User:InfiniteNexus/citations

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A guide to best practices when it comes to formatting citations. The contents of this page have neither been endorsed nor vetted by the community, and are not to be taken as guidelines or policies.

Order of parameters

Cite web, news, and magazine

For consistency, all citations using {{Cite web}}, {{Cite news}}, or {{Cite magazine}} should follow the same parameter order, as illustrated below. This is adapted from the order used by the ProveIt gadget when normalizing {{Cite web}} citations.

Most commonly used parameters in horizontal format

For most sources: <ref>{{Cite web |last= |first= |date= |title= |url= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |website=}}</ref> Additional parameters: <ref>{{Cite web |last1= |first1= |author-link1= |last2= |first2= |author-link2= |date= |title= |trans-title= |url= |url-access= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |website= |publisher= |issn= |language= |quote=}}</ref>

Other templates

Other citation templates should follow a similar order, as illustrated below:

Most commonly used parameters in horizontal format

For {{Cite journal}}: <ref>{{Cite journal |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |url= |url-access= |url-status=live |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |journal= |volume= |issue= |doi= |arxiv=}}</ref> For {{Cite arXiv}}: <ref>{{Cite arXiv |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |class= |eprint=}}</ref> For {{Cite press release}}: <ref>{{Cite press release |date= |title= |url= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |publisher= |via=}}</ref> For {{Cite tweet}}: <ref>{{Cite tweet |last= |first= |author-link= |user= |date= |title= |number= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date=}}</ref> For {{Cite Instagram}}: <ref>{{Cite Instagram |last= |first= |author-link= |user= |date= |title= |postid= |location= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date=}}</ref> For {{Cite AV media}}: <ref>{{Cite AV media |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |url= |url-access= |type= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |via=}}</ref> For {{Cite episode}}: <ref>{{Cite episode |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |url= |url-access= |series= |series-link= |season= |number= |episode-link= |time= |network= |quote=}}</ref> For {{Cite book}}: <ref>{{Cite book |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |url= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |publisher= |page= |isbn=}}</ref> For {{Cite podcast}}: <ref>{{Cite podcast |last= |first= |author-link= |date= |title= |url= |url-access= |url-status= |archive-url= |archive-date= |access-date= |website= |publisher= |via= |time=}}</ref>

Choosing a template

For the vast majority of news articles and webpages online, {{Cite web}} will be the go-to template for citing them.

As established by an RfC in 2022, online articles published by newspapers (such as The New York Times and The Washington Post) and news agencies (such as CNN and the BBC) should use {{Cite news}}, while online articles published by magazines (such as Time and Vanity Fair) should use {{Cite magazine}}. An easy way to determine whether a publication is considered a newspaper or magazine is by looking at the first sentence of its Wikipedia article.

If a source is covered by a specific-source template such as one listed above, that should be used instead of {{Cite web}}.

Parameters

Authors

If there is one credited author, use |last= |first=. If the author has a Wikipedia article, append the string with |author-link=

If there is more than one credited author, use |last1= |first1= |last2= |first2= and so forth. If the author(s) have Wikipedia articles, append each string with |author-link1=, |author-link2=, and so forth.

If there is no credited author, use |author=<!-- Byline -->. If there is no byline, omit the string outright.

Date

For articles written in American English, use the month–day–year (MDY) format for |date=; for articles written in British English, use the day–month–year (DMY) format for |date=. The date should be spelled out in words and in full, not numerically or abbreviated.

The publication date should use the time zone in which the publication is based in — for example, Pacific Time (PT) or Eastern Time (ET) for U.S. publications. Sometimes, a source displays a publication date and time that has been adjusted to match your time zone. If you are not located in the time zone of the publication, check to see if the date is embedded in the URL. Otherwise, you may have to manually convert time zones.

Title

The source's title in its original language should be used in |title=. If there is no title on the webpage itself, use the title in the browser tab header.

Per MOS:CONFORMTITLE, source titles should be adjusted to comply with Wikipedia's Manual of Style. In particular, quotation marks should be replaced by italics for title of works, while hyphens should be replaced by en dashes where appropriate. Do not correct misspellings; use {{as written|wo|rd [''sic'']}} instead — do not use the {{sic}} template.

If the source is not in English, append the string with |trans-title=. Google Translate may be used to translate the title to English.

URL

For |url=, convert HTTP to HTTPS unless the URL would be rendered inaccessible.

If the source has a soft paywall, append the string with |url-access=limited. If the source has a hard paywall, append the string with |url-access=subscription. If the source requires a free account, append the string with |url-access=registration. A list of commonly used sources with soft and hard paywalls can be found here.

Archive

It is good practice to always include an archived copy of the source, even if it is a live link. However, if the source is dynamic (e.g. Rotten Tomatoes) or inaccessible when viewed as an archived copy (e.g. streaming services), it may not be helpful to include an archived copy. Append {{cbignore}} to the end of the citation template to prevent bots from adding archives.

If the link is live, use |url-status=live. If the link is down, use |url-status=dead. If the link is live but no longer supports the content cited, use |url-status=deviated. If the source's domain has changed owners, use |url-status=usurped.

Copy-and-paste the earliest working archived copy of the source from the Wayback Machine onto |archive-url=. For some publications, such as Bloomberg News and The Wall Street Journal, a working archived copy may not be available; try archive.today instead.

For |archive-date=, use the same formatting used in |date=. Use the date displayed on the Wayback Machine, which is set to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

Access date

For |archive-date=, use the same formatting used in |date=. The time zone used should be set to UTC, which is the time zone used on Wikipedia and reflected in the page history. If an access date is missing and needs to be added retroactively, WikiBlame may be used to locate the date on which the text was added; otherwise, use the current date.

Work

In general, the generic |work= should be avoided and replaced with a more specific parameter.

• For {{Cite web}}, use |website= if the publication is a website (e.g. Business Insider) and |publisher= if the publication is an organization (e.g. Bloomberg News).
• For {{Cite news}}, use |newspaper= for newspapers (e.g. The New York Times) and |publisher= for news agencies (e.g. CNN) and wire agencies (e.g. Reuters); do not use |agency=.
• For {{Cite magazine}}, use |magazine= for magazines (e.g. Time).

An easy way to determine whether a publication should be italicized is by looking at the first sentence of its Wikipedia article. If a publication is embedded within another publication (e.g. Intelligencer), the "child" publication should use |website= in conjunction with the "parent" under |publisher=. Otherwise, the |publisher= parameter should generally not be used, per WP:CS1 § Work and publisher.

Citation bot may sometimes behave irrationally and attempt to make a bad change to this parameter. When this occurs, append {{cbignore}} to the end of the citation template to prevent it from doing so.

Other optional parameters

If the publication is a newspaper whose ISSN is widely used, include the ISSN in |issn=. A list of commonly used sources with ISSNs can be found here. If the source is not in English, include the foreign language of the source in |lang=; see WP:LANGCODE for a list of language codes.

If the claim is controversial, it may be beneficial to quote the pertinent portion of the source in |quote=. For more than three citations in a row, bundle the citations with an explanatory footnote in the following format: {{efn|Attributed to the following references: <ref>...</ref>}} Exceptional claims, including the use of superlatives such as acclaimed or widely, must be attributed by multiple reliable sources, typically in a citation bundle.

To prevent bots from modifying the citation, append {{cbignore}} to the end of the template. Alternatively and more aggressively, {{bots|name of the bot(s)}} may be placed at the top of the page to block selected or all bots from the article. If the source has many pages, append {{rp}} to the end of the template with the page number.