# DeepWiki Hacker Approved page: https://hackerapproved.com/p/deepwiki/ 31 people recommended DeepWiki in Hacker News comments, 4 had mixed feelings and 24 criticized it, November 2025 to October 2026. It was recommended in 9 of 12 months, in 25 threads. It does not meet the Hacker Approved badge rule. **Verdict:** People recommend it for getting oriented in unfamiliar codebases quickly; critics say its diagrams and answers are often wrong or superficial. Summary written by Claude from 54 comments. It was written before the November 2026 recount, and 52 of those comments still count. ## Why people recommend it - Quick overview of unfamiliar codebases (5 comments in the sample): "excellent resources to learn about a codebase when their is not much documentation going around" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46097569)) "they are pretty decent at getting an overview of a large project and are relatively accurate" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49648794)) "A great improvement over the alternatives for getting oriented in unfamiliar code" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45886233)) - Helpful answers and Ask feature (4 comments in the sample): "DeepWiki really helps as a backstop for anything not already covered" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48031781)) "Ask DeepWiki is a great shortcut for finding the right context" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47056874)) "the DeepWiki documentation is very helpful" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46588020)) - Useful autogenerated diagrams and visual docs (2 comments in the sample): "Their diagrams on PRs and generated docs have made it much easier to quickly drop into a complex codebase" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48881839)) "has some usable autogenerated architecture diagrams worth a look" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48863291)) - Detailed explanations of code internals (2 comments in the sample): "does a pretty good job of going in the weeds of how the useState hook works in react" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45816332)) "I love deepwiki for understanding deep code architectures" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47604363)) ## What people warn about - Search results dominated by generated pages (3 comments in the sample): "this website has been appearing near the top of the search results for some time now" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45886403)) "it's the first result on google for just about anything technical I search for" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45892855)) "I had to block multiple such "excellent resources" from my search results." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46097791)) - Distracting AI slop and superficial content (3 comments in the sample): "it seems correct albeit very superficial" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45886140)) "Some occasionally useful tables or diagrams buried in pages of distracting irrelevant slop." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45884921)) "I was fooled multiple times by the slop into thinking I’m doing something wrong" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46171834)) - Diagrams and answers often wrong (3 comments in the sample): "the DX of the documentation is horrible and the diagrams are often just incorrect" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45884502)) "It is extremely ironic that he is so gungho about DeepWiki getting this wrong." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45894048)) "It's so wrong in every section I saw. The generated diagrams make no sense." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45884860)) - Fails on some repos (2 comments in the sample): "DeepWiki totally breaks, telling me it doesn't even have access to those source files" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45885923)) "multiple project maintainers pointing out deepwiki didn't get their repos at all" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45926908)) ## Where to get it - [Visit the official site](https://deepwiki.com/) ## The badge A product earns the Hacker Approved badge when at least 10 people recommend it, recommenders outnumber critics at least 2 to 1 (mixed feelings count toward neither side), it was recommended in at least 4 of the 12 months and in at least 5 different threads, and no single thread supplies more than half of the people who recommend it. Health and money products are never badged. ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "DeepWiki", https://hackerapproved.com/p/deepwiki/ (31 recommend, 4 mixed, 24 criticize; Hacker News comments, November 2025 to October 2026). Counts updated 2 Nov 2026, with data through October 31, 2026.