Speedy deletion is a process that provides administrators with broad consensus to bypass deletion discussion, at their discretion, and immediately delete certain Wikipedia pages or files that meet one of the criteria for speedy deletion (CSD) listed below. Because deletion is reversible only by administrators, other deletions occur only after discussion, unless they are proposed deletions. Speedy deletion is intended to reduce the time spent on deletion discussions for pages or files with no practical chance of surviving discussion. Anyone can request speedy deletion by adding one of the speedy deletion templates, but only administrators may actually delete. There are ways to contest the speedy deletion requests, although in most cases the page creator must refrain from removing the tag.
Before nominating a page for speedy deletion, consider whether it could be improved, reduced to a stub, merged or redirected elsewhere, reverted to a better previous revision, or handled in some other way (see Wikipedia:Deletion policy §Alternatives to deletion). A page is eligible for speedy deletion only if all of its history is also eligible. Users nominating a page for speedy deletion should specify which criteria the page meets, and should notify the page creator and any major contributors. If a page needs to be removed from Wikipedia for privacy reasons (e.g., non-public personal information, a child disclosing their age, or possible libel), request oversight instead.
Administrators should take care not to speedily delete pages or media except in the most obvious cases. If a page has survived its most recent deletion discussion, it should not be speedily deleted except for the criteria noted in §Pages that have survived deletion discussions. Contributors sometimes create pages over several edits, so administrators should avoid deleting a page that appears incomplete too soon after its creation.
Besides speedy deletion, there are the following methods of deletion:
Letter-number abbreviations (G12, A3...) are often used to refer to the criteria for speedy deletion, and are given in each section. For example, "CSD G12" refers to criterion 12 under general (copyright infringement) and "CSD U1" refers to criterion 1 under user (user request). Some in-between numbers are skipped, as abbreviations denoting obsolete criteria remain unused. These abbreviations can be confusing to new editors or anyone else unfamiliar with the process; in many situations a plain-English explanation of why a specific page was or should be deleted is preferable.
Requesting speedy deletion
Immediately following each speedy deletion criterion below is a list of templates used to mark pages or files for speedy deletion under the criterion being used. To alert administrators to the nomination, place the relevant speedy deletion template at the top of the page or file you are nominating (but see §Pages that need to be tagged in a special manner below). Please be sure to supply an edit summary that mentions that the page is being nominated for speedy deletion. All of the speedy deletion templates are named as Db-X with Db standing for 'delete because'. A list of the Db-X templates can be found at Wikipedia:Speedy deletion/Deletion templates.
If a page falls under more than one of the criteria, instead of adding multiple tags it is possible to add a single {{Db-multiple}} tag to cover them all. For example, if an article seems both to be blatantly promotional (G11) and also to fail to indicate the significance of its subject (A7) then the tag {{Db-multiple|G11|A7}} can be used to indicate both of these concerns. The article can then be speedily deleted if an administrator assesses it and decides that either or both of the criteria apply.
There is a strong consensus that the creators and major contributors of pages and files should be warned of a speedy deletion nomination (or of the deletion if not informed before). All speedy deletion templates (using criteria other than U1, U2, G5, G6, G7, G8, C4) thus contain in their body a pre-formatted, suggested warning template to notify the relevant party or parties of the nomination for speedy deletion under the criterion used. You can copy and paste such warnings to the talk pages of the creators and major contributors, choose from others listed at Category:Speedy deletion warning templates, or place the unified warning template, {{subst:CSD-warn|csd|Page name}}, which allows you to tailor your warning under any particular criterion by replacing csd with the associated criterion abbreviation (e.g., G4, A7).
Use common sense when applying a speedy deletion request to a page: review the page history to make sure that all earlier revisions of the page meet the speedy deletion criterion, because a single editor can replace an article with material that appears to cause the page to meet one or more of the criteria.
Pages that need to be tagged in a special manner
Some pages either cannot or should not be tagged for speedy deletion in the normal manner:
Pages that you cannot edit (e.g., due to protection), or JSON pages: place the template on the corresponding Talk page instead, along with an explanation of which page to delete.
Template: pages: place the template within a noinclude tag, like <noinclude>{{Db-x}}</noinclude>, so the deletion tag doesn't get included in a page using it.
Module: pages (except for /doc pages): place the template with Module:Module wikitext, like this: require('Module:Module wikitext')._addText('{{Db-x}}')
CSS (including sanitized CSS) or JavaScript pages: place the template in a comment, like this: /* {{Db-x}} */
If the page has been tagged for speedy deletion but has not been deleted yet, any editor other than the creator may remove the tag, which should be taken in as a good faith sign that the deletion is controversial and another deletion process should be used. The creator of a page may remove a speedy deletion tag only if the criterion in question is G6, G7, G8, G13, G14, C1, C4, T5, U1, or U6. For all other speedy deletion criteria, the creator of a page must not remove the speedy deletion tag from it. A creator who disagrees with the speedy deletion shall instead click on the "Contest this speedy deletion" button that appears inside the speedy deletion tag. This button links to the discussion page with a pre-formatted area for the creator to explain why the page should not be deleted.
If a page has already been speedily deleted, any editor (including the creator) can request its undeletion by using the box below if the page was deleted under one of the following criteria:
For abandoned pages that were deleted under G13 (abandoned drafts and Articles for creation submissions) or U6 (abandoned user subpages of non-contributors), use the button below instead:
If the page was not deleted under one of the criteria listed above and you believe the deletion was erroneous, you can contact the administrator who performed the deletion or you can formally contest the decision by opening a deletion review.
§G14. Unnecessary disambiguation pages–if extant pages listed have decreased down to 0 (or to 1, other requirements being met), since the deletion discussion
These criteria for speedy deletion apply to every type of page, such as articles, drafts, redirects, user pages, talk pages, and files, with exclusions listed for specific criteria.
This applies to pages consisting entirely of incoherent text or gibberish with no meaningful content or history. It does not cover poor writing, partisan screeds, obscene remarks, implausible theories, vandalism, hoaxes, fictional material, coherent non-English material, or poorly translated material. In short, if it is understandable, G1 does not apply. It also does not apply to pages in the user namespace.
This applies to pages created to test editing or other Wikipedia functions. It applies to subpages of the Wikipedia Sandbox created as tests, but does not apply to the Sandbox itself, pages in the user namespace, or valid but unused or duplicate templates.
This applies to pages that only consist of vandalism, redirects created by cleanup from page-move vandalism, blatant and obvious misinformation (including files), and blatant hoaxes. Articles about hoaxes are acceptable if it is clear that they are describing hoaxes.
This applies to pages that are substantially similar to any other page deleted via its most recent deletion discussion or deletion review and when the reason for deletion has not been addressed. It excludes drafts and userpages containing content that was draftified for the explicit purpose of improvement and not simply to circumvent Wikipedia's deletion policy. This criterion also does not apply to content from pages deleted via the proposed deletion and speedy deletion processes, or whose only deletion discussion was closed as "soft delete". A page being creation-protected is not a factor in whether G4 applies; the content still has to be substantially similar.
For pages that are not substantially similar, consider moving to draft space without leaving a redirect.
This applies to pages created by banned or blocked users in violation of their ban or block, as well as pages created in violation of creation restrictions imposed by general sanctions, and that have no substantial edits by others not subject to a block, ban, or sanction. Pages created by a sockpuppet account are eligible if they were created while any of that person's accounts was blocked or banned.
For topic-banned editors, the entire page must fall within the scope of the user's topic ban. If only parts of the page violate the ban and another speedy deletion criterion would not immediately apply if they were removed, the page is ineligible for G5.
For violations of creation restrictions imposed by general sanctions, such as the extended confirmed restriction, the remedies must specifically permit deletion as an enforcement measure.
This criterion does not apply to transcluded templates or populated categories unless they have been transcluded or populated entirely by the banned or blocked user; these edits need to be reverted before deletion.
{{Db-g5|banned or blocked user}}, {{Db-banned|banned or blocked user}}, {{Db-gs|contentious topic code}}
Pages which prevent page moves, such as redirects. Administrators should be aware of the proper procedures where a redirect or page holding up a move has a non-trivial page history. An administrator who deletes a page that is blocking a move should ensure that the move is completed after deleting it.
Pages unambiguously created in error or in the incorrect namespace, and redirects left behind after moves that promptly correct an obviously unintended title.
{{Db-copypaste|page to be moved}} – for cut-and-paste moves that need to be temporarily deleted to make room for a clean move
{{Db-move|page to be moved|reason}} – for pages holding up an uncontroversial or consensual move
{{Db-moved}} – for pages that were holding up a move until they were moved out of the way by a page mover
{{Db-afc-move|Draft:page to be moved}} – for pages holding up an uncontroversial or consensual move as a result of an Articles for creation review, typically for unpublished articles
{{Db-xfd|fullvotepage=link to closed deletion discussion}} – for pages where a consensus to delete has been previously reached via deletion discussion, but which were not deleted
{{Db-error}} – for pages obviously created in error
{{Db-g6|rationale=reason}} – If none of the other tags apply, this should be used with a clear |rationale= parameter.
This applies any page whose author added the only substantial content of the page and requested in good faith that it be deleted. For redirects created as a result of a page move, the mover must also have been the only substantive contributor to the pages before the move. If the sole author blanks a page other than a userspace page, a category page, or any type of talk page, this can be taken as a speedy deletion request.
Talk page archives (except article talk page archives where the corresponding article and main talk page have been deleted and the page is not otherwise useful to Wikipedia – check for page-moves and merges before using G8 on article-talk-page-archives; the parent article might still exist under a different name)
Redirects that were broken as a result of a move or retargeting (these should instead be retargeted to their target's new name), except where another speedy deletion would then immediately apply if they were fixed (e.g., redirects to articles that have been draftified)
Plausible redirects that can be changed to valid targets
User subpages when the user has not created a user page
In exceptional circumstances, the Wikimedia Foundation may immediately delete a page as an office action. Deletions of this type must not be reversed without permission from the Foundation.
G10. Pages that disparage, threaten, intimidate, or harass their subject or some other entity, and serve no other purpose
Redirects from plausible search terms are not eligible under this criterion. For example, a term used on the target page to refer to its subject is often a plausible redirect – see Wikipedia:RNEUTRAL.
This applies to pages that are exclusively promotional and would need to be fundamentally rewritten to serve as encyclopedia articles, rather than advertisements. If a subject is notable and the content could plausibly be replaced with text written from a neutral point of view, this is preferable to deletion. "Promotion" does not necessarily mean commercial promotion: anything can be promoted, including a person, a non-commercial organization, and a point of view.
This applies to non-file pages that contain copyrighted material with no credible assertion of public domain, fair use, or a compatible free license, where there is no non-infringing content on the page. Only if the history is unsalvageably corrupted should it be deleted in its entirety; earlier versions without infringement should be retained. In every other case (e.g., the assertion of permission is dubious, free-content edits overlie the infringement, there is only partial infringement or close paraphrasing), the page or section should be blanked using {{subst:Copyvio|url=insert URL here}} and listed at Wikipedia:Copyright problems. Public domain and other free content, such as Wikipedia mirrors, do not fall under this criterion, even if they merely lack attribution information.
{{Db-multiple|g12|url=source URL|other criteria}} – If another criterion applies, use this tag so we do not waste time seeking copyright permission after deleting the page.
This applies to any non-redirect page that has not been edited by a human in six months and is either a user page containing an {{AfC submission}} template, or a draftspace page. Pages deleted under this criterion may be restored upon request by following the procedure at Requests for undeletion/Abandoned pages.
Disambiguation pages with titles ending in "(disambiguation)" that list only one extant Wikipedia page
Disambiguation pages, regardless of title, that list zero extant Wikipedia pages
Redirects that end in "(disambiguation)" but target neither disambiguation pages nor pages that perform disambiguation-like functions (such as set index articles or lists)
If a disambiguation page lists only one extant Wikipedia page but its title does not end in "(disambiguation)", it should be turned into a redirect, unless it is more appropriate to move the linked page to the title currently used for the disambiguation page.
This applies to any page whose current revision or any substantially similar past revision exhibit any of the three following signs which indicate that it could only plausibly have been generated by large language models (LLMs):
Communication intended for the user – This may include collaborative communication (e.g., "Here is your Wikipedia article on..."), knowledge-cutoff disclaimers (e.g., "Up to my last training update ..."), self-insertion (e.g., "as a large language model"), and unfilled placeholders (e.g., "Smith was born on [Birth Date]" rather than the person's actual birth date).
Non-existent or nonsensical references – This may include external links that are dead on arrival, ISBNs with invalid checksums and no WorldCat results, unresolvable or unrelated DOIs (e.g., a paper about a species of beetle in an article about computer science), citations that exhibit invalid temporality (e.g., news reports about an accident before the accident occurred), or incorrect metadata (e.g., misattributed authors). To rule out other causes like typos and link rot, tagging editors should consult the Wayback Machine and not take a single example as definitive. When a page includes a large number of references, the references of concern should be noted in the rationale.
Technical indicators – This may include model-specific citation bugs like the insertion of oaicite, attributionIndex JSON blocks, or turn0search0, as well as the presence of ```wikitext or ```wikimarkdown code blocks (additional explanation).
While there are other common signs of LLM writing, those are not sufficient for applying this criterion. (This includes an author admitting to creating an article using a LLM.) Instead, consider proposing the article for LLMPROD, nominating it at Articles for deletion, or starting a discussion at the AI noticeboard.
These criteria for speedy deletion apply only to pages in the article (main) namespace. They do not apply to redirects. For any articles that are not speedy deletion candidates, use Wikipedia:Articles for deletion or Wikipedia:Proposed deletion.
This applies to articles lacking sufficient context to identify the subject of the article. For example, if the page title is "Alex", and the page only has the content "He is a funny man with a red car and makes people laugh.", there isn't sufficient context to identify who is meant by "Alex". It applies only to very short articles. Note that context is different from content, treated in A3. This excludes coherent non-English material and poorly translated material. If any information in the title or on the page, including links, allows an editor, possibly with the aid of a web search, to find further information on the subject in an attempt to expand or edit it, A1 is not appropriate. Do not tag under this criterion in the first few minutes after a new article is created.
This applies to articles not written in English that have essentially the same content as an article on another Wikimedia project. If the article is not the same as an article on another project, use the template {{Not English}} instead, and list the page at Wikipedia:Pages needing translation into English for review and possible translation.
This applies to articles consisting only of external links, category tags, "See also" sections, a rephrasing of the title, attempts to correspond with the person or group named by its title, questions that should have been asked at a noticeboard, chat-like comments, template tags, or images. This may also apply to articles consisting entirely of the framework of the Article wizard with no additional content, or no content at all. However, this criterion does not cover very short articles that have context, which may be valid stubs, and articles consisting only of an infobox. This criterion excludes poor writing, coherent non-English material, and poorly translated material. Do not tag under this criterion in the first few minutes after a new article is created.
This applies to any article about a real person, individual animal, commercial or non-commercial organization, web content, or organized event that does not indicate why its subject is important or significant, except for educational institutions. This is distinct from verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. This criterion applies only to articles about the listed subjects; in particular, it does not apply to articles about albums (these may be covered by A9), products, books, films, TV programs, software, or other creative works, nor to entire species of animals. The criterion does apply if the claim of significance or importance given is not credible, and any article with a blatantly false claim may also be submitted for speedy deletion as a hoax. If the claim's credibility is unclear, you can improve the article yourself, propose deletion, or list the article at articles for deletion.
This applies to any article about a musical recording or list of musical recordings where none of the contributing recording artists has an article and that does not indicate why its subject is important or significant (both conditions must be met). This is distinct from questions of verifiability and reliability of sources, and is a lower standard than notability. This criterion does not apply to other forms of creative media, products, or any other types of articles.
The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify on Wikipedia's notability guidelines.
This applies to any recently created article with no relevant page history that duplicates an existing English Wikipedia article, and that does not expand upon, detail or improve information within any existing article(s) on the subject, and where the title is not a plausible redirect. This does not include split pages or any article that expands or reorganizes an existing one or that contains referenced, mergeable material. It also does not include disambiguation pages.
The title chosen for the vast majority of duplicate articles will be a plausible misspelling of, or alternative name for, the existing article, and a redirect should be created instead of deletion. This criterion should, accordingly, only be used rarely, and only for pages whose titles are not plausible redirects.
This applies to any article that plainly indicates that the subject was invented, coined, or discovered by the article's creator or someone they personally know and does not credibly indicate why its subject is important or significant. The criterion does not apply to any article that makes any credible claim of significance or importance, even if the claim is not supported by a reliable source or does not qualify under Wikipedia's notability guidelines. Note: This is not intended for hoaxes (see G3).
These criteria for speedy deletion apply to redirects, including soft redirects, in any namespace, with exclusions listed for specific criteria. Redirects whose page histories are necessary for attribution, including redirects created by merges, and articles or stubs that have been converted into redirects are not eligible for speedy deletion. For any redirects that are not speedy deletion candidates, use Redirects for discussion. In some cases, it may be possible to make a useful redirect by changing the target instead of deleting it.
This applies to recently created redirects from implausibletypos or misnomers. However, some redirects in other languages are generally useful. This criterion does not apply to common misspellings or misnomers, to redirects created as a result of a page move (unless nothing was at the title until recently), and to redirects that point to a disambiguation page and end with "(disambiguation)".
This applies to redirects in the "File:" namespace with the same name as a file or redirect at Wikimedia Commons, provided any eventual file links to it on Wikipedia are obviously not intended for the file and don't redirect to Wikimedia Commons.
Redirects that do not work because of software limitations, such as redirects to special pages or to pages on other wikis, may be converted to soft redirects if they have a non-trivial history or other valid uses.
For reversal of redirects, use {{Db-move}}, a special case of {{Db-g6}}.
These criteria for speedy deletion apply to files, images, and other media. These criteria formerly began with I (e.g., I1, I2, I3) but have since been replaced with F, without the actual criteria being changed. This was because the file namespace was formerly known as the image namespace.
This applies to unused duplicates or lower-quality/resolution copies of another Wikipedia file having the same file format. This excludes files hosted on Wikimedia Commons; for these, see criterion F8.
This applies to files that are corrupt, missing, empty, or that contain superfluous and blatant non-metadata information. This also applies to file description pages that lack a corresponding file or correspond to Commons files and do not include information that is specific to English Wikipedia (like {{FeaturedPicture}}).
This applies to files lacking the necessary licensing information to verify copyright status after being identified as such for seven days. Administrators should check the upload summary, file information page, and the file itself for a source before deleting under this criterion.
This applies to files that are not under a free license or in the public domain and that are not used in any article. These may be deleted after being identified as such for more than seven days or immediately if the file's only use was on a deleted article and it is very unlikely to have any use on any other valid article. This includes previous revisions of the files overwritten by copyright violations. Reasonable exceptions may be made for files uploaded for an upcoming article.
This applies to non-free files claiming fair use but without a use rationale. These may be deleted after being identified as such for seven days. The boilerplate copyright tags setting out fair use criteria does not constitute a rationale. This criterion does not apply to situations where a use rationale is provided but is disputed.
Non-free files that have been identified as being replaceable by a free file and tagged with {{Rnfu}} may be deleted after two days, if no justification is given for the claim of irreplaceability. If the replaceability is disputed, the nominator should not be the one deleting the file.
Invalid fair-use claims tagged with {{Dnfu}} may be deleted seven days after they are tagged, if a full and valid fair-use use rationale is not added.
This applies to local files available as identical copies on Wikimedia Commons that meet the following conditions:
The Commons version is in the same file format and is of the same or higher quality and resolution.
The file's license and source status are beyond a reasonable doubt, and the license is undoubtedly accepted at Commons. To avoid deletion at Commons, please ensure the Commons page description has all of the following:
Name and date of death of the creator of the artistic work represented by the file, or else clear evidence that a free license was given. If anonymous, ensure the page description provides evidence that establishes the anonymous status.
Country where the artistic work represented by the file was situated, or where it was first published.
Date when the artistic work represented by the file was created or first published, depending on the copyright law of the origin country.
All file revisions that meet the first condition have been transferred to Commons as revisions of the Commons copy and properly marked as such.
All information on the local file description page is also present on Commons, including the complete upload history (if required by the license) with links to the uploader's local user pages. After deleting the file, the local file description page must be undeleted if it contains information that is not relevant to any other project (e.g., the {{Featured picture}} template).
If the file on Commons has a different name, all local references to it must be updated to use the Commons title.
The file is not protected. Do not delete protected files, even if there is an identical copy on Commons, unless the file is no longer in use (check what links here). They are usually uploaded locally and protected here since they are used in the interface or in some widely used high-risk templates. Deleting the local copy of an image used in the interface does break things. More about high-risk images.
This applies to obviously non-free files that are not claimed by the uploader to be fair use. A URL or other indication of where the file originated should be mentioned. This does not include files with a credible claim that the owner has released them under a Wikipedia-compatible free license. Most files from stock photo libraries such as Getty Images will not be released under such a license. Blatant infringements should be tagged with the {{Db-filecopyvio}} template. Non-blatant copyright infringements should be discussed at Wikipedia:Files for discussion.
If an uploader has specified a license and has named a third party as the source or copyright holder without providing evidence that this third party has in fact agreed, the item may be deleted seven days after notification of the uploader. Acceptable evidence of licensing normally consists of either a link to the source website where the license is stated, or a statement by the copyright holder e-mailed or forwarded to permissions-enwikimedia.org. Such a confirmation is also required if the source is an organization or web publication that the uploader claims to represent or own.
Instances of obvious copyright violations where the uploader would have no reasonable expectation of obtaining permission (e.g., major studio movie posters, television images, album covers, or logos) without a claim of fair use should instead be speedily deleted per F9 (unambiguous copyright infringement). Files tagged with {{Permission pending}} for more than 30 days may also be speedily deleted under this criterion. (The permissions-en queue currently has a backlog of less than a day.) Files tagged {{Permission received}} whose permissions have not been confirmed after 30 days may be deleted immediately under this criterion, without waiting an additional seven days, provided a check of the ticket is performed by a VRT agent to confirm that no further interaction is ongoing.
These criteria for speedy deletion apply only to pages in the category namespace. For any category pages that are not speedy deletion candidates, use Categories for discussion instead.
This criterion applies to unused maintenance categories, such as empty dated maintenance categories for dates in the past (e.g., Category:Articles lacking sources from July 2009), tracking categories no longer used by a template after a rewrite, or empty subcategories of Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets or Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets. Note that empty maintenance categories are not necessarily unused—this criterion is for categories that will always be empty, not just currently empty. If you are unsure whether a category is still being used by a template, consider asking the creator of the category or at the template's talk page before tagging.
This applies to unused subpages of templates or modules, such as:
Template documentation subpages unused by the template itself (editors tagging and deleting such pages should ensure that all relevant content, including categories, has been moved to the template page or the replacement documentation)
/core subpages which are not called by the template itself
These criteria for speedy deletion apply only to pages in the User: and User talk: namespaces. For any user pages that are not speedy deletion candidates, use Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion instead.
Personal user pages and subpages (but not user talk pages) upon request by their user. This also includes editnotices for user pages. In some rare cases, there may be an administrative need to retain the page. Pages that have previously been moved are only eligible if all previous titles were in the user's userspace.
{{Db-u1}}, {{Db-userreq}} (These templates are not displayed on pages such as .css and .js, but their categorization still works.)
This applies to user pages, user subpages, and user talk pages of users that do not exist on the English Wikipedia (check Special:ListUsers), except user pages for IP users who have edited, redirects from misspellings of an established user's user page, and redirects created due to a user being renamed. Pages of users who exist on other WMF wikis but do not have local accounts are eligible for deletion.
Before tagging or deleting a page under this criterion, consider whether it is preferable to move the page to another location, such as a user subpage of the primary contributor.
User subpages of users who have made few or no edits outside of user space, which have not been edited by a human in at least six months, excluding redirects, .js pages, .css pages, and Wikipedia Books. Promising drafts may be moved to draftspace by any editor as an alternative to deletion.
The CSD U6 Bot automatically tags unambiguous U6 candidates. In addition to tagging newly-eligible pages, it is working through the backlog of eligible pages predating U6's adoption. Its taggings carry a one-week delay to allow for human review and potential draftification. Humans may apply U6 tags as with any other criterion, without the delay, but are discouraged from scripted mass-tagging of pages that will eventually be handled by the bot.
User subpages of users who have made few or no edits outside of user space, were created more than six months ago, could not be interpreted as draft articles (even very bad ones), and consist entirely of:
creative or persuasive writing unrelated to Wikipedia (e.g., fan fictions or political essays)
The following proposals for new speedy deletion criteria are frequently raised, but have repeatedly failed to gain consensus:
How-to articles
Essay articles
Expansion of A7, A9 and A11 to include books, software, schools and/or other subjects
Neologisms
Unsourced articles
A7, A9 and A11 scope
A7, A9 and A11 do not apply to any other subject that does not indicate importance. Expanding the scope of A7, A9 and A11 to different subjects (such as products, software, books, schools, etc.) have been proposed several times in the past and failed to gain consensus. Amongst the reasons for those rejections were that such subjects are not created often enough to require speedy deletion (such articles can be handled by proposed deletion or by listing the article at articles for deletion), that such subjects cannot be objectively covered in A7, A9 and A11's wording and that admins are not able to assess claims of importance for certain subjects. Before proposing a change to A7, A9 and A11 to expand their scope, please check whether your proposal has not already been discussed on the talk page (archives).
Less-obvious hoaxes. If even only remotely plausible, a suspected hoax article should receive scrutiny in a wider forum. Truth is often stranger than fiction. Note that "blatant and obvious hoaxes and misinformation" are subject to speedy deletion as vandalism.
Failure to assert importance but not an A7, A9 or A11 category. There is no consensus to speedily delete articles of types not specifically listed in A7, A9 or A11 under those criteria. Nor does it apply to neologisms that do not meet A11 because new specialized terms should have a wider hearing.
Author deletion requests made in bad faith. Author deletion requests made in bad faith, out of frustration, after others have contributed substantially (because the work of others is involved) or in an attempt to revoke their freely-licensed contributions are not granted. However, anyone may request deletion of pages in their userspace.
Very short articles. Short articles with sufficient content and context to qualify as stubs may not be speedily deleted under criteria A1 and A3; other criteria may still apply.
Copies that are not copyright violations. If content appears both here and somewhere else (possibly in modified form), consider the possibility that Wikipedia's is the original version and the other site copied from Wikipedia's version. Alternatively, the same author may have written both versions, or the original may be free content.
PNG / GIF files replaced by JPEG images. JPEG encoding discards information that may be important later. Do not delete the original PNG / GIF files.
Questionable material that is not vandalism. Earnest efforts are never vandalism, so to assume good faith, do not delete as vandalism unless reasonably certain.
User and user talk pages of temporary accounts. Although users are encouraged to create Wikipedia accounts, unregistered users are still allowed to edit Wikipedia and are identified by temporary accounts. If an unregistered user uses a temporary account for some time, it may have a user page and/or user talk page associated with it, and even for abandoned temporary accounts, the history can contain important discussions or information that may be of interest.
An article written in a foreign language or script. An article should not be speedily deleted just because it is not written in English. Instead it should be tagged with {{Not English}} and listed at Wikipedia:Pages needing translation into English. It may be reconsidered after translation whether the article merits deletion, retention or improvement by means of a suitable tag. However, if it already exists on another Wikimedia project, it might be speedily deletable under criterion A2.
Subject request. Sometimes somebody claiming to be the subject of a biographical article requests deletion of the article, or even blanks the article. Article subjects do not have an automatic right to have their articles deleted. Nor does such a criterion apply to namespaces other than article space: for example, pages in the Wikipedia namespace devoted to a discussion about a particular editor. See also: Wikipedia:Deletion policy §Deletion of biographies and BLPs
Orphaned pages or redirects. A page cannot be deleted just because no other pages link to it. This includes redirects – even if 'What links here' returns nothing, a redirect may be a likely search phrase, or have links to it from outside Wikipedia.
Redirects that are poorly targeted. A redirect should not be deleted just because its target is incorrect or confusing. Instead, change the redirect to a better target. If you're not sure where it should be targeted, open a discussion at Redirects for discussion.
Conflict of interest. Merely having an author connected to its subject, or even one paid to write about it, is not by itself sufficient to speedily delete a page. While users with promotional usernames are frequently blocked, G5 does not apply unless they were already evading a block or ban when they wrote it. G11 can be used to delete exclusively-promotional writing, but doesn't apply to neutrally written material even if the intent is obviously promotional.
Make sure to specify the reason for deletion in the deletion summary. Also, in general, the article's creator and major contributors should have been notified.
Before deleting a page, check the page history to assess whether it would instead be possible to revert and salvage a previous version, or if there was actually a cut-and-paste move involved. Also:
The initial edit summary may have information about the source of or reason for the page.
The talk page may refer to previous deletion discussions or have ongoing discussions relevant to including the page.
The page log may have information about previous deletions that could warrant SALTing the page or keeping it on good reason.
What links here may show that the page is an oft-referred part of the encyclopedia, or may show other similar pages that warrant deletion. For pages that should not be re-created, incoming links in other pages (except in discussions, archives and tracking pages) should be removed.
When deleting a page through the speedy deletion process, please specify the reason for deletion in the deletion summary, so that it will be recorded in the deletion log. Quoting page content in the deletion summary may be helpful, but must not be done for attack content or copyrighted text. In some cases, it would be appropriate to notify the page's creator of the deletion.
Twinkle or CSDHelper can be used to process nominations more quickly and smoothly. When processing a nomination:
Twinkle can delete the page.
Twinkle can notify the page creator if the page is deleted.
CSDH can delete the page, convert the nomination into a PROD nomination, or decline the nomination.
CSDH can notify the nominator if the nomination is converted or declined.
In the past, criteria for speedy deletion beginning with the following letters were used:
"P" for portals
"X" for temporary criteria to assist in large-scale cleanups of problematic pages that would otherwise overwhelm the normal deletion processes
All criteria in these groups have been rendered obsolete; as such, these groups are not currently in use.
Some criteria in the active groups were also used in the past but are no longer valid. They are kept here for historical reference and to preserve numbering. Two of the repealed criteria did not have consensus before being enacted, and three were meant to be temporary. The remainder were merged into broader criteria or removed entirely.
A4. Attempts to correspond with the person or group named by its title
F7a. Non-free images or media with a clearly invalid fair-use tag
Repealed in March 2021 due to the problem being easily surmountable (discussion). Instead, the invalid tag should be corrected. Once the tag is corrected, other speedy deletion criteria may apply.
F10. Useless non-media
Deprecated in favor of proposed deletion in February 2023 following rare usage and added technical restrictions on what file types can be uploaded (discussion).
Was repealed in December 2020 due to misuse and the seven-day hold (discussion). Instead, use an existing applicable criterion or submit the template to Wikipedia:Templates for discussion.
Created to delete pages created by the content translation tool prior to 27 July 2016. Was deprecated in July 2017 when consensus agreed to move most of the remaining pages to the draft namespace (discussion).
X3. Redirects with no space before a parenthetical disambiguation
Created in May 2024 to deal with improper spacing of article title redirects that did not fall under R3 due to their age. Repealed in November 2025 following the completion of the cleanup.
↑The result of the most recent discussion at either venue controls. For example, if the most recent discussion was a deletion review closed as "keep" or an AfD closed as no consensus, G4 does not apply. Likewise, an article that was deleted through its most recent AfD discussion or deletion review but was kept in earlier discussions is eligible for deletion under this criterion (discussion).
↑If a page is deleted at Articles for deletion and subsequently recreated as a redirect, G4 does not apply, even if that option was discussed and rejected in the AfD (discussion).
↑To qualify for this criterion, the page must have been created while the user was actually banned or blocked, or while the creation restriction imposed by the general sanction was in effect. Pages created before the ban, block, or general sanction was imposed, as well as pages created after it was lifted, cannot be speedily deleted under this criterion.
↑The underlying rationale for this criterion was articulated in a 2026 RfC:
[A]lthough the general, default rule on Wikipedia is that pages are only deleted if the topic or content of the page violates policy and not because of how the page was created – meaning that a page on a policy-compliant topic and with policy-compliant content is generally not deleted, even if it was created in a way that violates policy (e.g., by an undisclosed paid editor) – Wikipedia has no firm rules and there are exceptions to this default rule. A well-known exception that already has global consensus is [G5], which allows, under certain circumstances, speedy deletion of pages created by banned or blocked users in violation of their ban or block, even if the page is otherwise policy-compliant.The rationale behind G5 is twofold: first, it acts as a deterrent. If people who are blocked or banned could just create a new account and keep on editing, it would render the blocks and bans ineffective at preventing disruption, since block/ban evasion would be an effective way to continue editing. Second, it saves editor time by allowing block- or ban-evading pages to be deleted wholesale, without having to review each page for policy compliance. This is a judgment call, a trade-off, between needing blocks/bans to be effective and the practicalities of having limited editor resources on the one hand, and removing otherwise policy-compliant pages on the other hand. In the case of G5, global consensus is that it's worth deleting "good" pages in order to deter block/ban evasion, and in order to keep the cleanup workload manageable.
↑The Arbitration Committee and the community have included the following when deciding a topic area should be covered by the extended confirmed restriction:
Non-extended-confirmed editors may not create new articles, but administrators may exercise discretion when deciding how to enforce this remedy on article creations. Deletion of new articles created by non-extended-confirmed editors is permitted but not required.
12Page moves are excluded because of a history of improper deletions of these redirects. A move creates a redirect to ensure that any external links that point to Wikipedia remain valid; should such links exist, deleting these redirects will break them. Such redirects must be discussed at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion before deletion. However, redirects that were obviously made in error can be deleted as G6, technical deletions.
↑New editors sometimes mistakenly start article drafts on talk pages that have no article. If you see this, move the draft into draftspace or to the user's userspace, thereby making sure the new user is listed as the author and not you.
↑Per a 2016 RfC, redirects amounted to "there is a clear consensus against deletion of draft namespace redirects. There is a rough consensus against the alternative proposal to delete draft namespace redirects after six months."
12Per a 2022 RfC, tagging a page for deletion does not reset the six-month clock, but removing someone else's speedy deletion template does.
12A boldfaced link to the primary topic at the top of a disambiguation page counts as a listed page.
↑Per a 2026 RfC, "It should be noted that global consensus is that "G" CSD criteria apply to all pages, ... so G15 already applies, and continues to apply, to any kind of page, not just articles. However, whether templates, modules, user scripts, etc., could, even in theory, meet the criteria of G15 ... remains unresolved."
↑Note that user-facing instructions may be present in infoboxes, especially older ones. For example, articles with Template:Infobox military person often contain the boilerplate "Add spouse if reliably sourced".
↑Note that placeholders also appear on human-made article templates such as Template:Biography, the use of which are not signs of LLM generation.
↑For example, seemingly dead-on-arrival links may have been geoblocked in your region or copied from another article. Another example is books with an invalid ISBN not caught by the publisher, which can be checked by WorldCat.
12Consensus has developed that in most cases articles should not be tagged for deletion under this criterion moments after creation as the creator may be actively working on the content; though there is no set time requirement, a ten-minute delay before tagging under this criterion is suggested as good practice. Please do not mark the page as patrolled before that delay passes, to ensure the article is reviewed at a later time.
12The definition of recent is intentionally flexible since some pages may receive more notice than others. Pages older than about 3–6 weeks are unlikely to be considered recently created; pages older than about 3–4 months almost never are. Higher-profile pages are considered recently created for shorter periods than those with a lower profile.
↑Unlike a hoax, subject to deletion as vandalism under G3 as a bad faith attempt to deceive, CSD A11 is for topics that were or may have been actually created and are real, but have no notice or significance except among a small group of people, e.g., a newly invented drinking game or new word.
↑See Wikipedia:Merge and delete for an explanation as to why redirects created by merges cannot be deleted in most cases.
↑Before deleting this latter type of file/page, check whether the MediaWiki engine can read it by previewing a resized thumbnail of it. Even if it renders, if it contains significant superfluous information that cannot be accounted for as metadata directly relating to the file data, it may be deleted. It is always preferred to correct the problem by uploading a file that contains only good data plus acceptable metadata.
↑Content from file description pages that is relevant to the Commons should be copied over before deleting the local page. If necessary, copy the attribution history as well.
↑Wikipedia Books are a legacy feature and are slated to eventually be converted into reading lists. See phab:T394563.
↑In such a case, the act of moving the page to draftspace counts as a human edit that restarts the G13 eligibility clock.
↑The primary criteria to count as unambiguous are that the creator has no non-userspace edits and the page has no non-bot-flagged edits in the past six months. See Wikipedia:Bots/Requests for approval/CSD U6 Bot for the full definition.
12"Lengthy" is not precisely defined, but note that it is not uncommon for established Wikipedians' user pages to have several paragraphs about their personal and professional lives. Less leeway may be given on length for content that veers closer to being promotional.
↑A link indirectly providing some way to give the user money (e.g., a YouTube channel that enables paid subscriptions, or a personal website with a donation button) does not automatically make it primarily commercial.
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