Wikipedia:Article titles

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This naming conventions page sets out Wikipedia's policy on how to name articles. It is supplemented by guidelines that advise on how to apply the principles set out here, advise on managing conflicts between them. The naming conventions should be interpreted in conjunction with other policies, particularly the three core content policies: Verifiability, No original research and Neutral point of view.

For information on the procedure for renaming an article, see Help:Moving a page and Wikipedia:Requested moves.

Deciding an article name

Article titles should name or describe the subject of the article and make Wikipedia easy to use. Article titles do this if they are:

  • Recognizable – Use names and terms most commonly used, and so most likely to be recognized, for the topic of the article.
  • Easy to find – Use terms that readers are most likely to look for in order to find the article (and to which editors will most naturally link from other articles).
  • Precise – Be precise, but only as precise as is necessary to identify the topic of the article unambiguously.
  • Concise – Keep it brief. A good article title is to the point. This makes finding and recognising the article easier (and makes life easier for editors linking to it).
  • Consistent – Similar articles generally should share similar terms. This may be true of a series of articles sharing a common topic or articles describing different topics but from a common field.

In addition, article titles are constrained by unavoidable technical restrictions, including the necessity that titles be unique for every article.[1]

Most articles will have a simple and obvious name that satisfies most or all of these. If so, use it. It may be necessary to balance or trade-off one or more of the above guidelines against the one another. In such situations, article names are determined by consensus. Consensus on naming articles in specific fields, or with respect to particular problems, is stated and explained in the guidelines below. When no consensus exists, it is established through discussion, always with the above principles in mind. At all times, the choice of an article name should ultimately be agreed upon in terms of what is in the best interest of readers over editors and of a general audience over specialists.

Redirects should be created to articles that may reasonably be searched for or linked to under two or more names (such as different spellings or former names). Conversely, a name that could refer to several different articles may require disambiguation.

Use common names

Further information: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names)
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Articles are normally titled using the most common English-language name of a person or thing that is the subject of the article. If the article's subject has no evident name, a concise, recognizable and neutral description is used instead. In determining what this name is, we follow the usage of reliable sources. As part of this, the name chosen for an article, while in common use, should be neither vulgar nor pedantic: readers will not expect such names to be the titles of an article in an encyclopedia such as Wikipedia.

Occasionally, specific subject domains may follow a standardised precedent that is not strictly the common name (e.g. articles relating to flora or medicine). Where so, the choice of article titles adopted should follow a neutral and common convention specific to that subject domain but which otherwise adheres to the general principles in naming articles on Wikipedia. The decision to adopt such a convention may be influenced by factors such as where:

  • Several common names are available for articles across the subject domain
  • There is no obvious method to determine which names are the most common and otherwise suitable common names are ambiguous

Be precise when necessary

Further information: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (precision) and Wikipedia:Disambiguation

Articles are named as precisely as is necessary to indicate their scope accurately, while avoiding over-precision. Readers should not have to read into the article to find which of several meanings of the title is the actual subject, but there is no virtue in excess. Wikipedia also has disambiguation pages to help readers find the meaning they want. When (as with Paris), the unmodified term has an overwhelmingly predominant meaning, we use the simple term for that article; see WP:PRIMARYUSAGE.

All articles must, by the design of Wikipedia, have a unique name. If there are several articles with the same name, it may be that one concerns the primary topic for that name; if so, that one keeps the common name, and the others must be disambiguated. It may be that using an alternative common name for a topic is the simplest way to disambiguate; if not, add a disambiguator in parentheses. The articles should be linked, to help readers get where they want to go, either to each other or to a disambiguation page, normally called topic or topic (disambiguation).

Subsidiary articles

Do not use an article name that suggests a hierarchy of articles. For example, an article on transportation in Azerbaijan might be considered a subsidiary article of the main article Azerbaijan, but it should not be given a name like "Azerbaijan/Transport" or "Azerbaijan (transport)" – use Transport in Azerbaijan. (Forward slashes are nonetheless used to create subpages in non-article namespaces. See also the technical restrictions on their use.)

Occasionally, subsidiary articles may have more complex names than normal, especially if they are only intended to be accessed by a link from the main article. For example, Isaac Newton has the subsidiary article Isaac Newton's early life and achievements. However, if a common name for such a topic is available, that is always preferred.

For how to link between main and subsidiary articles, see Wikipedia:Summary style. It is also important to avoid content forks.

Controversial names

Further information: Wikipedia:Naming conflict

The purpose of an article's title is to enable that article to be found by interested readers, and nothing more. In particular, the choice of title is not influenced by disputes about whether a name is "right" in a moral sense. Note also that the use of one name as an article title does not preclude the use of alternative names in appropriate contexts in the text of articles.

Nor does the use of one name for one article require that all related articles use the same name. The advantages of consistency and of common usage should be considered; there is often some reason, such as anachronism, for inconsistencies in common usage. For example, Wikipedia has articles on both Volgograd and the Battle of Stalingrad.

Editing for the sole purpose of changing one controversial name to another is strongly discouraged. If an article name has been stable for a long time, and there is no good reason to change it, it should not be changed. If it has never been stable for a long time, and no consensus can be reached on what the name should be, default to the name used by the first major contributor after the article ceased to be a stub.[2]

Any potentially controversial proposal to change a name should be discussed and advertised at WP:RM before any change is made. However, debating controversial names is often unproductive, and there are many other ways to help improve Wikipedia.

Where articles have descriptive names, they are neutrally worded. A specific example is that the term allegation should be avoided in a title unless the article concerns charges in a legal case or accusations of illegality under civil, criminal or international law which have not yet been proven in a court of law.

Disambiguation

See the sections of the disambiguation guideline dealing with naming the disambiguation page and naming the specific topic articles.

Use English words

Further information: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (use English)

Articles are named in English unless the foreign form of a name has greater recognition by English-speaking readers. The choice between anglicized and local spellings should follow English usage (e.g., Besançon, Søren Kierkegaard and Göttingen, but Nuremberg, delicatessen and Florence). Other significant forms of the name should be given in the first line of the article.[3] Sometimes the usual English version will be the same as the local form, as in Madrid; sometimes it will differ somewhat, as in Franz Josef Strauss; and rarely, as with Mount Everest, it will be completely different.

National varieties of English

Further information: Wikipedia:Manual of Style, National varieties of English

All national varieties of English spelling are acceptable in article names; Wikipedia does not prefer any national variety over any other. American spellings should not be respelled to British standards, and vice versa, unless there is some other advantage to the encyclopedia; for example, both color and colour are acceptable and both spellings are found in article titles (such as color gel and colour state). However, an article title on a topic that has strong ties to a particular English-speaking nation should use the variety of English appropriate for that nation.

Prefer standard English over trademarks

Further information: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (trademarks)

Article titles follow standard English text formatting in the case of trademarks, unless the trademarked spelling is demonstrably most common usage in sources independent of the owner of the trademark. Items in full or partial uppercase (such as Invader ZIM) should have standard capitalization (Invader Zim); however, if the name is ambiguous, and one meaning is usually capitalized, this is one possible method of disambiguation.

Exceptions include article titles with the first letter lowercase and the second letter uppercase, such as iPod and eBay. For these, see the technical restrictions guideline.

Name construction

Special characters and formatting

Technically all Unicode characters can be used in page titles (subject to the restrictions). However the following should be noted:

ʻ, ʾ, ʿ, ᾿, ῾, ‘, “, ’, ”, c, combining diacritical marks combined with a "space" character) should be avoided in page names. A common exception is the curly apostrophe ' (as in Anthony d'Offay), which should, however, be used sparingly, e.g. Shia instead of Shi'a.

  • Non-language characters such as "♥", "★", and "*", when found in advertisements or logos, normally do not represent common English usage, and are not used in titles.
  • Article names which are quotes (or song titles etc.) are not enclosed in quotation marks. For example, To be, or not to be is the article, while "To be, or not to be" is a redirect to that article.
  • Formatting, such as italics or bolding, is technically achievable in page titles, but is used only in special cases. The main use is to produce italics for taxonomic names of genera and species. See Italics and formatting.

Titles containing "and"

Sometimes two or more closely related or complementary concepts are most sensibly covered by a single article. Where possible, use a single name covering all cases: for example, Endianness covers the concepts "big-endian" and "little-endian". Where no reasonable overarching name is available, construct an article title using "and", as in Acronym and initialism; Pioneer 6, 7, 8, and 9; Promotion and relegation. (The individual terms – such as Acronym – should redirect to the combined page, or be linked there via a disambiguation page or hatnote if they have other meanings.)

If there is no obvious ordering, place the more commonly encountered concept first, or if that is not applicable, use alphabetical order. Alternative names using reverse ordering (such as Initialism and acronym) should be redirects.

Avoid use of "and" in ways that appear biased. For example, use Islamic terrorism, not "Islam and terrorism".

Conventions by topic area

This section lists naming conventions applicable to articles on particular types of subject. Some of the conventions appear here, but in most cases the details can be found on other naming conventions pages.

People

For guidance on naming articles about individual persons, see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (people).

The usual format is First name – Last name. The above guideline concentrates on these cases where this format is not obviously applicable, for example, how to deal with middle names, with Iberian naming customs, with names of people from countries where the surname comes first, with disambiguation (when several people share the same name), etc.

For certain more specific classes of people, see:

Places

For articles on places, see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (geographic names). Local names are generally used unless there is a more common English equivalent. Methods of disambiguation differ depending on the type of place, and are often country-specific.

Living things

See:

Note that in official common names of birds, each word is capitalized, as in Bald Eagle (but lower case is used after hyphens, as in Red-winged Blackbird).

Literature, music and entertainment

Literature: see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (books), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (comics), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (films), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (manuscript names).

Films: when disambiguating a film from something else, use "(film)" in the title when only one film had that name, and "(YEAR film)" in the title when there are two or more films by that name, as in Titanic (1997 film).

Radio and television: see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (broadcasting) and Wikipedia:Naming conventions (television).

Music: see Wikipedia:Naming conventions (pieces of music), Wikipedia:Naming conventions (operas). For musical works, name the article in its most common form, adding the composer's surname in parentheses after it if more than one piece has that title. For example, War Requiem, Violin Concerto (Berg), Symphony No. 6 (Mahler).

Bands, albums and songs: in band names and titles of songs or albums, capitalize words that are not coordinating conjunctions (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so), prepositions (in, to, over), articles (an, a, the), or the word to when used to form an infinitive. Note that short verbs (Is, Are, and Do) and pronouns (Me, It, and His) are capitalized. Do not replicate stylized typography in logos and album art, though a redirect may be appropriate (for example, KoЯn redirects to Korn).

When necessary, disambiguation should be done using (band), (album), or (song) (such as Anthrax (band) or Off the Wall (album)); use further disambiguation only when needed (for example X (U.S. band), X (Australian band)). Unless multiple albums of the same name exist (such as Down to Earth), they do not need to be disambiguated any further. For example, Down to Earth (Ozzy Osbourne album) is fine, but Off the Wall (Michael Jackson album) is unnecessary. Disambiguate albums and songs by artist and not by year unless the artist releases multiple albums with the same name. When a track is not strictly a song (in other words a composition without lyrics, or an instrumental that is not a cover of a song), disambiguation should be done using (composition) or (instrumental).

Language-specific and country-specific topics

Articles and categories relating to some aspect of a specific country should generally be named "(item) of (country)" (as in History of France). See: Wikipedia:Naming conventions (country-specific topics).

The following pages contain naming guidelines for articles relating to particular countries or languages:

ǫ) with the character 'ö'.

For proposed naming conventions and guidelines relating to certain other countries and languages, see Proposed naming conventions and guidelines.

Country-specific guidance on the names of places can also be found at Naming conventions (geographic names).

Other topic areas

Aircraft: see Naming conventions (aircraft).

Astronomy: see Naming conventions (astronomical objects).

Chemistry: see Naming conventions (chemistry).

Companies: see Naming conventions (companies).

Elections: use the format "Demonym type election, date", as in Canadian federal election, 1867. For future elections of uncertain date, the format Next Irish general election can be used. For special elections or elections of subnational parliaments, follow the format Scottish Parliament election, 2007 and Nepalese Constituent Assembly election, 2007.

Events: see Naming conventions (events).

Government: see Naming conventions (government departments and ministers).

Languages: see Naming conventions (languages). Human languages which share their names with some other thing should be suffixed with "language". If the language's name is unique, there is no need for any suffix. For example, English language, but Esperanto. Families and groups of languages are pluralized (Niger-Congo languages).

Laws: For UK legislation, acts should be titled with the short name form and then the year, without any comma between them ("Foo Bar Act 1974"). There should be a redirect from "Foo Bar Act" if the act is uniquely named. If several acts have the same short name, then "Foo Bar Act" should redirect to the primary topic if one exists; otherwise it should either serve as a disambiguation page (as at Representation of the People Act) or redirect to "Foo Bar Acts" (plural), which should be an article about the series of acts.

If two acts are passed with the same name and year in two parliaments as different enactments of the same piece of legislation, then have just one article (as with Act of Union 1707). However if the two acts are different pieces of legislation, use parenthetical disambiguation based on jurisdiction or entity, as in European Communities Act 1972 (UK) and European Communities Act 1972 (Ireland).

Lists: for articles which are lists, see the list naming convention. The usual format is List of foos, rather than "Foos", "Famous foos", "Listing of important foos", "List of noted foos", "List of all foos", etc. If a list becomes so long as to necessitate a split, follow Naming conventions (long lists), where the preferred format is List of foos: A, and for ranges: List of foos: W-X-Y-Z.

Medicine: see the medicine-related naming convention.

Money: for articles on currencies and other money-related topics, see the numismatics naming convention.

Numbers and dates: see Naming conventions (numbers and dates).

Organizations: the general "use English" principle applies: name pages with the English translation and place the original native name on the first line of the article unless the native form is more commonly used in English media than the English form.

Political parties: Naming conventions (political parties).

Programming languages: these are disambiguated with the suffix "(programming language)" if needed. For example, VBScript, but Python (programming language).

Religion: for issues relating to the Latter Day Saints movement (Mormonism), see Naming conventions (Latter Day Saints).

Schools: for disambiguation when schools share the same name, use the most general locale of a school in parentheses.

Ships: see Naming conventions (ships).

Sports teams: in cases where there is no ambiguity whatsoever as to the official spelling of a club's name in English, the official name should be used. "No ambiguity" means that the name is used on the English-language section of the club's official website, and the name has been adopted at least by a significant section of the English-language media, and it is recognizable, and it is not easily confused with other clubs' names.

In cases where there is some ambiguity as to the official spelling of a club's name in English, the name most commonly used by the English-language media should be used (as determined using the number of hits at Google News).

Where an article is clearly about a particular sport you do not need to put a prefix or suffix like 'RLFC', 'CCC' or 'FK' throughout the article text, merely in the title. For example, FC Barcelona is the category name but throughout the body Barcelona is sufficient. However, for cross-sport references it may be appropriate, ie "St Helens share Knowsley Road stadium with St Helens FC". Do not extend this to nicknames as they may confuse unfamiliar users.

For North American teams, use both place and nicknames; ie Detroit Red Wings rather than Detroit or Red Wings, as non-Americans may not know who the Bears or the Falcons are and it aids cross-referencing. Furthermore, where there is more than one team from a city – New York Giants and New York Jets, for example – this specificity is essential.

Trademarks: see Manual of Style (trademarks).

Video games: see Naming conventions (video games).

Non-article pages

Naming of disambiguation pages is covered at the disambiguation guideline.

For the naming of Wikipedia categories, see Naming conventions (categories).

For stub categories and templates, see the stub naming convention.

The naming of pages in other namespaces generally follows the same rules for capitalization etc. as with articles. Note, however, the possible use of the forward slash character to make subpages, which does not apply in article space.

Proposed naming conventions and guidelines

Main page: Wikipedia:Policies and guidelines § Proposing guidelines and policies

Proposals for new naming conventions and guidelines should be advertised at Wikipedia talk:Naming conventions, at Requests for comment, the Village Pump, or any related pages. If a strong consensus has formed, the proposal is adopted and should be listed on this page.

New naming conventions for specific categories of articles often arise from WikiProjects.

For a list of current and former proposals, see Proposed naming conventions and guidelines.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ It is technically possible to make articles appear to have the same title, but this is never done, as it would be highly confusing to readers, and cause editors to make incorrect links.
  2. ^ This paragraph was adopted to stop move warring. It is an adaptation of the wording in the MOS which is based on Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Jguk
  3. ^ When it is not practical or aesthetically pleasing to place all of them in the first line, place one or two significant forms in the first paragraph and the others elsewhere in the article.
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