{"slug": "wayback-machine", "name": "Wayback Machine", "category": "other", "category_name": "Other software", "description": "The Internet Archive's service for browsing and saving archived snapshots of web pages.", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 8, "warners": 1, "score": 5.228, "rising": 4.67, "first": "2025-11-06", "latest": "2026-09-16", "why": "HN commenters value it as a library of the internet worth donating to, especially for recovering old sites and personal content that are no longer online.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 1, "compare": 0, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 5, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Valuable public service", "Recovering lost content"], "caveat": "Failed captures", "short_quote": "I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in", "icon": true, "domain": "archive.org", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://web.archive.org/", "pricing": "free", "aliases": ["Wayback Machine"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters value it as a library of the internet worth donating to,", "cites": [{"id": 795628416, "item_id": 49726776, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49726776", "by": "zhynn", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive.", "excerpt": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive. It really is the library of the internet, and I love it.", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 793499424, "item_id": 49593714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49593714", "by": "pm90", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in", "excerpt": "It was super easy to donate; Im so glad they have a landing page that supports several payment methods and makes it easy to donate. I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in : ).", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "Keep Our Servers Running"}, {"id": 795528240, "item_id": 49720515, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49720515", "by": "Kodiack", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "They provide an incredibly valuable service and I love the benefit that I get from them", "excerpt": "I run some small websites, including a tiny forum that\u2019s been a goldmine for scrapers. I had to significantly tweak some firewall rules and configuration after scrapers behind residential proxies suddenly accounted for over 99% of requests. However, I also relaxed rules for automated traffic that was well-behaved, and I went out of my way to ensure that the Wayback Machine was able to hit everything. I should kick a ", "context": "runs small websites and a tiny forum", "use_case": "web archiving", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}]}, {"text": " especially for recovering old sites and personal content that are no longer online.", "cites": [{"id": 795555056, "item_id": 49722191, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49722191", "by": "delis-thumbs-7e", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again.", "excerpt": "I recently remembered a wonderful comic blog from 2010\u2019s that is not online anymore. It was a sonderful Finnish LGTG-thened comic blog that I use to read, then forgot completely until few weeks ago. WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again. I really so through some money their way, they do wonderful work.", "context": "", "use_case": "retrieving archived web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795518288, "item_id": 49719893, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719893", "by": "robotmay", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16", "excerpt": "Unrelated, but this week I've been on a memory binge with the Wayback Machine, trying to find old content of mine from the early 2000s. Took me a while but I've finally put together a good bit of info about myself at the time that I'd completely forgotten, and it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16. I could barely remember any of the other stuff, it's been g", "context": "", "use_case": "recovering old web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}]}, {"text": " The one complaint raised is that it can fail to save some pages,", "cites": [{"id": 733404320, "item_id": 45837770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45837770", "by": "layman51", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it absolutely fails to actually save the content", "excerpt": "It is pretty sad that this is happening and that it apparently is at risk of just disappearing soon. I understand there are a lot of ethical concerns with that site, but if I use like the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to try to save some specific documentation pages for certain proprietary software, it absolutely fails to actually save the content. So then it is just a bit more difficult to save a particular kno", "context": "", "use_case": "archiving documentation pages", "switched_from": "", "story": "FBI tries to unmask owner of archive.is"}]}, {"text": " such as documentation for proprietary software.", "cites": [{"id": 733404320, "item_id": 45837770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45837770", "by": "layman51", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it absolutely fails to actually save the content", "excerpt": "It is pretty sad that this is happening and that it apparently is at risk of just disappearing soon. I understand there are a lot of ethical concerns with that site, but if I use like the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to try to save some specific documentation pages for certain proprietary software, it absolutely fails to actually save the content. So then it is just a bit more difficult to save a particular kno", "context": "", "use_case": "archiving documentation pages", "switched_from": "", "story": "FBI tries to unmask owner of archive.is"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Valuable public service", "summary": "Commenters call it the library of the internet and say they donate or want to.", "quotes": [{"id": 795628416, "item_id": 49726776, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49726776", "by": "zhynn", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive.", "excerpt": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive. It really is the library of the internet, and I love it.", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795528240, "item_id": 49720515, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49720515", "by": "Kodiack", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "They provide an incredibly valuable service and I love the benefit that I get from them", "excerpt": "I run some small websites, including a tiny forum that\u2019s been a goldmine for scrapers. I had to significantly tweak some firewall rules and configuration after scrapers behind residential proxies suddenly accounted for over 99% of requests. However, I also relaxed rules for automated traffic that was well-behaved, and I went out of my way to ensure that the Wayback Machine was able to hit everything. I should kick a ", "context": "runs small websites and a tiny forum", "use_case": "web archiving", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 793499424, "item_id": 49593714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49593714", "by": "pm90", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in", "excerpt": "It was super easy to donate; Im so glad they have a landing page that supports several payment methods and makes it easy to donate. I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in : ).", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "Keep Our Servers Running"}]}, {"label": "Recovering lost content", "summary": "It let commenters find offline blogs and their own old websites again.", "quotes": [{"id": 795555056, "item_id": 49722191, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49722191", "by": "delis-thumbs-7e", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again.", "excerpt": "I recently remembered a wonderful comic blog from 2010\u2019s that is not online anymore. It was a sonderful Finnish LGTG-thened comic blog that I use to read, then forgot completely until few weeks ago. WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again. I really so through some money their way, they do wonderful work.", "context": "", "use_case": "retrieving archived web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795518288, "item_id": 49719893, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719893", "by": "robotmay", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16", "excerpt": "Unrelated, but this week I've been on a memory binge with the Wayback Machine, trying to find old content of mine from the early 2000s. Took me a while but I've finally put together a good bit of info about myself at the time that I'd completely forgotten, and it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16. I could barely remember any of the other stuff, it's been g", "context": "", "use_case": "recovering old web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}]}, {"label": "Easy access", "summary": "Pages load without JavaScript, CAPTCHAs or geoblocking, unlike archive.ph.", "quotes": [{"id": 768460880, "item_id": 48028805, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48028805", "by": "1vuio0pswjnm7", "date": "2026-05-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Works without Javascript, no CAPTCHA, no DDoS, no geoblocking, etc.", "excerpt": "Alternative to archive.ph Works without Javascript, no CAPTCHA, no DDoS, no geoblocking, etc. https://web.archive.org/web/20260504192142if_/https://www.thatprivacyguy.com/blog/chrome-silent-nano-install/", "context": "", "use_case": "reading archived articles", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google Chrome silently installs a 4 GB AI model on your device without consent"}]}, {"label": "Fixing link rot", "summary": "One blogger replaces broken links with Wayback Machine links.", "quotes": [{"id": 780546145, "item_id": 48784134, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784134", "by": "vbernat", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "substitute broken URL with links to the Wayback machine", "excerpt": "I often run a linkchecker on my blog and substitute broken URL with links to the Wayback machine. Unfortunately, this is becoming quite difficult to detect broken URL as everybody is fighting bots. I am using linkchecker <https://github.com/linkchecker/linkchecker/> and it respects robots.txt but many sites are now serving 503 or various other codes.", "context": "blog owner", "use_case": "replacing broken links", "switched_from": "", "story": "Gone but Not Forgotten: Recovering the Dead Web"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Failed captures", "summary": "Saving some proprietary documentation pages fails to capture the actual content.", "quotes": [{"id": 733404320, "item_id": 45837770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45837770", "by": "layman51", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it absolutely fails to actually save the content", "excerpt": "It is pretty sad that this is happening and that it apparently is at risk of just disappearing soon. I understand there are a lot of ethical concerns with that site, but if I use like the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to try to save some specific documentation pages for certain proprietary software, it absolutely fails to actually save the content. So then it is just a bit more difficult to save a particular kno", "context": "", "use_case": "archiving documentation pages", "switched_from": "", "story": "FBI tries to unmask owner of archive.is"}]}], "who": [{"by": "Kodiack", "context": "runs small websites and a tiny forum", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49720515", "date": "2026-09-16"}, {"by": "vbernat", "context": "blog owner", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784134", "date": "2026-07-04"}], "tags": ["for recovering lost sites", "for fixing broken links", "for bloggers"], "use_cases": ["web archive", "retrieving archived web content", "web archiving", "recovering old web content", "replacing broken links", "reading archived articles"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49716176", "title": "An update on Wayback Machine access", "mentions": 4}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49593563", "title": "Keep Our Servers Running", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48739682", "title": "Gone but Not Forgotten: Recovering the Dead Web", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48019219", "title": "Google Chrome silently installs a 4 GB AI model on your device without consent", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45836826", "title": "FBI tries to unmask owner of archive.is", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"warn": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {}, "2026-05": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 5}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 795628416, "item_id": 49726776, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49726776", "by": "zhynn", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive.", "excerpt": "I have a recurring donation, there is so much cool stuff in the archive. It really is the library of the internet, and I love it.", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795555056, "item_id": 49722191, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49722191", "by": "delis-thumbs-7e", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again.", "excerpt": "I recently remembered a wonderful comic blog from 2010\u2019s that is not online anymore. It was a sonderful Finnish LGTG-thened comic blog that I use to read, then forgot completely until few weeks ago. WM had it stored of course, so I could read through this amazing piece of internet art again. I really so through some money their way, they do wonderful work.", "context": "", "use_case": "retrieving archived web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795528240, "item_id": 49720515, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49720515", "by": "Kodiack", "date": "2026-09-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "They provide an incredibly valuable service and I love the benefit that I get from them", "excerpt": "I run some small websites, including a tiny forum that\u2019s been a goldmine for scrapers. I had to significantly tweak some firewall rules and configuration after scrapers behind residential proxies suddenly accounted for over 99% of requests. However, I also relaxed rules for automated traffic that was well-behaved, and I went out of my way to ensure that the Wayback Machine was able to hit everything. I should kick a ", "context": "runs small websites and a tiny forum", "use_case": "web archiving", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 795518288, "item_id": 49719893, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49719893", "by": "robotmay", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16", "excerpt": "Unrelated, but this week I've been on a memory binge with the Wayback Machine, trying to find old content of mine from the early 2000s. Took me a while but I've finally put together a good bit of info about myself at the time that I'd completely forgotten, and it's all thanks to the Internet Archive storing my little gaming review website from when I was 16. I could barely remember any of the other stuff, it's been g", "context": "", "use_case": "recovering old web content", "switched_from": "", "story": "An update on Wayback Machine access"}, {"id": 793499424, "item_id": 49593714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49593714", "by": "pm90", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in", "excerpt": "It was super easy to donate; Im so glad they have a landing page that supports several payment methods and makes it easy to donate. I love the wayback machine, hope everyone pitches in : ).", "context": "", "use_case": "web archive", "switched_from": "", "story": "Keep Our Servers Running"}, {"id": 780546145, "item_id": 48784134, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48784134", "by": "vbernat", "date": "2026-07-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "substitute broken URL with links to the Wayback machine", "excerpt": "I often run a linkchecker on my blog and substitute broken URL with links to the Wayback machine. Unfortunately, this is becoming quite difficult to detect broken URL as everybody is fighting bots. I am using linkchecker <https://github.com/linkchecker/linkchecker/> and it respects robots.txt but many sites are now serving 503 or various other codes.", "context": "blog owner", "use_case": "replacing broken links", "switched_from": "", "story": "Gone but Not Forgotten: Recovering the Dead Web"}, {"id": 768460880, "item_id": 48028805, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48028805", "by": "1vuio0pswjnm7", "date": "2026-05-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Works without Javascript, no CAPTCHA, no DDoS, no geoblocking, etc.", "excerpt": "Alternative to archive.ph Works without Javascript, no CAPTCHA, no DDoS, no geoblocking, etc. https://web.archive.org/web/20260504192142if_/https://www.thatprivacyguy.com/blog/chrome-silent-nano-install/", "context": "", "use_case": "reading archived articles", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google Chrome silently installs a 4 GB AI model on your device without consent"}, {"id": 733404320, "item_id": 45837770, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45837770", "by": "layman51", "date": "2025-11-06", "stance": "warn", "quote": "it absolutely fails to actually save the content", "excerpt": "It is pretty sad that this is happening and that it apparently is at risk of just disappearing soon. I understand there are a lot of ethical concerns with that site, but if I use like the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine to try to save some specific documentation pages for certain proprietary software, it absolutely fails to actually save the content. So then it is just a bit more difficult to save a particular kno", "context": "", "use_case": "archiving documentation pages", "switched_from": "", "story": "FBI tries to unmask owner of archive.is"}]}