Article traffic for Wikipedia entries has been seen to increase whenever the subject made the news, or the concept was mentioned in some prominent public article or other artistic work. Recent data is partially inaccurate as mobile views are not counted.
(incomplete, ordered by approximate rank; uncertainty is because of carryover between days)
Steve Jobs[2] 7.4m page views on October 6, 2011 and 1.6m views on October 7.
Robin Williams[1] 6.5m page views on August 12, 2014 and 1.4m views on August 13.
Donald Trump[3] 6.1m page views on November 9, 2016, 2.7m views the next day, 1.5m views the day after that, and 1m views the day after that after his election.
Swine influenza[18]. 1.3m hits each on two days in late April 2009 after the first U.S. death related to the virus was reported, up from under 10 views per day.
Roza Shanina[48] jumped from around 50–200 views per day to 1,600 views on November 10, 2011 for unknown reason.
New Nationalism[49] jumped after being mentioned in speech by President Obama, Dec. 6, 2011.
Kim Jong Il[50] (300–400 per day to 72.5k) and
Kim Jong Un[51] (15–20 per day to 12.5k) jumped on 19 December 2011 when the former's death was announced.
2012 items
Fabrice Muamba[52] jumped from around 100 per day to nearly 460,000 on 17 March 2012 after suffering a
cardiac arrest on the pitch during an
FA Cup quarter final.
One Direction[53] surpassed 250,000 views the day after their performance on Saturday Night Live in April 2012.
Roanoke Colony[54], jumped in May 2012 after news articles about new clues found on 400-year-old map regarding colony.
United Airlines Flight 232[55] Jumped on May 10, 2012, upon the death of Dennis Fitch, one of the pilots involved in that incident.
Harlem Shake (meme)[62] has been viewed over 3 million times in February 2013, the month that the meme broke out. It hit its peak on February 19, where it surpassed 370,000 views.
Harlem Shake[63], despite being a disambiguation page, has been viewed over 4 million times, with its peak of over 433,000 hit on February 15th.
Pope Benedict XVI[64] jumped from around 5000 hits per day to over 477,000 on the day he announced he was retiring.
Pope Francis I[65] jumped from single digit views per day as a redirect to a
1979 American novel to over 100,000 when the new pope's name was announced, despite occurring late in the day for most of the world.
Equilibrium (film)[67] soared from roughly 1000 views per day to 289,555 views on July 10, 2013 for an unknown reason.
Shooting of Trayvon Martin[68] surpassed the 100,000 mark eleven consecutive days in July 2013, peaking at 854,000 the day after Martin's shooter George Zimmerman was found not guilty of murder.
Duck Dynasty[70] jumped in December 2013 after
Phil Robertson was suspended from the program for homophobic remarks he made during an interview with Drew Magary
2014 items
Woody Allen[71],
Mia Farrow[72], and
Ronan Farrow[73] saw a huge surge in pageviews on 13 January, the day after Allen was recognized for his lifetime achievements at the
71st Golden Globe Awards, and then derided by the Farrows, who maintained that Allen sexually abused Mia's daughter, Dylan.
Flappy Bird[74] grew gradually throughout the first week of February 2014, but spiked a week later when its developer removed the game from the iTunes app store. Its peak was at 126,000 views on February 10th].
Donald Sterling[79] surpassed the 100,000 mark for six consecutive days in April 2014, after the Los Angeles Clippers owner was banished from the National Basketball Association. It peaked at just under 570,000 page views on 29 April.
Narendra Modi[80] jumped ten times on 16 May 2014, the day his party lead alliance won the 2014 Indian General elections receiving more than 250,000 page views.
Ice Bucket Challenge[81] jumped quickly in August 2014, once the social media campaign started gaining mainstream attention. On 21 August it had 559,582 views.
Joan Rivers[82]. Jumped upon news of Joan Rivers' medical complications.
Floyd Mayweather Jr.[93] jumped after his fight against Manny Pacquiao. Views of his page hit 547,000 the day after the fight, and since 62.66% of his views were from mobile services, his total page views that day were possibly over 1.45 million.
Manny Pacquiao[94] was viewed about 425,000 times the day after the fight. Since 61.83% of views were mobile, overall views were around 1.1 million.
Pokémon Go[110] in July 2016 at the peak of the game's popularity.
Mike Pence[111], jumped July 2016, upon Donald Trump's selection of Pence as running mate for 2016 election.
Doctor Strange[112] jumped July 2016, in part due to new upcoming movie on this comic-book character.
Desmond Doss[113], jumped July 31- August 1, 2016, on release of first trailer for Hacksaw Ridge, a movie depicting Doss's achievements as a conscientious objector in World War II.
Steve Biko[114]. Jumped when Biko was commemorated by a special Google Doodle depiction on December 18, 2016.
Ray Kroc[116] jumped upon biographical film The Founder which depicts Kroc's story when he founded McDonald's.
2017 items
DUP jumped in June when a British hung parliament was announced and it was thereafter revealed that the Democratic Unionist Party from
Northern Ireland had agreed to support the
Conservative minority government.
Plimpton 322[117] Jumped in August 2017 when new scientific findings revealed new important insights into the mathematics shown on this ancient Babylonian tablet.
Many
Google Doodles have caused more than a million hits. For example,
Dian Fossey[119] had 2.4m views January 16, 2014 (
Google Doodle) on her 82nd birth anniversary. She died in 1985. Her 81st and 83rd anniversary only had 2260 and 1123 views. Hits which are clearly caused mainly by a Google Doodle are usually not listed elsewhere on this page, although sometimes they may be, such as in the case of this example.
Engine order telegraph[134]: gradually increase for the week prior to, and with several times the ordinary traffic on, the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic.
Star Trek: The Motion Picture[135]; jumped when the news broke in 2013 that
Voyager 1 had officially entered interstellar space (news related to the plot of the 1979 film; no other Star Trek films saw similar jumps)