A good article is a satisfactory article that has met the good article criteria but may not have met the criteria for featured articles.[1] The good article criteria measure decent articles; they are not as demanding as the featured article criteria, which determine our best articles.
Criteria[edit]
Immediate failures[edit]
An article can, but by no means must, be failed without further review (known as quickfailing or quick failing) if, prior to the review:
- It is a long way from meeting any one of the six good article criteria.
- It contains copyright infringements.
- It has, or needs, cleanup banners that are unquestionably still valid. These include {{cleanup}}, {{POV}}, {{unreferenced}} or large numbers of {{citation needed}}, {{clarify}}, or similar tags. (See also {{QF-tags}}).
- The article is not stable due to edit warring on the page.
In all other cases, the nominator deserves a full review against the six criteria from the reviewer. For most reviews, the nominator is given a chance to address any issues raised by the reviewer before the article is failed.
The six good article criteria[edit]
A good article is—
- Well written:
- the prose is clear and concise, it respects copyright laws, and the spelling and grammar are correct; and
- it complies with the manual of style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.[2]
- Verifiable with no original research:[3]
- it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline;[4]
- all in-line citations are from reliable sources, including those for direct quotations, statistics, published opinion, counter-intuitive or controversial statements that are challenged or likely to be challenged, and contentious material relating to living persons—science-based articles should follow the scientific citation guidelines;[5] and
- it contains no original research.
- Broad in its coverage:
- it addresses the main aspects of the topic;[6] and
- it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).
- Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without bias, giving due weight to each.
- Stable: it does not change significantly from day to day because of an ongoing edit war or content dispute.[7]
- Illustrated, if possible, by images:[8]
- images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content; and
- images are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.[9]
What cannot be a good article?[edit]
See also[edit]
- ^ Good articles are only measured against the good article criteria; at the time of assessment, they may or may not meet featured article criteria.
- ^ Compliance with other aspects of the Manual of Style, or the Manual of Style mainpage or subpages of the guides listed, is not required for good articles.
- ^ Wikipedia:Reviewing good articles says, "Ideally, a reviewer will have access to all of the source material, and sufficient expertise to verify that the article reflects the content of the sources; this ideal is not often attained. At a bare minimum, check that the sources used are reliable (for example, blogs are not usually reliable sources) and that those you can access support the content of the article (for example, inline citations lead to sources which agree with what the article says) and are not plagiarized (for example, close paraphrasing of source material should only be used where appropriate, with in text attribution if necessary)."
- ^ Dead links are considered verifiable only if the link is not a bare url. Using consistent formatting or including every element of the bibliographic material is not required, although, in practice, enough information must be supplied that the reviewer is able to identify the source.
- ^ Either parenthetical references or footnotes can be used for in-line citations, but not both in the same article.
- ^ This requirement is significantly weaker than the "comprehensiveness" required of featured articles; it allows shorter articles, articles that do not cover every major fact or detail, and overviews of large topics.
- ^ Vandalism reversions, proposals to split or merge content, good faith improvements to the page (such as copy editing), and changes based on reviewers' suggestions do not apply. Nominations for articles that are unstable because of non-constructive editing should be placed on hold.
- ^ Other media, such as video and sound clips, are also covered by this criterion.
- ^ The presence of images is not, in itself, a requirement. However, if images (or other media) with acceptable copyright status are appropriate and readily available, then some such images should be provided.
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