year of Community Resources' Grants Strategy Relaunch, prioritizing the Movement Strategy goal of Knowledge Equity.
In the new strategy's fourth year, 59% of the Community Fund was distributed outside North America (NA) and Northern & Western Europe (NWE), up from 40% in 2020-2021.
Community Fund Grant Programs
[edit]Community Fund grants fall under the following programs:
- General Support Fund for flexible operational support (usually between $10,000 and $400,000 USD);
- Rapid Fund for organizing projects (between $500 and $5,000 USD); and
- Conference and Event Fund for local, regional, or thematic convening (starting at $10,000 USD)
Of the 117 General Support grants, 41 (35%) were multi-year grants (5 in their third year of funding, 21 in their second, 15 in their first). This is a small increase from 2023-2024, when 32% of General Support grants were multi-year. Another 15 (13%) were receiving General Support funds for the first time.
In the 2024-2025 funding year, 2 General Support, 1 Conference, and 18 Rapid Projects were funded through the India Resourcing Pilot in alignment with applicable regulatory and operational requirements in India. These were carried out in collaboration with two long-time partners, the Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), and subsequently the International Institute of Information Technology, Hyderabad (IIIT-H). Following a change in CIS’s operational status in early 2025 impacting its ability to continue administering funds, the Foundation partnered with IIIT-H for the next phase of the India Resourcing Pilot to ensure continuity and support for Wikimedia communities.
With CIS' operational status change, $119,405 intended for WikiConference India 2025 and $60,122 intended for CIS' General Support fund became inaccessible.
Measures of Funding Equity
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In 2024-2025, the Community Fund supported 417 grants across 105 countries (nine more than the previous year). 101 (24%) grants were made to first-time grantees, mostly based in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) (38%) and the East, Southeast Asia, & Pacific (ESEAP) region (21%).
Key to the new grants strategy of distributing funds more equitably around the globe has been the work of Regional Funds Committees to make funding decisions for each of the 8 regions as well as a regionally diverse Conference Support Committee to review conference and event requests. In FY 2020-2021, before the new strategy began, 60% of funds were distributed to NA and NWE. While funding has increased for each region, funds distributed in NA and NWE have grown more slowly over the last four years. Funding to Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), SSA, ESEAP, and CEECA made up 52% of all General Support and Rapid Funding in 2024-2025, up from 36% in 2020-2021 but similar to 2023-2024 (51%).
The geographic diversity of General Support fund distribution held steady, with notable proportionate increases in GSF grantees located in MENA and South Asia over the last two fiscal years (17 total GSF grantees in 2024-2025).
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Conference and Event grants also supported convening across the world in 2024-2025. More information on the events supported by these funds can be found here.
A note on the figures above: 2024-2025 funding year totals do not reflect all grant-related transactions that were posted during the 2025 fiscal year. For General Support & Rapid funds this fiscal year, the above figures exclude $84,661 distributed for grants belonging to the 2023-2024 funding year and $27,263 belonging to the 2022-2023 funding year, $167,686 of underspent 2023-2024 grant funds either returned to the Foundation or credited toward 2024-2025 grants (as well as $90,749 from 2022-2023, $27,275 from 2021-2022, and $315 from 2019-2020). General Support & Rapid funds above also include $133,093 in scheduled payments for the 2024-2025 funding year that had not yet been posted as of this page's publication.
For Conference Funds, above figures exclude $19,303 of underspent 2023-2024 grant funds returned to the Foundation.
Other Funding
[edit]Other WMF funding activities in 2024-2025 included:
- Research Fund for Wikimedia-related research
- Hub Funds to pilot structures for local coordination as recommended in the 2030 Movement Strategy
- Knowledge Equity Fund, in its final year
- Stipends for volunteers serving on Regional Funds Committees
*The Knowledge Equity program includes one grant for $150,000 that was originally classified as a 23-24 FY grant.