This template is for linking to main content. For the mainspace detection template, seeTemplate:Main other.
This template is used onapproximately 379,000 pages. To avoid major disruption and server load, any changes should be tested in the template's/sandbox or/testcases subpages, or in your ownuser subpage. The tested changes can be added to this page in a single edit. Consider discussing changes on thetalk page before implementing them.
Use of this template should be restricted to the purposes described above. It isnot to be used as a substitute for inline links or{{Further}} template. The latter is used when the section expounds a specific aspect of the topic instead of summarizing its article. For example, inphthalate, the template under the "Endocrine disruptor" section shouldnot be{{Main|Endocrine disruptor}}, because the section specifically deals with phthalate as an endocrine disruptor and not endocrine disruptors in general.
Do not use this template on top of a page (such as above the lead), where hatnotes are for disambiguation and not for related topics (according toWP:RELATED). A lead section is always a summary of its own article, not any other; as such, the only appropriate target for a{{Main}} link in the lead section would be the article itself, which is not useful.
1,2,3, ... – the pages to link to. If no page names are specified, the current page name is used instead (without thenamespace prefix). Categories and files are automatically escaped with thecolon trick, and links to sections are automatically formatted aspage § section, rather than the MediaWiki default ofpage#section.
l1,l2,l3, ...orlabel 1,label 2,label 3, ... – optional labels for each of the pages to link to (this is for articles where a piped link would be used). Note that the extra parameters use a lower case 'L', for example,l1,notL1.
selfref – if set to "yes", "y", "true" or "1", adds the CSS class "selfref". This is used to denote self-references to Wikipedia. SeeTemplate:Selfref for more information. This is only necessary in articles and other content (e.g. templates) that will appear in articles, and need not be added for uses of this template onWikipedia: namespace pages.
This template is used after the heading of a section, to link to a sub-article (or sub-articles) that is entirely about the topic of the section. The template will display, in italics, "Main article: Article 1, Article 2 and Article 3"
The name of the first page that you want to link to. If this is not specified, the current page name (with no namespace prefix) is used instead.
Page name
required
Page 2
2
The name of the second page that you want to link to.
Page name
optional
Page 3
3
The name of the third page that you want to link to. More pages can be added using the parameters "4", "5", etc.
Page name
optional
Page 4
4
The name of the fourth page that you want to link to.
Page name
optional
Page 5
5
The name of the fifth page that you want to link to.
Page name
optional
Label 1
l1label 1
What the first linked page is to be displayed as.
String
optional
Label 2
l2label 2
What the second linked page is to be displayed as.
String
optional
Label 3
l3label 3
What the third linked page is to be displayed as. Other labels can be added by using increasing numbers (starting with "l4" for page 4) as parameter names.
String
optional
Label 4
l4label 4
What the fourth linked page is to be displayed as.
String
optional
Label 5
l5label 5
What the fifth linked page is to be displayed as.
String
optional
Self reference
selfref
Set to "yes" if the template is a self-reference to Wikipedia that would not make sense on mirrors or forks of the Wikipedia site.
No errors can be displayed due to the illegal usage of parameters or other usages (i.e. the first parameter can be omitted, other parameters can be used even if the first one is empty (and automatically filled with the current page name (with no namespace prefix)), equals sign can be used as one of the parameters, and template can be used by direct call to the module (using "#invoke")). This is not the case for{{see also}}, for example.
See also
{{Main list}}: For a more comprehensive list, seeArticle.
{{Broader}}: For broader coverage of this topic, seeArticle.
{{Excerpt}}, which allows transclusion of text (such as an intro section) from one article into another
