Wikipedia:Drafts: Difference between revisions

This is not the page to create a new draft. For that, please see #Creating and editing drafts below.

This is an information page. It is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines; rather, its purpose is to explain certain aspects of Wikipedia's norms, customs, technicalities, or practices. It may reflect differing levels of consensus and vetting.

Shortcut WP:DRAFTS

Drafts are administration pages in the Draft namespace where new articles may be created and developed. They help new articles to develop and receive feedback before being moved to Wikipedia's mainspace. If you are logged in, creating a draft before directly publishing the article is optional. Editors may instead choose to create draft pages in their userspace, or directly into mainspace, if they prefer.

Drafts are not indexed by most search engines including Google,^{[note 1]} meaning most readers will not find them. Anyone may search and view drafts on Wikipedia directly using Wikipedia's built-in search engine: simply choose "Advanced", then tick "Draft" or "Draft talk" on the list of options (i.e. in this manner). The list of all Draft pages is at Special:AllPages or Special:PrefixIndex. You may also view recent Draft changes to the namespace, newly created drafts or visit a random draft.

Anyone, including users who are not logged in, may create and edit drafts. Drafts in the namespace have "Draft:" before their normal title, and also have an associated draft talk page. Users who have VisualEditor enabled will be able to use VisualEditor just like on articles. WP:Autoconfirmed rights are required for moving drafts to article mainspace page but you may request a page move at Wikipedia:Requested moves if you are not yet autoconfirmed, or if there is a technical barrier to the move, or if the retitling is expected to be controversial and you need to seek consensus for the name change.

• Articles may be moved directly to Draftspace as a result of i) a deletion discussion, or indirectly following deletion and a Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion. Link to the original deletion discussion and the decision to move the article into draftspace.

• As part of the review of new pages, editors holding the permission of New Page Reviewer (see Wikipedia:Requests for permissions/New page reviewer) may unilaterally draftify a an unreviewed page in the following circumstances:

• New Page Reviewers may draftify unreviewed pages as part of new page review.

A reviewer unilaterally draftifying is appropriate if all of the following are true:

(1) The topic has some potential merit

(2) Is not good enough

(3) And there is no evidence of active improvement

Expanding on the above:

Has some merit

(1a) eg. The topic is plausibly notable (if not, it should be deleted, CSD#A7 or AfD; do not draftify junk)

Not good enough

(2a) The page is obviously unready for mainspace. It does not meet WP:STUB; or it would have very little chance of survival at WP:AFD; or it meets any speedy deletion criterion.

(2b) The topic does not look so important, is possibly not worth the effort of fixing, and no great loss if deleted due to expiring in draftspace.

(2c) The topic is not a new topic likely to be of interest to multiple people (e.g. Current affairs).

(2d) The page is a recent creation, by an inexpericed editor. (old pages, and pages by experienced editors deserve an AfD discussion)

And no evidence of active support

(3a) There is no evidence of actively working on it.

(3a) There is no assertion that the page belongs in mainspace, such as a clear statement to that effect in the edit history, or on the talk page, or a revert of a previous draftification.

Qualifications and responsibilities of the draftifier. To unilaterally draftify, you should:

(4a) have the New Page Reviewer reviewer right (includes all admins)

(4b) Notify the author (eg as facilitated by the script User:Evad37/MoveToDraft.js)

(4c) Be accountable for your draftification decisions per the standard described at Wikipedia:Administrators#Accountability

• An author of a page has a right to object to draftification, and to have the matter discussed at WP:AfD. If an author raises and objection, move the page back to mainspace and list at AfD.

Advice for the authors of draftified pages:

Authors of draftified pages should try to understand and respond to the reason for draftification, and then use the WP:AfC submission process to have the page moved back to mainspace. The author is encouraged to ask the draftifier questions, or to use the {{Help me}} template.

• A recommended tool for incubating articles is User:Evad37/MoveToDraft. Especially for users with the page mover user-right, which allows moving without leaving a redirect. For those without the page mover user-right, it is important to tag the redirect for deletion with CSD R2 after moving the article to draft.

• (Optionally) add the template {{Draft article}} at the top of the draft (not the talk page), along with the template's parameters |name and |subject=. A list of appropriate subject fields can be found here.
• Disable any categories by inserting a colon before the word "Category". Example: change [[Category:Living people]] to [[:Category:Living people]]
• Non-free content cannot be included in draft articles per Wikipedia's policy on where non-free media is allowed. Any desired non-free content should be added to the article once it has been moved to the mainspace.

Publishing a draft requires an editor to use the page move function to move it in the Main (article) namespace. This means that anonymous editors, or registered editors not autoconfirmed, will need to request publication by inserting into their drafts the relevant template for requesting a page move. Editors may also optionally submit drafts for review via the articles for creation process.

An article created in draftspace does not belong to the editor who created it, and any other user may edit, publish, redirect, merge or seek deletion of any draft.^{[note 2]} Editors who do not want that to happen should use their sandbox or userpage subpages.

Drafts are meant to be works in progress, and most will not meet Wikipedia's standards for quality at first.

The general section of the criteria for speedy deletion may be applied to drafts. Drafts that are copyright violations, vandalism, BLP violations, tests, or blatant advertising or promotion will be speedily deleted. No special deletion policy for drafts has been decided.

Drafts are not subject to article deletion criteria like "no context" or no indication of notability so creators may have time to establish notability. Drafts may be nominated for deletion at Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion, but not on a primary concern of notability.^{[note 3]}

Drafts that have not been edited in six months may be deleted under criterion for speedy deletion G13. Most G13 nominations for deletion are done by bots or users using Twinkle, processes that inform the draft creator on their talk page. Pages deleted under G13 may be restored upon request at WP:REFUND (see Wikipedia:Requests for undeletion/G13).

Redirects that are a result of page moves from the draft namespace to the main namespace should be retained.^{[note 4]}

• Request for Comment for the new namespace on the Village pump (proposals)
• Wikipedia:Namespaces

• See the technical requirements and future development ideas on MediaWiki.org