Help:Maintenance template removal

Many Wikipedia pages display maintenance templates that identify problems. You may have arrived at this help page after clicking a link on a maintenance template saying " Learn how and when to remove this template message ".

Maintenance templates are added and removed by volunteers. This help page explains the process for examining and removing such templates.

Overview
Maintenance templates (or "tags") are not removed automatically. Even if you fix the issue(s) described in a maintenance template, the tag will remain in the article until you or someone else manually removes it. The mechanics of removal are usually as simple as clicking "Edit" at the top of the page or in the section involved (if you're not already in edit mode), removing the code that produces the display of the template, leaving an edit summary, and saving the page.

It is not okay to remove maintenance templates until the issue flagged by the template is remedied first—that is, until the maintenance tag is no longer valid—unless it truly did not belong in the first place.

Wikipedia works because of the efforts of volunteers just like you, making bold edits to help build this encyclopedia. Fixing problems and then removing maintenance templates when you are done is important in that effort.

Addressing the flagged problem
We don't know which maintenance tag brought you to this page, and thus what specific problem needs attention. However, every maintenance template contains links to help pages, policies, guidelines, or other relevant pages that provide information on the problem the template was placed to flag. You will also find guidance on some of the more common templates below.

Many common templates address problems with article citations and references, or their lack – because reliable sourcing is the lifeblood of Wikipedia articles and at the core of all of Wikipedia's content policies and guidelines, such as notability, verifiability, neutral point of view, and no original research. But a host of other issues may be flagged, including tone and style of writing, structure, and formatting, lack of links to or from other articles, compliance with Wikipedia's manual of style and the lack of a lead section.

Please make sure the issue has been resolved before removing the template. That does require some effort on your part—to understand both the problem and how to solve it.

An example
If the issue flagged by the maintenance template is that the article contains no references, a citation needed template used might be –  typically placed by the code you would see when wikitext (source) editing:.

It is important to understand that what you see when reading an article, and what you see when editing it, are different unless you're in Visual editing mode. Thus, the above code, only seen when doing source editing, results in the display of the 'called' template below: Example:

This template contains several links, indicated by the words and phrases in blue. Three of these links are to pages that, when explored, provide context and resources for you to understand why the template was placed on the page, and how to address the issue of the article being unreferenced: Whatever maintenance tag brought you to this help page should likewise contain relevant explanatory links addressed to whatever its issue is. Read these explanatory and contextual pages to learn about the problem and what it is you need to do to take care of it. Again, some of the more common maintenance templates seen are addressed in the specific template guidance section below.
 * "cite", which links to the content guideline Citing sources;
 * "sources", which links to the policy Verifiability; and
 * "adding citations to reliable sources", which links to a help page providing a how-to guide to the basics of citing references.

When to remove
Maintenance templates are not meant to be in articles permanently. Any user without a conflict of interest may remove a maintenance template in any of the following circumstances:


 * 1) When the issue has been adequately addressed;
 * 2) Upon determining that the issue has been resolved (perhaps by someone else);
 * 3) If it reasonably appears that the template did not belong when placed or was added in error. Consider first discussing the matter with the original placer of the template (unless this user is no longer active on Wikipedia). In any case, if the issue appears contentious, seek consensus on the talk page;
 * 4) When an article talk  page discussion has not been initiated (for templates requesting it);
 * 5) When there is consensus on the talk page (or elsewhere) as to how to address the flagged issue, and you are reasonably implementing those changes. (It is good practice to note the location of the consensus in the edit summary accompanying your removal, ideally with a link to the location);
 * 6) When it can reasonably be concluded that the template is no longer relevant, such as a  template appearing in an article that no longer documents a current event;
 * 7) If the maintenance template is of a type that requires support but is not fully supported. For example, neutrality-related templates such as  (associated with the conflict of interest guideline) or  (associated with the neutral point of view policy) strongly recommend that the tagging editor initiate a discussion (generally on the article's talk page) to support the placement of the tag. If the tagging editor failed to do so, or the discussion is dormant, and there is no other support for the template, it can be removed;
 * 8) You may remove a template when according to your best judgment the lack of edits and/or talk page discussion should be interpreted as the issue not worth fixing (as a form of "silent consensus"). Please note there is currently no consensus for general age-related removal of maintenance templates – that is, removing a template purely or chiefly because it is old is not considered a sufficient argument. Exception: removing POV-related templates whose discussions have gone dormant is encouraged, as addressed in the bullet point immediately above;
 * 9) Lastly, there are times when a person attempting to address a maintenance template that flags some fundamental matter may find that the issue cannot actually be addressed. For example, if an article is flagged as lacking citations to reliable, secondary sources, written by third-parties to the topic, and a user seeing the maintenance templates discovers that such sources appear not to exist, that usually means the article should be deleted. In such cases, it is not so much that the template does not belong and should be removed, but rather that flagging the page for maintenance will never address the more critical issue that the page itself does not belong on Wikipedia at all.

When not to remove
You should not remove maintenance templates if any of the following apply:


 * 1) You do not understand the issues raised by the template;
 * 2) The issue has not yet been resolved;
 * 3) There is ongoing activity or discussion related to the template issue;
 * 4) The problem that the maintenance template flags is plainly and unambiguously required for a proper article under Wikipedia's policies and guidelines;
 * 5) You have been paid to edit the article or have some other conflict of interest [exceptions apply: see individual template documentation].

Removal
Have you carefully read the help pages and thoroughly fixed the problem? Or have you made a considered decision that the template is not, or is no longer, applicable? Great! Now, to remove the maintenance template: That's it. Thank you!
 * 1) Either click on "edit" or "edit source" at the top of the page, or if the maintenance template is not at the top but somewhere in the body of the article, you might instead use a section edit link;
 * 2) If you are editing wikitext ("source" editing): Delete the template code. The template code you see in this edit mode will usually be in the following form, as in the example above:  .  If you are editing using VisualEditor: Click on the template (tag), which will then turn blue. Press the "Delete" or backspace key on your keyboard.
 * 3) Leave a descriptive edit summary, e.g., "Removed [insert the name of template] because I have fixed the issue;"
 * 4) Click.

Changing a template
Problems flagged by some templates may imply secondary problems that will still exist after you take care of the main issue. In such cases, it may be more appropriate to switch the template to another applicable one following your edits, rather than just removing it. The reasoning behind the change in templates should be addressed in the edit summary.

A case in point is the template example used above. It is placed on pages with no references. Thus, adding just one suitable reference renders that maintenance template inapplicable. However, that change does not take care of the overarching issue of poor sourcing. In this example, a change to a different template may be appropriate, depending on the type, quality, depth, and manner of sourcing added to fix the issue, such as, , , or one of the many others listed at Template messages/Sources of articles.

Conversely, some templates flag highly discrete issues where there is no need to consider a switch to another template. For example, if an article is "orphaned" – no other articles in the main article namespace link to it – then once that is taken care of (by the addition of links to it from other articles), the issue is gone entirely and the tag's removal is unambiguous.

When a flagged issue has been addressed in parts of an article but remains in discrete sections, clarity may be served by replacing the template with a section variant, or by use of inline cleanup tags, if such versions of the template exist.

In some cases, it may be helpful to request a review of a maintenance template's removal or proposed removal with the editor who initially added it to the article at issue.

Specific template guidance
This section guides you on how to address some of the more common specific templates that may have brought you to this help page. More detailed information about the templates can be found by following the links to the templates themselves.

Click "show" at the right to display the instructions.

Some articles will be flagged for multiple discrete problems using a single template:. If you take care of one or more problems that it flags but not all, do not remove the template entirely but just those parameters in it that you have fixed. The example below shows three different issues flagged by this template: If you address the "orphaning" issue, but not the other two, remove just the line that flagged the orphan issue and leave the others intact. Thus, your removal would leave the template in this state. See the sections below for how to address some of the more common problems flagged by templates that may be wrapped into this template.

All of Wikipedia's core content policies and guidelines have as a common denominator the need for reliable sourcing. For example, the content of Wikipedia articles must be verifiable in reliable sources; the notability of a topic demonstrated through such reliable sources that are secondary in nature, which are independent of the topic and treat the subject in substantive detail (not just "mere mentions"); and to establish that the content is not original research, the sources cited must directly support the material being presented without analysis or synthesis to reach or imply a conclusion that is not stated in the sources.

, typically placed by the code, having redirects such as  ,  ,  ,  , and  , and displaying when reading as:

flags the issue of an article containing no references at all. This template no longer applies once a single reference appears in the article, whether placed through the preferred method of inline citations, ones appearing in a general references section, or even through such a poor method as including an embedded raw link.

To address the issue, add citations to reliable sources. Because of their importance, Wikipedia contains numerous instruction pages on aspects of referencing. We suggest starting with Help:Referencing for beginners and Help:Introduction to referencing/1, and then seeing Citing sources for a more involved treatment, noting that each contains see also sections linking to additional help pages, guides, and tutorials. A visual guide to placing inline citations through  tags may also help, and appears below.

{| class="wikitable" In brief, anywhere you want a footnote to appear in a piece of text, you place an opening tag. Note the closing slash ("/"). For multiple use of a single reference, the opening ref tag is given a name, like so: tag. Each time you want to use that footnote again, you simply use the first element with a slash, like so:. For these references to appear, you must tell the software where to display them, using either the code Multiple citation   use.
 * + Formatting references using inline citations
 * - style="vertical-align: top;"
 * colspan=2 | All information in Wikipedia articles should be verified by citations to reliable sources. Our preferred method of citation is using the "cite.php" form of inline citations, using the elements. Using this method, each time a particular source is mined for information (don't copy word-for-word!), a footnote is placed in the text ("inline"), that takes one to the detail of the source when clicked, set forth in a references section after the text of the article.

Researching the tagged issue
As noted previously, most templates contain links to guidance pages. Additionally, many templates have documentation that provides more information about the template's flagged issue, which is displayed when you visit the template page itself.

To access the template and thereby see its documentation, type into the search field Template:, followed by the name of the template, seen when you view its placement in the Edit interface (typically found in the first lines of the article). The first "parameter" is the name of the template.

For example, if you found this in the Edit interface,, then you would visit the template itself by searching for Template:Unreferenced. The accompanying documentation for all maintenance templates, if it exists, can be located in this way.

Still need help?
If you've read through this page and are still confused about what needs to be done to fix an issue on a page and remove a maintenance template, try asking at the Teahouse, a page designed for new users to ask questions. Alternatively, you could try the more general Help desk, or seek live assistance at the IRC channel: #wikipedia-en-help.