You can opt-in to VisualEditor at the English Wikipedia or at other Wikipedias where it is not generally available yet.

Opting in edit

Access to VisualEditor is handled by Beta Features on the English Wikipedia. To gain access to VisualEditor, go to the Beta Features section of Special:Preferences and choose the "VisualEditor" item. Then scroll to the end of the page and save your choice.

 
The Beta Features options for VisualEditor

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Troubleshooting edit

If you have opted in, but VisualEditor is not displaying, then check the following things:

  • Are you logged in to your account?
  • You must be using a supported web browser. VisualEditor is turned off for all Internet Explorer users and users of older web browsers.
  • You must have JavaScript enabled on your web browser.
  • Go back to Beta Features under your preferences and make sure that VisualEditor is actually selected.
  • Check Special:Preferences#mw-prefsection-gadgets to see whether you have used the gadget in the "Editing section" to "Remove VisualEditor from the user interface" . If you have used the gadget to disable it, then untick the box, scroll to the bottom of the page, and click "Save".
  • Under the main Preferences -> Editing tab, check to see if "Temporarily disable the visual editor while it is in beta" is checked.

Access for logged-out editors edit

Unregistered editors do not have access to Beta Features. However, it is possible to access VisualEditor by manually editing the URL. To do so, append ?veaction=edit to the end of the page name. For example, change https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random?veaction=edit to open a random page in VisualEditor. This is intended to support bug testing across multiple browsers, without requiring editors to login repeatedly.