While the world of Wikibase focuses mainly on institutional users, the increasing maturity of Docker-based distributions and availability of hosting platforms such as WBStack and Miraheze has led to a proliferation of individual and community use outside academia, as well as several independent research projects.

This overview of the field seeks commonalities in various examples, and briefly considers some of the challenges such users face.

The Wikibase Community User Group (WBUG) supports Wikibase as an entity distinct from Wikidata. As a WMF affiliate, its mission is to cultivate Wikibase's development and encourage like-minded developers and data analysts to create and improve related tools.

Over time, the group has taken on an operational support role for new users. Members offer interactive help over Telegram and give input to discussions via their mailing list, as well as contributing to Phabricator tickets and documentation.

WBUG's primary contacts will hold an open forum during WikidataCon's Wikibase Track, instead of the usual monthly meetup. This will introduce the group to a broader Wikidata community and offer space to reflect on what did or did not work in terms of programming and learning as the Wikibase track concludes. Any time remaining may be used to consider the group's future development and activities.