This help page is ahow-to guide. It explains concepts or processes used by the Wikipedia community. It is not one ofWikipedia's policies or guidelines, and may reflect varying levels ofconsensus.

Shortcuts WP:GDWP:GD WP:GTDWP:GTD WP:GAFDWP:GAFD

Deletion of a Wikipedia page removes the complete page (and all previous versions) from public view. Deletion happens when a page is unsuitable, unhelpful, or does not meet the required criteria.Two furtherdeletion processes exist to address undesirable material that may have been added to a page or visible in a log. Thedeletion policy explains when deletion is acceptable.

This page explains the processes available, and how deletion discussions work when articles are concerned. There is a separateguide to image deletion.

You may have come here because a deletion notice of some kind was added to an article that you wrote. Please read this guide to see what happens now and how you can participate in the communal decision-making process.

Deleting an entire Wikipedia page or file:

• Any user may suggest deletion of a page for good cause. There are three processes available for doing this:

1. If specific criteria are met, pages may be deleted summarily via thespeedy deletion process.
2. If these criteria are not met but the deletion is expected to be uncontroversial, a notice ofproposed deletion (PROD) may be used, which results in deletion if no other editor objects.
3. In all other cases, a "deletion discussion" takes place. This article deletion process is known as "articles for deletion" (AfD). Non-article deletions havesimilar processes.

• An "appeal" process (deletion review) also exists.

Deleting specific text within a page:

• Undesirable text can be removed by anyone byediting the page. However, the text will remain publicly accessible in the article history. If this is unacceptable, then an administrator can permanently delete the content, and it will only be visible to administrators. This is called "revision deletion"; to request it, seehow to request revision deletion.
• A form of extreme deletion known asOversight also exists, which is operated by a very few specially authorized users. Users with Oversight access can often remove certain serious privacy-breaching and defamatory material so that even administrators cannot see the material. This is requested by email viarequests for oversight.

All text created in the Wikipedia mainnamespace is subject to several important rules, including three cardinal content policies (Wikipedia:Neutral point of view,Wikipedia:Verifiability, andWikipedia:No original research) and the copyright policy (Wikipedia:Copyrights). Together, these policies govern the admissibility of text in the main body of the encyclopedia, and only text conforming to all four policies is allowed in the main namespace.

A failure to conform to aneutral point of view is usually remedied throughediting for neutrality, but text that does not conform to any of the remaining three policies is usuallyremoved from Wikipedia, either by removing a passage or section of an otherwise satisfactory article or by removing an entire article if nothing can be salvaged.

This guide deals with the process of addressing articles that contraveneWikipedia:Verifiability andWikipedia:No original research, which are often listed or "nominated" onWikipedia:Articles for deletion. A fifth, special, content policy additionally governs a large set of articles and has a top priority within its scope of application: Biographies of living persons and articles with material that relates to living persons require sensitive treatment (Wikipedia:Biographies of living persons). Articles that contravene this policy in a way that is not easily treatable may also be listed (if they are not deleted outright). Articles that violateWikipedia:Copyrights are listed on the project page forcopyright problems for further action.

When an article is nominated for deletion, the Wikipedia community may discuss its merits for a period usually no less than seven days, in order to come to a publicrough consensus about whether the article is unsuited to Wikipedia. Following seven days of discussion, an experienced Wikipedian will determine if a consensus was reached and will "close" the discussion accordingly.

A list of similar processes for other kinds of pages, including user pages, templates, categories, and redirects, ishere.

If the page is in your own user space (i.e. starts with "User:YourName/"), then you can request immediate deletion of the page at any time. Simply edit the page and put the template{{db-u1}} at the top of the page. An administrator will see that the page is in your own user space and delete it.

User talk subpages, with names beginning with "User talk:YourName/", can normally be deleted in the same way, but your main user talk page, named simply "User talk:YourName" with nothing else on the end, can't be deleted except under very exceptional circumstances, nor can any page which was your user talk page but which has been moved to a new title.

Please remember that the deletion process is about the appropriateness of thearticle for inclusion in Wikipedia. A deletion nomination isnot a rejection of the author or an attack on their value as a member of the Wikipedia community. Therefore, please do not take it personally if an article you've contributed to is nominated for deletion.

Over time, Wikipedians have invested a great deal of thought in the question of what may and may not be included in the encyclopedia. The cardinal article policies mentioned above form the core requirements for textual contributions to the mainspace. However, some Wikipedians have also written a number of standards and guidelines that are intended to provide guidance in specific areas; note that such guidelines cannot supersede the requirements of the above policies. Please take the time to review the standards Wikipedians abide by in evaluating content.

• Wikipedia:What Wikipedia is not
• Wikipedia:Criteria for inclusion of biographies
• Wikipedia:WikiProject Music/Notability and Music Guidelines
• Wikipedia:Companies, corporations and economic information/Notability and inclusion guidelines

Please remember that AfD is a busy and repetitive place. The people who volunteer to work the AfD process may seem terse, gruff and abrupt. They are not (usually) being intentionally rude. We valuecivility and always try toassume good faith. However, often over a hundred articles are nominated for deletion each day. ExperiencedWikipedians have been through thousands of deletion discussions and have read and thought through many of the same arguments many times before. For speed, some employ shorthands (described in the§ Shorthands section below) rather than typing out the same reasoning and arguments again and again. They are trying to be efficient, not rude.

Deletion discussions follow the normal Wikipediatalk page etiquette. Please be familiar with the policies ofnot biting the newcomers,Wikiquette,no personal attacks,biographies of living persons andcivility before contributing.

Asockpuppet is an account created by a vandal or bad-faith contributor in an attempt to bias the deletion process. A close variation is the "meatpuppet", people recruited from outside Wikipedia to try to alter the result of a discussion (for example, if your article about a web forum is up for deletion and you post a call for other forum members to "help keep our website in Wikipedia"). Because these tactics are common, comments by new users in deletion discussions may sometimes be viewed with suspicion. These users are difficult to distinguish from legitimate new users who are interested in improving the project. If someone notes that you are a new user, please take it in the spirit it was intended—a fact to be weighed by the closing admin, not an attack on the person.

Consensus is ultimately determined at the discretion of the closing admin after considering the contribution history and pattern of comments. Civil comments and logical arguments are often given the benefit of the doubt while hostile comments are presumed to be bad-faith.Verifiablefacts and evidence are welcome from anybody andwill be considered when the discussion is closed.

You and others are welcome to continue editing the article during the discussion period. Indeed, if you can address the points raised during the discussion by improving the article, you areencouraged to edit a nominated article (noting in the discussion that you have done so if your edits are significant ones).

There are, however, a few restrictions upon how you may edit an article:

1. You must not blank the article (unless it is a copyright infringement).
2. You must not modify or remove the Articles for deletion notice (AfD notice).
3. You should not turn the article into a redirect. A functioning redirect will overwrite the AfD notice. It may also be interpreted as an attempt to "hide" the old content from scrutiny by the community.
4. Moving the article while it is being discussed can produce confusion (both during the discussion and when closing using semi-automated closingscripts). If you do this, please note it on the deletion discussion page, preferably both at the top of the discussion (for new participants) and as a new comment at the bottom (for the benefit of the closing administrator).
5. Participants in deletion discussions should not circumvent consensus bymerging or copying material to another page unilaterally before the debate closes. Such action may cause contention, extra process steps, and additional administrative work if undoing any copying is necessary. If you wish to merge or copy material, it is preferable to offer a specific proposal in the deletion discussion, negotiate with the other participants, and wait for the discussion to be closed. Even if the article is ultimately deleted, you can ask the closing administrator for a copy of the material to reuse, and the administrator can also advise you on any further steps that you may need to perform in order to reuse the content.

Main article:Wikipedia:Deletion policy

Deletion of articles from Wikipedia occurs through one of four processes.

1. So-calledspeedy deletion involves the scrutiny of only a few people before an article is deleted. The allowable criteria for speedy-deletion are deliberately very narrow. The list of candidates for speedy deletion can be viewed atCategory:Candidates for speedy deletion.
2. Another quick method is the use ofproposed deletion: simply add {{subst:prod|reason goes here}} to the top of the article. This is meant for articles where the deletion is believed to be uncontroversial, yet does not meet the criteria for speedy deletion. A proposed deletion can be contested by any user by removing the {{prod}} tag within seven days, and if anyone still wants the article deleted the full Articles for deletion process is required.
3. For unsourcedarticles about living persons, adding{{subst:prod blp}} willpropose the BLP for deletion. If sources are not added within 7 days, the article may be deleted.
4. Articles which do not meet the narrow criteria for speedy deletion and whose deletion is (or might be) contested are discussed by the community through theArticles for deletion (AfD) process.

Before nominating an article forArticles for deletion (AfD), please:

• Strongly consider if an alternative deletion process (speedy deletion, orproposed deletion) should be used.
• Check thedeletion policy to see what things arenot reasons for deletion. Consider whether you actually want the article to bemerged orcleaned up rather than deleted, and use the appropriate mechanism instead of AfD.
  • Before nominating a recently created article, please consider that many good articles started their Wikilife in pretty bad shape. Unless it is obviouslya hopeless case, consider sharing your reservations with the article creator, mentioning your concerns on the article's discussion page, and/or adding a"cleanup" template, instead of bringing the article to AfD.
  • The pagesWikipedia:Notability (people),Wikipedia:Conflict of interest,Wikipedia:Notability (organizations and companies),Wikipedia:Notability (music),Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources,Wikipedia:Notability (web), andWikipedia:What Wikipedia is not are frequently cited in deletion discussions. Familiarize yourself with the ones relevant to the article in question.
  • Consider adding atag such as {{cleanup}}, {{disputed}} or {{expert-subject}} instead; this may be preferable if the article has some useful content.
  • Consider making the page a usefulredirect or proposing it bemerged rather than deleted. Neither of these actions requires an AfD.
• If an article content happens to fit any of oursister wikis, considercopying it there before proceeding. You can replace an article with asoft redirect to a sister wiki in some cases.
• Investigate the possibility of rewriting the article yourself (or at least creating astub on the topic and requesting expansion) instead of deleting it.
• First do the necessary homework and look for sources yourself, and invite discussion on the talk page by using the{{notability}} template, if you are disputing thenotability of an article's subject. The fact that you haven't heard of something, or don't personally consider it worthy, are not criteria for deletion. You must look for, and demonstrate that you couldn't find, anyindependent sources of sufficient depth. SeeWP:Before.
• Check the "what links here" link to see how the article is being used within Wikipedia.
• Checkinterwiki links to pages "in other languages" which may provide additional material for translation.
• Read the article'stalk page, which may provide reasons why the article should or should not be deleted.
• Check that what you wish to delete isan article.Templates,categories,images,redirects andpages not in the main article space (including user and Wikipedia namespace pages) have their own deletion processes separate from AfD.
• Note that if you are editing under anIP address because you have not yet created auser account, you will not be able to complete the AfD process, as anonymous contributors are currently unable to create new pages (as required by step 2 of "How to list pages for deletion", below). If this is the case, consider creating a user account.

After reviewing the above section, if you still think the article should be deleted, you must nominate it and open the AfD discussion. Nomination is a three-stage process. Please carefully follow the instructions on theArticles for deletion page. Youmust perform all three stages of the process (they are listed under thesingle page instructions). Nominations follow a very specific format because wetransclude the discussion page onto a consolidated list of deletion discussions. This makes it more efficient for other participants to find the discussion and to determine if they have anything relevant to add. Incomplete nominations may be discarded or ignored. If you need help, ask.

• It is generally considered civil to notify thegood-faith creator and any main contributors of the articles that you are nominating for deletion. Do not notifybot accounts or people who have made only insignificant 'minor' edits. To find the main contributors, look in thepage history ortalk page of the article. For your convenience, you may use {{subst:Adw|Article title}}.
• To avoid confusing newcomers, the reasons given for deletion should avoid Wikipedia-specific acronyms.
• Place a notification on significant pages that link to your nomination, to enable those with related knowledge to participate in the debate.
• If recommending that an article be speedily deleted, please give the criterion or criteria that it meets, such as "A7" or "biography not asserting importance".

Anyone can make a nomination, though anonymous users cannot complete the process without help from a logged-in user. The nomination, however, must be in good faith. Nominations that are clearlyvandalism may be discarded. Anonymous users cannot complete the process, as they are technically prohibited from creating new pages.

Nominations already imply a recommendation to delete the article, unless the nominator specifically says otherwise, and to avoid confusion nominators should refrain from explicitly indicating this recommendation again in the bulleted list of recommendations. (Some nominations are performed by experienced users on behalf of others, either because they are inexperienced with the AfD process or because the deletion recommendation was the result of a separate discussion.)

Discussion occurs on a dedicated discussion page, a sub-page ofWikipedia:Articles for deletion named after the article.

Unlike speedy deletion, which can potentially involve just a single editor, AfD involves multiple editors. The purpose of this is in part to ensure that articles are not erroneously deleted or kept. Editors are not expected to know everything. AfD is designed to place "multiple layers of swiss cheese" (see theSwiss Cheese model) in the process, to reduce the possibility of an erroneous conclusion being reached. Other editors can find things that one editor has overlooked or not been aware of. This process does not work when editors merely echo the rationales of others, and do not double-check things for themselves. The best way to help AfD to continue to work is always to check things out for yourself before presenting a rationale. (For example: If the assertion is that the subject is unverifiable, have a look yourself to see whether you can find sources that other editors may have missed.)

Anyone acting in good faith can contribute to the discussion. The author of the article can make their case like everyone else. As discussedabove, relevant facts and evidence are welcome from anyone but theopinions of anonymous and/or suspiciously new users may be discounted by the closing admin. Please bear in mind that administratorswill discount any obviously bad faith contributions to the discussion when closing the discussion. On the other hand, a user who makes a well-argued, fact-based case based upon Wikipedia policy and does so in a civil manner may well sway the discussion despite being anonymous.

For consistency, the form for the discussion is a bulleted list below the nomination text. You may indent the discussion by using multiple bullets. Mixing of bullets and other forms of indentation is discouraged because it makes the discussion much harder for subsequent readers to follow.

Sign any contribution that you make by adding ~~~~ to the comment. Unsigned contributions may be discounted at the discretion of the volunteer who closes the discussion.

Please do not refactor the discussion into lists or tables of recommendations, however much you may think that this helps the process. Both the context and the order of the comments are essential to understanding the intents of contributors, both at the discussion closure andduring the discussion. Refactoring actually makes the job of determining consensus at the time of closure much harder, not easier.

Always explain your reasoning. This allows others to challenge or support facts, suggest compromises or identify alternative courses of action that might not yet have been considered. It also allows administrators to determine at the end of the discussion, whether your concerns have been addressed and whether your comments still apply if the article was significantly rewritten during the discussion period. "Votes" without rationales may be discounted at the discretion of the closing admin.

The purpose of the discussion is to achieveconsensus upon a course of action. Individuals will express strong opinions and may even "vote". To the extent that voting occurs (seemeta:Polls are evil), the votes are merely a means to gauge the degree of consensus reached so far.Wikipedia is not a democracy andmajority voting is not the determining factor in whether a nomination succeeds or not.

Please do not "spam" the discussion with the same comment multiple times. Make your case clearly and let other users decide for themselves.

Experienced AfD participants re-visit discussions that they have already participated in. They are looking for new facts, evidence or changes to the article which might change their initial conclusion. In this situation, strike through your previous comment using <s>...</s> (if you are changing your mind) or to explicitly comment "no change" to confirm that you have considered the new evidence but remain unconvinced.

Do not remove or modify other people's comments even if you believe them to be in bad faith—unless the user has been banned from editing the relevant pages, or is making ablatantly offensive personal attack or adefamatory comment about a living person.^[1][2]

Itis acceptable to correct the formatting in order to retain consistency with the bulleted indentation. It is also acceptable to note the contribution history of a new user or suspected sockpuppet as an aid to the closing admin.

If, in a deletion discussion, you refer toWikipedia policies or guidelines, you are responsible for making agood faith effort to represent those policies or guidelines accurately. Policies and guidelines reflect widespread communityconsensus. If you disagree with a guideline, you should raise your concern on the guideline's talk page; contradicting or misrepresenting policies and guidelines in deletion discussions isdisruptive of the discussion process.

Main articles:Wikipedia:Deletion guidelines for administrators andWikipedia:Deletion process

After seven days, links to discussions are automatically moved fromWikipedia:Articles for deletion#Current discussions to the below sectionOld discussions. Depending on the backlog, a discussion may remain open for several more days, during which it is still acceptable to add comments to the discussion. A volunteer (the "closing admin") will review the article, carefully read the discussion, weigh all the facts, evidence and arguments presented and determine if consensus was reached on the fate of the article.

The desired standard isrough consensus, notunanimity. Please also note that closing admins are expected and required to exercise their judgment in order to make sure that the decision reached by the community complies with the spirit of all Wikipedia policy and with the project goal. A good admin will transparently explain how they determined consensus.

Common outcomes are "speedy keep" or "keep" or "merge" or "redirect" or "userfy/draftify" or "delete" or "speedy delete". Discussions which fail to reach rough consensus, so that the community could not decide either for or against a particular action are closed as "no consensus"; this means that no particular action is taken, defaulting to the article being kept. The closing statement may also include a strong recommendation for an additional action such as a "merge" or "redirect". In many cases, keeping or deleting may be conditional on the community's acceptance of the additional action. These recommendations do represent the community consensus and also should not be overturned lightly. However, these are actions which can be taken by any editor and do not require "admin powers". If they are challenged, the closure should be discussed and decided on the respective article Talk pages. A second deletion discussion is unnecessary.

The discussion is preserved for future reference in accordance with thedeletion process, both for consultation as non-binding precedent and for determining when a previously deleted article has been re-created. In some rare cases in the past, deletion discussions have been blanked as a courtesy, leaving the history available (example: the 2005deletion discussion for Rational objectivism; however,discussions are no longer indexed by web search engines.) The closing admin will also perform any necessary actions to implement the outcome. If the consensus is to merge the article and the merger would be non-trivial, it is acceptable for the admin to only begin theproposed article merger process by use of appropriate templates (if consensus is not clear on merger target, use{{Afd-merge required}}; if merger target is clear, use both{{Afd-merge to}} on source page and{{Afd-merge from}} on destination talk page).

Your vote should be made inbold.

• Delete means simply that the user thinks the article should be deleted. They may state reasons or simply leave it at this statement. Because the deletion process is a discussion and not a vote, simply stating "delete" without any further comment is discouraged.
• Keep means simply that the user thinks the article should not be deleted. They may state reasons or simply leave it at this statement. Because the deletion process is a discussion and not a vote, simply stating "keep" without any further comment is discouraged.
• Merge is a recommendation tokeep the article's content but to move it into some more appropriate article. It is either inappropriate or insufficient for a stand-alone article. After the merger, the article will be replaced with a redirect to the target article (in order to preserve the attribution history).
• Redirect is a recommendation tokeep the article's history but to blank the content and replace it with aredirect. Users who want to see the article's history destroyed should explicitly recommendDelete then Redirect.
• Userfy/Draftify is a recommendation tomove the article to either a subpage of the author's user page or theDraft namespace. Wikipedia allows greater leniency in the userspace than the main article space. The resultant redirect is always deleted.

This table summarizes the end state of several aspects of a page: its page history, the article itself, its status as a stand-alone article as opposed to a redirect, and how much content is retained.

While editors are encouraged to discuss the deletion, a bolded AfD recommendation ("Delete", "Keep", etc.) should be left only once by an editor in a deletion discussion unless the previous one isstruck. Editors may leave multiple recommendations as alternatives when unsure, for instance "Merge orredirect".

The consensus of the community about an article's disposition is generally respected, and should not be overturned or disregarded lightly. Sometimes, however, users disagree with the consensus arrived at in the AfD quite strongly. If you disagree with the consensus, it is a good idea to first try to understand why the community made its decision. You may find that its reasoning was sensible. However, if you remain unsatisfied with the community's decision, there are a few options open to you.

If you think that an article was wronglykept after the AfD, you could wait to see if the article is improved to overcome your objections; if it isn't, you can renominate it for deletion. If and when you do renominate, be careful to say why you think the reasons proffered for keeping the article are poor, and why you think the article must be deleted.

If you think that an article was wronglydeleted, you can recreate the article. If you do decide to recreate it, pay careful attention to the reasons that were proffered for deletion. Overcome the objections, and show that your new, improved work meets Wikipedia article policies. It can help to write down the reasons you think the article belongs on Wikipedia on the article's discussion page. If you manage to improve on the earlier version of the article and overcome its (perceived) shortcomings, the new article cannot bespeedily deleted, and any attempt to remove it again must be settled before the community, on AfD.

Finally, if you are unsatisfied with the outcome of an AfD because you believe that aprocedural issue interfered with the AfD or with the implementation of its outcome, you can challenge the closure atWikipedia:Deletion review, where deletions are reviewed by the community over a period of seven days. The consensus reached at this forum has the authority to overturn AfD closures. Note, however, that by long tradition and consensus, Deletion review only addresses procedural problems that may have hampered an AfD. For example, if the participants of an AfD arrived at one decision but the closing administrator wrongly executed another, a consensus at Deletion review can overturn the administrator's action. It must be emphasized that the review exists to addressprocedural (or "process") problems in AfDs that either made it difficult for the community to achieve a consensus, or prevented a consensus that was achieved from being correctly applied.It does not exist to override community consensus. If the outcome of the AfD was arrived at fairly and applied adequately, it is unlikely that the closure will be overturned after a review. For more information, please seeWikipedia:Deletion policy#Deletion review.

Articles that have been deleted in the past generally should not be re-created unless the reason for deletion is specifically addressed (for information on determining the reason why the page was deleted, seeWikipedia:Why was the page I created deleted?). If the article was deleted atWikipedia:Articles for deletion, you should read the full deletion discussion before re-creating. Articles that are re-created without any substantial changes can be re-deleted immediately (seeCSD G4). This applies regardless of whether you wrote the original article. If you are uncertain whether your new article will adequately address the original reasons for deletion, you may wish to create a draft version of it inyour sandbox and then request feedback atdeletion review. Some example scenarios:

• If an article was deleted because it infringes copyright (G12), it may be recreated if you rewrite the article entirely in your own words. SeeWikipedia:Copy-paste.
• If an article was deleted because it was advertising or promotion (G11), it may be recreated if it is rewritten from aneutral point of view, avoiding any promotional language.
• If an article was deleted because it included no assertion of significance (A7), it may be recreated if you include an explanation of why the subject is important or significant.
• If an article was deleted because the subject was notnotable, but since that time many more independentreliable sources discussing them have been found or published, you can re-create the article if you include these new additional sources.
• If an article was deleted because it wasa biography of a living person with no sources, you may recreate it if you include reliable sources.
• Articles deleted for any of the following reasons may be re-created as a new, completely rewritten article at any time:
  • patent nonsense (G1), vandalism (G3), test page (G2), author requested deletion (G7), attack page (G10), no context (A1), no content (A3)

In some cases, articles may be deleted for erroneous reasons. For example, the deletion summary may claim that the article included no assertion of significance, but in fact the article did explain why the subject is significant. In this case, contact the administrator who deleted it, or request undeletion atdeletion review.

Note that if you copy and paste text from a deleted article (that you did not write yourself) into a new article, you should visitWikipedia:Cut and paste move repair holding pen to request an administrator to repair the history and correctly give credit to all authors. Articles that are restored viadeletion review will automatically include the original history.

Articles that are deleted by the Wikimedia Foundation for legal reasons (seeWikipedia:Office actions) should never be re-created without the Foundation's explicit approval.

As discussed above, experienced Wikipedians use specialized jargon in an effort to communicate efficiently. Often, if a Wikipedian uses capitalized letter abbreviations, you can find what they are talking about by affixingWP: in front of their capitalized abbreviation and searching for an article of that name. "NPOV", for example, can be found atWP:NPOV. Be sure to match capitalization. Other examples of shorthand in general include:

Articles for deletionor AfD

The place on Wikipedia where people discuss whether an article should be deleted. It includesBEFORE which states that alternatives to deletion must be considered before deletion. It also includesAlternatives to deletion orATD which outlines the alternatives to deletion.

Biographies of living personsor BLP

A policy which outlines the rules around adding information on living people to Wikipedia.

BLP1E

A policy-level norm that low-profile individuals covered only in the context of a single event, when their role was not substantial or well-documented (or the event itself wasn't even significant), must not be subjects of standalone articles.

Copyvioor CV

The user thinks the article is acopyright violation. In general, the copyvio deletion process takes precedence over the AfD process.

-cruft(for example, "fancruft", "gamecruft" or "forumcruft")

Shorthand for "This article is trivia of interest only to hardcore fans of a specific film, television series, book, game, pop singer, web forum, etc".

Delete

The user thinks the article should be deleted. They may state reasons or simply leave it at this statement. Because the deletion process is a discussion and not a vote, simply stating "delete" without any further comment is discouraged.

Deprodded

The article wasproposed for deletion (or "prodded", see below), but someone contested this by removing the{{prod}} message from the article.

Dicdef

Shorthand for "This is a dictionary definition andWikipedia is not a dictionary".

Draftify

A recommendation tomove the article to draft space. Wikipedia allows somewhat greater leniency in the draft space than the main article space. The resultant redirect is always deleted.

General notability guidelineor GNG

Standard under which a topic that has received significant coverage inreliable sources that areindependent of the subject is presumed to be suitable for a stand-alone article or list.

Essayand original research(OR)

Shorthand for an opinion that an article contravenes theno original research policy or is an essay that promotes a particular point of view, contravening theneutral point of view policy. Both policies are fundamental Wikipedia policies.

Essays

The opinion or advice of an editor or group of editors for which widespread consensus has not been established. SeeWP:EDIR for a directory of essays.

Guidelines

Sets of best practices that are supported by consensus. Editors should attempt to follow guidelines, though they are best treated with common sense, and occasional exceptions may apply.

Keep

The user thinks the article should not be deleted. They may state reasons or simply leave it at this statement. Because the deletion process is a discussion and not a vote, simply stating "keep" without any further comment is discouraged.

Merge

A recommendation tokeep the article's content but to move it into some more appropriate article. It means the editor thinks the article content is either inappropriate or insufficient for a stand-alone article. After the merger, the article will be replaced with a redirect to the target article (in order to preserve the attribution history).

Neologismorprotologism

The user considers an article to be about a word or phrase that is not well-established enough to merit a Wikipedia article. This could be aneologism (a recent word) or aprotologism (a brand-new word coined in a small community but not used outside it).

Notabilityor WP:N

A test used by editors to decide whether a given topic warrants its own article.

Notability (people)or NBIO

A guideline fornotability of people, it includesANYBIO,BASIC: andCREATIVE.

Notability (events)or NEVENT

A guideline that outlines the notability criteria for events. It includesevent inclusion criteria also calledEVENTCRIT.

Non-notableor nn

The user thinks the subject fails to meet Wikipedia'sinclusion guidelines because it is an obscure topic that is not documented by multiple independent reliable sources.

NOTNEWS

The policy that Wikipedia isnot a newspaper.

Patent nonsense

Total nonsense or content that, while apparently intended to mean something, is so confusing that no reasonable person can be expected to make any sense of it

Per nomination, per nominator, or simply per nom

The user agrees with and wishes to express the same viewpoint as the user who nominated the article for deletion.

per <user>

The user agrees with the reasoning or comments of the other user named, who will have commented earlier in the discussion, and wishes to express the same opinion.

Policy

Pages that have wide acceptance among editors and describe standards that all users shouldnormally follow.

POV

The user considers the article's title and/or the article's mere existence to be inherently biased and to violate Wikipedia'sneutral-point-of-view policy.

POV fork

Shorthand for "This article is on the same topic as an existing article and was created in an attempt to evade the spirit ofWP:NPOV."

Prodded

The article was previouslyproposed for deletion, a half-way house betweenspeedy deletion andArticles for deletion for uncontroversial proposals. The name comes from the{{prod}} template the process uses.

Protectorsalt the Earth("salt")

The user thinks that the article, if deleted, should beprotected against recreation. This is for cases where the article may be persistently re-created.

Redirect

A recommendation tokeep the article's history but to blank the content and replace it with aredirect. Users who want to see the article's history made unavailable to the general public should explicitly recommenddelete then redirect.

Smerge

"Slight merge" or "selective merge", and is used when a user thinks the article's topic deserves mention in another article, but doesn't think that all of the information is needed (or wanted). This is a recommendation for merging the essentials of an article, but not the whole thing.

Speedy delete, speedyor CSD

The user thinks the article qualifies for one of the narrow speedy deletion criteria. If there are no objections, the deletion discussion may be closed early. If the decision is contested, the AfD discussion continues. See also:Wikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion.

Speedy keep

Rarely but thoroughly used. It implies that the user thinks the nomination was in bad-faith (vandalism, disruption, edits by banned users, and so forth) and that the deletion discussion can be closed early. See alsoWikipedia:Speedy keep. It is sometimes, even more rarely, used for cases where a discussion has led to all parties being in favour of keeping. However, that is usually not indicated by a third party coming along and using a shorthand.

Snowball

A request for application of theWikipedia:snowball clause (for either keeping or deletion). However, an AfD should be closed early only by reference toWikipedia:Speedy keep orWikipedia:Criteria for speedy deletion.

Too soonor TOOSOON

An essay (not a policy). This indicates that the subject of the article might be notable in the future, but isn't yet.

TNTorblow it up and start over

An essay (not a policy) that suggests articles should be deleted even if the topic is notable if the content is not repairable.

Transwiki

A recommendation tocopy the article to a sister project in Wikimedia (such asWiktionary,Wikisource,Wikibooks, or one of the foreign language projects) and remove it from Wikipedia, either by deleting it or redirecting it to another article. It has also been used to recommend a transfer to a wiki aimed at a more specific audience (for example,Wookieepedia forStar Wars topics,WikiFur forfurry fandom topics).

Userfy

A recommendation tomove the article to the author's user page. Wikipedia allows somewhat greater leniency in the userspace than the main article space. The resultant redirect is always deleted.

Vanity

Suggests that an article was created to promote the author or some topic associated with the author. This term is discouraged because it is easy to interpret as an attack against the author, and has caused problems for the Wikimedia Foundation.^[3]

WP:POINT

The rule that one should not disrupt Wikipedia to make a point.

without prejudice

When used in Wikipedia AfD debates, it suggests that the result of this particular debate does not preclude a particular option (for example, without prejudice of re-creation) and should NOT be used as an example in other and future AfD debates due to its unique situation or issues.

What Wikipedia is not

A policy which outlines what Wikipedia isn't, it includesNOTTRAVEL andPROMO.

Withdraw

The nominator withdraws their deletion proposal, usually because the article has been improved enough to address the initial concerns, or because the nominator changed their mind after seeing the counter arguments.

As a courtesy, when dealing with articles written by new contributors, one should avoid shorthand to facilitate their learning Wikipedia policy and improve their future contributions.

• If you are the nominator of an article for deletion, your desire to delete it is assumed (unless you specify that you are neutral, and nominating for other reasons). Because of this, you do not get to!vote (that is, for the second time) in your own AfD.
• If you expect the AfD page will be edited by newcomers to Wikipedia (perhaps because the article is linked from some visible place outside Wikipedia), or if you notice this happening, you might want to insert the{{Not a ballot}} template into it.
• If you are not logged in, you will not be able to create the AfD discussion page. You could eitherlog in, sign up, orrequest an account first, or request that a logged in user complete the nomination on the article talk page.
• It is recommended that you describe the steps you have taken to check that your nomination is appropriate, including any search for reliable sources you have done. This may avoid duplication of effort and prevent your nomination from being labelled as spurious or thoughtless.

• Wikipedia how-to