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Criterion 4 ofWP:QF says that a nomination can be quick failed if it is not stable due to edit warring. However, this seems to be redundant, as a nomination can also be quick failed under Criterion 1 for not meeting Criterion 5 ofWP:GACR6 ("it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute"). Thoughts?Icepinner03:30, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah. Might want to open an RFC to propose removing Criterion 4 of WP:QF. I wonder which came first: Criterion 4 or Criterion 1 of WP:QF? (or may have been an error, who knows)Icepinner15:24, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree thatWP:QF Criterion 4 can be removed as redundant withWP:QF Criterion 1's incorporation ofWP:GACR6 Criterion 5. In comparison,WP:QF Criterion 2 is not redundant withWP:GACR6 Criterion 2d because the former clarifies that the other parts ofWP:GACR6 Criterion 2 are not grounds for a quick-fail unless the article is far from compliance with them.ViridianPenguin🐧 (💬)02:23, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
GAR one-month minimum: stats analysis and proposal to reduce
On January 15, 2025, GAR ruleswere ammended so that GARs were open for a minimum of one month. Advocates for the change wanted more time for editors to volunteer to fix the article. Detractors felt that reviews didn’t need to be kept open for that long, and reviews without a response would clutter the GAR page. Since this change has been implemented for 10 months, I want to find out what happened when this change was made, and to find out if keeping GARs open longer resulted in more articles being kept. My bias before starting this study was that the one-month minimum was too long and should be reduced. I also believe that during the time of this study, I nominated the greatest number of articles at GAR, although I have not quantitatively proven this.
Methodology
Using theGAR archives, I recorded the GARs that resulted in "kept" that were created after January 15 (when the one-month change took place). I then recorded when the first editor posted a comment that indicated they wanted to work on the article. This metric was selected because GARs will not be closed if someone indicates they want to work on the article. GARs will stay open while work is ongoing, even past the one-month minimum. I then recorded the number of days difference between the review being opened and the first indication comment.
Results
184 GARs opened between January 15 and November 15 were closed as "kept". One article was closed as "kept" without additional comments (Evansville tornado outbreak of November 2005) and was not included in these results. This leaves 183 kept GARs.
This chart displays the time between the creation of the review and the first comment that indicated that someone wants to work on this:
Time distance
Number of articles (cumulative)
% of articles that received an indication (cumulative)
Less than one day
95
51.9
One day
108
59
Two days
124
67.8
One week
150
82
Two weeks
165
90.1
Three weeks
171
93.4
One month (30 days)
177
96.7
Older than one month
183
100
Analysis
Over 50% of articles that are eventually declared "keep" receive the first indication within 24 hours. By two days, over two-thirds of the articles had an indication posted. By two weeks, over nine-tenths had an indication. Seven articles had the first indication after the one-month minimum and would have been delisted if closed at the minimum. The GAR with the furthest distance wasStar Wars Jedi Knight: Jedi Academy at 40 days.
My proposal
Change the minimum amount of time a GAR can be open before delisting from one month to two weeks.
Rationale
When many GARs are open at the same time, it becomes difficult for editors to navigate and find articles they are interested in.
GAR nominators avoid nominating similar articles from the same topic at the same time: by closing GARs sooner, other articles from a similar topic can be nominated sooner.
The minimum amount of time an article remains open at FAR without comment is four weeks (28 days). At one month (28-31 days), GAR’s process to delist an article is longer than FAR, even though it is supposed to be a lower-stakes assessment.
After two weeks, the likelihood that an editor will indicate that they want to work on the article drops substantially.
I think I wouldsupport lowering the no-comment close threshold to no lower than two weeks so longer as the closer of the nomination is a different editor than the one who opened the GAR, to at least guaranty two sets of eyes on the article. (I think an editor who is closing a GAR, especially a low-participation one, needs to check the article history to make sure improvements are not occurring without mention of such at the GAR page and scan the article to verify that the problems alleged in the GAR are actually present). GA status is much more easy-come-easy-go than FAC. Since GAN operates on effectively a two-editor consensus (nominator + reviewer), then I see no reason why GAR should not operate on a two-editor consensus model as well. As to timing, I would certainly fail a GAN where significant work was needed and the nominator had made no reply for multiple weeks unless there were extentuating circumstances. We do need to be careful with how many GARs of a topic are listed at once, or in short succession after GARs closed as keep. Most of the GARs I have been involved with making the corrections to the articles in required substantial work, which can wear out an editor group.Hog FarmTalk00:07, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support The logic of the proposal checks out. I would also not object, based on the data provided above, to lowering it back to one week since an additional week beyond the first only leads to a 10% increase in the number of articles receiving input. If it is indeed the case that open GARs are rate-limiting when it comes to new GARs being opened, processing GARs that do not lead to significant article improvement more quickly means that we get to the GARs that do lead to such improvement in shorter order; in other words, the process becomes more productive from a perspective of article improvement.TompaDompa (talk)01:01, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comments It would depend on what the value of a kept GA article is compared to the value of keeping the clutter down, and the relative amount of work in resubmittong for GA against fixing an article under review. At a rough guess, there should be little difference, but do we have any statistics about how many failed articles are resubmitted and how long it takes for that to happen, and what the success rate it? I would guess that we have no useful data on any of these considerations, but if we do, we should consider them. Do we even have any idea of the value of a GA?· · ·Peter Southwood(talk):06:11, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support a reduction to a 2 week minimum time before closure. I was opposed to the 1 month minimum waiting time from the beginning - my comment at the time wasWe're assessing articles, not selling guns. Forcing a 30 day hold no matter what is foolish extra bureaucracy. Searching through Archive 33 shows multiple threads lamenting the massive GAR backlog that was caused by this change. I've appealed to the community to get more involved in GAR but there hasn't been a significant difference in engagement. Most nominations end up being simple delists with little or no activity besides the initial nomination. I do agree with Hog Farm about the pace of nominations being potentially too fast. It doesn't take long to determine an article merits reassessment, but it's almost always far more work to address the issues which merited the assessment. As someone who closes GARs, I am perfectly happy to wait far longer than 2 weeks if there is work being done on the article or someone needs time. That's not what happens in most cases, as the data provided by Z1720 proves. I think two weeks is more than enough time for an interested editor to indicate their intent to work on improving an article listed at GAR.Trainsandotherthings (talk)22:25, 17 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose GARs are a "break glass in case of emergency" nuclear option, yet I've seen them being handed out like candy for trivial issues such as single unsourced sentences. The last thing we want to do is encourage more GARs by making them delist sooner rather than encouraging fixing the article oneself perWP:BEBOLD andWP:SOFIXIT. A month is a suitably major length of time for a major action.ᴢxᴄᴠʙɴᴍ (ᴛ)02:34, 19 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support, I think it's clear from the thorough statistical analysis presented above that the extra time does not provide a commensurate benefit in terms of retaining GAs/closing GARs as keep. ♠PMC♠(talk)02:36, 19 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: About the "closer is different from nominator" caveat: right now I don't close GARs that I opened or commented on, as I want a second opinion. Adding HF's stipulation wouldn't change my practices, and I think it would be a positive aspect to codify into the rules. If put in place, I would appreciate it if editors interested in the GAR process would consider patrolling the GARs so that they aren't stalled waiting for a closer or that they aren't being closed/checked by a small group of editors.Z1720 (talk)04:09, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is a good point, and appears to be a good practice, but it also produces situations where an editor responds, fixes all the issues to the extent that they understand them, and leaves the article in what they consider satisfactory condition, after which nothing happens. The nominator should at least provide feedback on whether the issues they identified have been rectified, so the responding editor has some confidence that the work is done (or not, as the case may be), and an independent closer knows what to look for.
To facilitate this process, the responding editor/s should preferably leave a message indicating that they think they have fixed the listed issues.
A checklist template for this could be useful. Also maybe a maintenance category for unclosed GARs that have been reported as fixed.
Also, if both nominator and responding editor/s agree that the issues have all been fixed, I see no reason why the nominator should not also close. An additional opinion is only really necessary if there is uncertainty or disagreement. Cheers, · · ·Peter Southwood(talk):04:59, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Pbsouthwood: I can only speak for myself, but I try to follow-up on articles after concerns are addressed. Sometimes there is a long wait because I am not pinged, so I do not know that editors are waiting for me to comment. A checklist template might be difficult, as GARs aren't a full GAN review (for example, I rarely check image licences in a GAR). Also, if there is only one concern in the article (usually uncited statements) then a checklist is probably not necessary. There are also some GARs I open where other editors post additional concerns, so I want this process to give space for those editors to also comment, rather than sending articles to GAR repeatedly.Z1720 (talk)14:54, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
All fair comment, but a template providing a checklist can have non-relevant items either deleted or checked as complete (I prefer the former) and it is a good check that the criteria of the review actually match the GA criteria and are not arbitrary or scope creep.
Not being pinged can happen, and sometimes seems to happen even when a reply should automatically generate a ping. One doesn't want to appear rude or impatient - other things exist, but sometimes when nothing happens for long enough, everyone forgets and nothing continues to happen. Cheers, · · ·Peter Southwood(talk):15:57, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Comment This is moreso aimed atZ1720 but would this include cases where an editor has shown interest in fixing the article but has not been able to have time to do so in the two weeks? for example withCancer pain I do intend to do what I can to fix your concerns but I'm tied up with improvingCoeliac disease which I started improving a couple weeks ago. Basically if I was to say "hey I don't have the time right now for this but if you could keep this open for a month that would allow me to improve thigs, if I haven't made any edits in that month then feel free to close it" would that mean I could still have a full month to find the time to improve it?IntentionallyDense(Contribs)07:24, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@IntentionallyDense: If any editor says "I want to work on this article" the GAR will remain open indefinitely to give time for editors to improve it. The GAR will then remain open as long as work is ongoing, and editors should ping for updates if they think work has stalled.Z1720 (talk)15:04, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support, we should keep nominations open of core articles waiting for someone to pick it up, and clean out most of the others after a week or so. Happy with two weeks too.—Femke 🐦 (talk)11:13, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A positive aspect of increasing the number of GAs is that some section headings have lots of articles. Last year,I opened a discussion about how many articles should be in each section before editors consider splitting them. One consensus of the discussion (in which only a few editors expressed opinions) was that a section could be split if there are over 200 articles, but only if there is a logical place to split it.
In thevideo games GA section, I did asplit of video games released in 1995-1999 into 1995-1997 and 1998-1999. I split that heading first because it was the first one chronologically to have over 200 articles. It wasgood-faith reverted byPresN: in the edit summary, the stated reason was that other video game sections were larger, that the categories should have consisten ranges of time (though noted that Music's categories are not) and that the two year range for a category is too small. Before conducting more splits, I wanted to get more opinions from the GA community.
Questions: When should editors consider splitting GA headings? Should the video games section headings be consistent (every five years) or should different time ranges be used to keep the number of articles below an arbitrary number?
If we do go with a cap on section size, I would prefer aesthetically not to go with the alternating 2-year/3-year setup, but maybe 3-year groupings starting at 1990 through 2019. I don't love tiny year ranges, but I do understand that there's not a lot of great options if we don't want sections to have more than 200 articles. --PresN15:53, 17 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I would be fine with 3-year sections: it's a bit of a pain to set up (splitting a section into 2-and-3-year sections is easier than splitting three sections into five) so if implemented it would have to be done in one series of edits.Z1720 (talk)16:15, 17 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What is the major argument against having larger sections? Especially in the sense that lots of readers probably won't know precise date ranges media came out in, smaller and smaller increments don't make a lot of intrinsic sense to me.Der Wohltemperierte Fuchstalk17:45, 17 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@David Fuchs: Some arguments against large sections is that it is too difficult to find articles of interest when scanning a large list, and a large list makes editing it more difficult, and more categories make the headings more precise. An example of a large list isWarships of the United Kingdom, with 441 articles. At the other extreme isTelevision series, with some sections with two articles.Z1720 (talk)01:12, 18 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
When the title disappears off the top of the screen (on standard Vector2022 width) that is not ideal for easily remembering where you are in the sea of blue.CMD (talk)02:49, 18 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I've been privately maintaining a variation of the section dividing the decades into early, middle and late segments (visible here), my reasoning being that thirds of a decade have clearer specific cultures than whole ones; nobody's going to mistake the late 90s for the early 90s, for example. If we were to do further splitting, I would suggest a format similar to what I'm using, though my method might come off as somewhat persnickety to some, since the divisions occur within a part of a year rather than between years (the divide between early and mid occurs at April/May XXX3, and the divide between mid and late occurs at August/September XXX6). A simpler and slightly more agreeable alternative might be to go by a "3-4-3" format for each decade that's a bit more clear cut, an example being 1990-92, 93-96, and 97-99. I have no strong feelings whether or not we go through with any split at all, but I figured suggestions for that route would be helpful.Cat's Tuxedo (talk)01:42, 18 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I have no qualms with irregular time ranges, but of course if someone is willing to do the work of reformatting to implement a shift to 3-year groupings, I would prefer that for aesthetics. If we go with the latter approach, I agree with PresN's pitch to do ten 3-year groupings covering 1990 through 2019.ViridianPenguin🐧 (💬)02:48, 22 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ideally I'd prefer if the video game sections were split byconsole generations, although that may not be a very well defined term. If we end up splitting them by smaller time frames, one question I'd ask is howearly access games (more specifically, fully released games that were formerly in EA) would be handled? Would we want to use the date the game enters EA, or the date the game fully releases? What would happen if the two dates were in different time frames?Gramix13 (talk)05:54, 27 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. I have two articles,Tamara Bunke andJosé Vicente Barbosa du Bocage, in which two different editors opened the review but never made any substantial comments in months. I was wondering if it was possible to remove them from reviewers but not lose the original nomination date. Many thanks,TheBlue Rider12:14, 20 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I just quickfailed this. As this is my first time quickfailing a nomination and my first time reviewing a GA in four months, I'd appreciate if someone could confirm I'm not being too harsh.--Launchballer07:04, 21 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
When quickfailing for broadness it's best to specify at least some specific sourcing that needs to be added to the article. The closest you came to that was "Around a quarter of the references contain the word 'review', so reception almost certainly exists". You should verify that that sourcing actually contains a decent chunk of information that needs to be added to address the subject's main topics. I think the prose review was good, though I don't see anything there that I would consider quickfail worthy.IAWW (talk)10:18, 21 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The singer is currently involved in an investigation, and due to the nature of said investigation it's impossible for the article to remain stable. Changes in the investigation, and the attention it brings, will mean the article may change wildly. Thus I believe the GA review should be closed and delayed until this matter is sorted out.Harizotoh9 (talk)01:51, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The GA criteria specifies that "Stability is based on the article's current state, not any potential for instability in the future." The D4vd article as it currently stands is not unstable, given that there isn't an edit war or content dispute going on regarding his involvement in the Celeste incident. Rather, there appears to be a lot of normal, constructive editing towards keeping the article up-to-date, and the details aren't changing so dramatically that it would be a moot point to perform a review (seeWP:GANOT). Thus, I wouldn't support closing the review on the sole basis of stability.Leafy46 (talk)06:33, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The article would have benefitted from a more rigorous shaking‑loose of minor issues before being brought to GAN. Wikilinking insignificant words liketeenager,montages,Singapore,California,anonymous sources,album,maturity, andimpounded are always best avoided, as is the practice of Wikilinking a word in one paragraph of an article to another paragraph inthe exact same article — all issues found in theD4vd article. Errors like this are demonstrative of a lapse of focus, and runs the risk of draining a good reviewer's energy. I don't condone what appears to be the other reviewer's abandonment of this review, but then again, there's at least aresidue of argument for not blaming them for it. (Still, clicking "begin review" is a contract that ought to be honoredrain or shine.) The nominator should feel free to renominate this article at their earliest convenience (ideally,after the above mentioned issues are addressed).Spintendo12:10, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Well, that's for another reviewer to deal with. It very well could be unsuccessful even with a new reviewer, but that's the point, it should have a reviewer to go through such issues and decide if the article has met the criteria. You don't quick-fail reviews for wikilinking too much - the whole point of the review is to bring issues like this up so the nominator can resolve them. It's unfair to have that permanent stain on the article history for something that is not the nominator's fault.jolielover♥talk13:12, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Stability is one of the least important aspects of a GA in my experience, and it's more so concerning edit wars than new information popping up. Most articles on BLPs are going to have new information come up after their review, that's why you can check the permanent revision the review was conducted on. I recently had a GA pass in the midst of his album announcement (which was not intended), and obviously, new information to the page, but you can make it work. D4vd's article has been, for the most part, not too shabby in terms of fast changing information and edit warring.jolielover♥talk13:16, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. I do think we should readdress whether it should be a part of the GA Criteria. In my eyes, it basically suggests that there isn't an edit war going on, not that it is stable as in "complete".Lee Vilenski(talk •contribs)14:00, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Jolielover: is absolutely right, over-Wikilinking should never form the basis of a quikfail. I have to admit that overlinking-issues in general form one of the first things I look for in gauging an article's robustness, so when I see a nominator who has invested an admittedly generous192 edits into an article and yetstill overlooks the overlinks, it naturally places me in the position of being unfairly biased against them. The GAN process is, as Jolielover rightly mentions, yet another opportunity for nominators to improve their issue-identifying acumen. At the end of the day, I think everyone agrees the more untenable position is that of the reviewer who promised a review that ultimately wasn't delivered (and who appears to have done this before). for increasing everyone's workload. If it were me, my contrition would be to offer 2 additional reviews as a penance.Spintendo19:56, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Stability is more than just edit wars and content disputes; an upcoming, unreleased film is generally held to fail stability because in not very long it will be substantially different from what is reviewed. That isn't too say that this situation is so analogous that it should be failed on stability, but I personally would put off taking up a review until the dust settles in a few months.Rollinginhisgrave (talk |edits)20:31, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oh and perfect example just came up.Peoplejust released a news article citing sources which contradicts information from news reports only a day or two ago which means the need for re-writes information added in the last few days. The recent reports are ultimately cited to TMZ, and some or all of it may be incorrect. Sources can't even agree upon Rivas' age (whether she was 14 or 15), and basic other details of the investigation. Stability is not possible under these circumstances since investigators have said very little about the case, and sources are sometimes in contradiction with each other.Harizotoh9 (talk)08:47, 25 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
TMZ is not sourced once (I in fact phased out the source entirely). The citations were toKTLA, who have since posteda new article correcting their past article. The highest quality and most cautious sources for this article arePeople, ABC, NBC, AP, CBS andLATimes.. News sources are relying upon sources because officials have been very quiet and released very little official information. That will eventually change and investigator and medical examiner findings will be released, which will lead to heavy expansion of the investigation section. None of this is stable and it's expansion, re-writes piled upon re-writes.Harizotoh9 (talk)19:04, 25 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This article was recently quickly failed at GAN with the claim that I "fundamental lack of understanding of the subject matter", which was reaffirmed ata talk page discussion where the reviewer flat out said that they "can only conclude that [I] do not understand" the topic. Now I contest this quick fail for obvious reasons (I was the one who wrote the article and have good understanding of what the sources say), but I am not here for that since I have anopen peer review. What I am more concerned about is that if the same standard of review keeps up (where the review is quick failed because a perceived lack of knowledge/the problem with the article is really "I don't understand what I am writing about"), this article may never become a good article without a significant rewrite. I would like some other opinions on this; how valid was the quick fail justification and what major problems does the article really have that should be addressed by me before a future GAN?RandomInfinity17(talk -contributions)02:08, 26 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't claim to understand the technical terminology in play, but it sounds like Roy does, and I trust that he wouldn't QF on those grounds otherwise. It is not unreasonable for a reviewer to QF an article that contains numerous errors. Nobody needs to be an expert to write a Wikipedia article, but you do need to have sufficient understanding, especially in technical fields with lots of jargon and doubly so if you're going to take something to GAN. ♠PMC♠(talk)06:00, 26 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Suggestion for easing the backlog of reassessments
Looking at the GAR page, it seems to me like a large number of articles listed there are being reassessed because of issues that were present at the time of the review. (I was specifically motivated to write this byBury F.C., but it's far from the only one). It seems silly to me to list articles here with the expectation that someone will work on them to bring them back to their former glory, if they were never good in the first place. If I want a mediocre article worked on, should I get a friend to pass it as a GA and then list it here for reassessment in the hope someone will work on it?
Instead I propose some sort of mechanism to annul problematic reviews that didn't address an obvious issue that existed at the time of the review, to make it as if the article was never good in the first place (which it wasn't). It's much easier to take a glance at the reviewed versions of recent GAs to check whether there are any issues the reviewer hasn't addressed than find time to improve the article. Additionally, the nominator is not going to complain about an incorrectly passed GA as they would for an incorrectly failed one, so a mechanism for outside observers to object might be good.
Thoughts? Is there some reason I've overlooked why this is a terrible idea?
Spintendo 12:10, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]
for increasing everyone's workload. If it were me, my contrition would be to offer 2 additional reviews as a penance. Spintendo 19:56, 23 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]