Wikipedia:Good article criteria

Good article nominations

The good article criteria are the six standards by which a good article nomination (GAN) may be compared and judged to be a good article (GA). A good article does not have to meet the more demanding featured article criteria.

Criteria

The six good article criteria are the only aspects that should be considered when assessing whether to pass or fail a GAN. Other comments designed to improve the article are encouraged during the review process but should not be mandated as part of the assessment.

Immediate failures

Shortcuts

An article may fail without further review (known as a quick fail) if, prior to the review:

It is a long way from meeting any one of the six good article criteria
It contains copyright violations
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}})
It is not stable due to edit warring on the page
It has issues noted in a previous GA review that still have not been adequately addressed, as determined by a reviewer who has not previously reviewed the article

In all other cases, the nominator deserves a full review against the six criteria. For most reviews, the nominator is given a chance to address any issues raised by the reviewer before the article is failed. Often the nomination is brought up to standard during the review.

The six good article criteria

Shortcut

WP:GACR6

A good article is:

Well-written:
1. the prose is clear, concise, and understandable to an appropriately broad audience; spelling and grammar are correct; and
2. it complies with the Manual of Style guidelines for lead sections, layout, words to watch, fiction, and list incorporation.
Verifiable with no original research:
1. it contains a list of all references (sources of information), presented in accordance with the layout style guideline;
2. reliable sources are cited inline. All content that could reasonably be challenged, except for plot summaries and that which summarizes cited content elsewhere in the article, must be cited no later than the end of the paragraph (or line if the content is not in prose);
3. it contains no original research; and
4. it contains no copyright violations or plagiarism.
Broad in its coverage:
1. it addresses the main aspects of the topic; and
2. it stays focused on the topic without going into unnecessary detail (see summary style).
Neutral: it represents viewpoints fairly and without editorial 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.
Illustrated, if possible, by media such as images, video, or audio:
1. media are tagged with their copyright statuses, and valid non-free use rationales are provided for non-free content; and
2. media are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions.

What cannot be a good article?

Stand-alone lists, portals, sounds, and images: these items should be nominated for featured list and featured picture status, if applicable.
Disambiguation pages and stubs: these pages cannot meet the criteria.
Featured articles: a good article loses its status when promoted to a featured article. Demoted featured articles are not automatically graded as good articles and must be reassessed for quality.

Notes