Wikipedia:Vital articles

Vital articles

Overview
Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5

Vital articles in Wikipedia

There are 6,926,153 articles on the English Wikipedia, and 50,000 (circa 0.73%) have been selected as vital articles to the project. They are organized into five levels: Level 1 contains the ten most vital articles, Level 2 contains the one hundred most vital articles (and by definition, includes the articles of Level 1), and each further level expands on the selection of the previous level, as follows:


Vital article Level	Target number of vital articles	Current situation (at end May 2024)
Vital article Level	Target number of vital articles	Current number	At or above -class (%)	At or above class (%)
1	10	10	10 (100%)	5 (50%)
2	100	100	67 (67%)	26 (26%)
3	1,000	999	617 (62%)	220 (22%)
4	10,000	10,019	? (?)	? (?)
5	50,000	49,911	16,021 (32%)	3,714 (7%)

The five nested vital article levels are meant to give direction to the prioritization of improvements of English Wikipedia articles (e.g. which articles to bring to WP:GA and WP:FA status), to provide a measurement of quality of overall English Wikipedia (e.g. what proportion of the most important articles are at GA and FA status), and to serve as a centralized watchlist of English Wikipedia's most important articles. Unlike the list of articles every Wikipedia should have, they are tailored to the English Wikipedia and are actively maintained by the dedicated WikiProject Vital Articles.

What makes an article "vital"?

Shortcuts

The key criteria in determining whether an article is vital are:

Coverage: Vital articles at higher levels tend to "cover" more topics and be broader in their scope. For example, Science 1 is a Vital-1 article, while Scientific method 3 is a lower level of vitality. Determining which articles are vital at lower levels often involves looking at the articles at higher levels. For example, since History 2 is of high vitality, World War II 3 is also a vital article, just at a lower level.
Essential to Wikipedia's other articles: While Scientific method 3 may be less vital than Science 1, since it is such a critical topic regarding science, covering many science-related topics in Wikipedia, it is undoubtedly a vital article.
Notability: Individuals within the People section represent the pinnacles of their field with a material impact on the course of humanity, such as Albert Einstein 3 in "Inventors and scientists", William Shakespeare 3 in "Authors", and Genghis Khan 3 on "Leaders".
No (Western) bias: While the vitals list is for English Wikipedia, the focus is on the world. For example, the current consensus for Level 3 is to list two cities in China (Hong Kong, Beijing) and India (Delhi, Mumbai), but only one in the United States.
Pageviews: The number of views a page receives should be considered (i.e. it is a proxy on its importance to Wikipedia's structure), however, pageviews should be treated with caution as they can be driven by WP:RECENTISM, which is a particular concern at Levels 1-4.

Nominating or removing a vital article

All Wikipedia extended confirmed editors are welcome to propose an article that should be added, removed, or demoted from one of the Level 1-4 vital article lists (which are ECP-protected from here), and/or !vote or comment on any existing proposal. Any editor can make a proposal at Level 5.

A number of guidelines/practices have been agreed regarding the proposal process:

Pre-checks

When proposing to add or remove a particular topic from the vital articles list, we strongly recommend that the proposer review and compare the other articles in the same category to get a better sense of what is considered vital in that area and that they also check the talk page archives for that Level to see if the topic was previously proposed, and what was the resulting discussion. Use the 'VA link' template to allow editors to easily check its location (e.g. Internet 3).

No skipping

Shortcut

WP:VANOSKIP

A proposed vital article must exist at a lower level before being nominated at a higher level, as agreed here. For example, a proposal to move the Level 5 vital article Twitter 5 to Level 3 could not happen until it had first been successfully proposed for Level 4. Only after it had been added to the Level 4 list, could it then be proposed to Level 3.

Swapping

Levels 1 to 4 are usually at their full quota, and any nomination to 'Add' a topic to one of these Levels is often accompanied by a proposal to 'Remove' an existing topic. For example, a Level 3 proposal could say: "Add Steve Jobs 4" and Remove Henry Ford 3". While it is not obligatory to frame proposals as a swap (and not needed if the proposal is to 'Remove'), it is recommended, as some discussions may fail to progress (and be closed as 'no consensus'), as no agreement could be reached on a suitable swap candidate.

Relitigation

There is currently no hard limit to how soon a failed proposal can be retried, and articles can occasionally see major swings in coverage or notability. However, editors are strongly discouraged from knowingly repeating a recent proposal (active within the past 6 months is a good rule-of-thumb). If someone does happen to repeat a proposal, assume good faith in the absence of disruptive behavior and include a link to the previous discussion from the archives.

Batches

At Level 5, the size of the list sometimes makes comparing articles on a case-by-case basis impractical. Instead, proposers might suggest a rule or principle for their changes, then bundle several relevant articles together. Batch proposals have several advantages, such as conserving talk-page space and keeping similar discussions together, but they can also become unwieldy if too large or when discussions fragment. Editors are encouraged to use their best judgment when bundling proposals although 3-10 articles is often a good rule-of-thumb.

Other

A redlink (i.e. a Wikipedia article that has not yet been written) can be proposed as a vital article (from here).

A good article or featured article creator should be courtesy pinged where their article has been proposed at vital articles (from here).

Targets and quotas

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Each level of the vital articles list implements a target number of articles a.k.a. quota. These not only characterize the relative vitality levels, but also discipline the selection process.

Level 1-3 targets

At Levels 1 and 2, the lists are very stable and small, resulting in a rigid target for the level as a whole. The list size will likely never deviate from the target, and one should expect all proposals to effectively swap one article for another. However, the smaller list size also allows for comparing articles case-by-case, which means the article count for specific categories, while very stable, is mostly for reporting purposes.

Targets at Level 3 work mostly the same, only the list is slightly more fluid. As a result, the list size may fluctuate around the overall target by a few articles. While swap candidates are always encouraged, they aren't absolutely required for Level 3 proposals either.

Level 4-5 quotas

Starting with Level 4, the vital articles list is subdivided into several pages by category. The sizes of Levels 4 and 5 also make direct comparison across fields impractical. As a result, the overall level target becomes largely a data-point and article counts by category are more influential.

These category counts function more like quotas, with some variance in list size tolerated. For example, Level 5 considers a category "at quota" with an article count anywhere between 98% and 102% of the formal target. This flexibility also means proposals can usually be split into separate additions or removals, even with a swap in mind, in order to minimize conflicted or partial votes.

The category quotas are also adjusted through distinct quota proposals. Proposers can have several reasons to reallocate slots between categories, but one accepted rule is that quota proposals should be considered independently of article proposals. Anyone that believes a category should be resized based on the articles it includes or lacks is encouraged to propose the relevant article changes first, then affirm the new sizes with a quota proposal.

Note that on some Level 5 pages, individual section headers may show their own sub-quotas (not to be confused with the automatic section counts). These sub-quotas are deprecated for the foreseeable future and can be removed when updating a Level 5 list.

Closing a proposal

A number of guidelines/practices have been agreed regarding the closing of proposals:

Level 1–4 closes

Any Level 1–4 proposal can be closed by any editor, including editors who have already !voted in the proposal (i.e. the concept of WP:INVOLVED does not arise in vital article closures), provided it meets the following specific criteria:

After 15 days it may be closed as PASSED if there are (a) 5 or more supports, AND (b) at least two-thirds are in support.
After 30 days it may be closed as FAILED if there are (a) 3 or more opposes, AND (b) it failed to earn two-thirds support.
After 30 days it may be closed as NO CONSENSUS if the proposal hasn't received any !votes for +30 days, regardless of tally.
After 60 days it may be closed as NO CONSENSUS if the proposal has (a) less than 5 supports, AND (b) less than two-thirds support.

Level 5 closes

Any Level 5 proposal can also be closed by any editor, including editors who have already !voted in the proposal, provided it meets the following specific criteria (these are different from Level 4 due to the greater frequency of proposals at Level 5):

Before being closed, a Level 5 discussion must:
1. Run for at least 14 days; AND
2. Allow at least 7 days since the most recent vote; AND
3. Have at least 4 participants.
For a proposal to be implemented on the Level 5 list:
1. It must have over 60% support; AND
2. It must have at least 4 support !votes.

The informal consensus has been that a proposal can be closed as "NO CONSENSUS" after it has run at least 90 days from being opened, even if it hasn't had at least 4 participants. This isn't a hard rule unlike on Levels 1–4, but instead the closer has been given the discretion to decide how long a discussion should continue.

Executing a close

The closer of any proposal, following the above rules for closing, must execute the resulting changes to the existing vital article lists (e.g. adding or removing an article from the relevant vital article lists); closers who are not able to do this should not close proposals. Once a Level 1-5 proposal is closed on the VA talk page, it should be left for auto-archiving and not be immediately archived by the closer.
Cewbot will later update the VA-status on the talk page of the article in question (i.e. removing, adding, or updating the VA level per the latest VA article lists). The closer of a VA discussion does not need to edit the article's talk page.
A useful script for automatically closing discussions is the User:DannyS712/DiscussionCloser tool, however, this tool only closes the discussion on the talk page, and does not make the physical changes to the articles and the VA lists that are needed as part of any close.

Archiving proposals

Auto-archival has been enabled on many discussion pages of the Vital Articles project. However, some areas (such as Level 5) have suspended it for now due to a wide spread in how quickly proposals are resolved. Even on pages where an archival bot is active, editors may want to archive closed discussions themselves in order to de-clutter the page.

Here are some suggestions for anyone that wants to manually archive some closed proposals:

In case of disagreements about how a proposal was closed, it's strongly encouraged to wait at least 72 hours (3 days) after a proposal is closed before moving it to the archives.

If only portions of a large batch proposal are closed, it is OK to split the batch and partly archive it.
- Use your best judgment on when and how to split large batches; prefer keeping things together if you're unsure
- Feel free to add a note (such as "set N of M") to the batch header when splitting

Even if auto-archival is disabled, respect the max archive size and counter for a talk page.
- These values can be found in the archival bot configuration at the top of the talk-page in edit mode.
- Check the current archive page size after you move in your closed proposals. If it now exceeds the max archive size, be sure to create the next archive page and increment the counter on the talk page.

Consider using a one-click archiving tool to help partly automate the process.

Article improvement drives and awards

There have been many initiatives around improving vital article quality which are listed at Wikipedia:WikiProject Vital Articles, including:

Rewards for improving vital articles include:

{{Good Article Barnstar}}: Awarded for improving a Level 1 article to Good Article status. Prize awarded by Sdkb with no expiry date. More details....
$100 reward for improving a level 3 or above vital article to Featured Article status. Prize awarded by Feminist until 10 August 2024. More details...

Please contact the prize sponsors for additional information. Remember to adhere to Wikipedia:Conflict of interest, and to exercise common sense.

Maintenance of lists

Wikipedia:Database reports/Vital articles update report

Some notes about our maintainer User:Cewbot:

All attributes of articles are fetched from corresponding categories.
The bot will automatically update the summary table if there are summary table marks.

Userboxes

The following relevant userboxes are available:

Template

Appearance

Purpose

This user contributes to Vital Articles on Wikipedia.

For members of vital articles.

This user has received a Vital barnstar.

Good old userbox, given to those that have done a good job.

This user has helped promote vital good articles on Wikipedia.

Userbox for those that have successfully nominated a Vital good article.

This user has helped promote vital featured articles on Wikipedia.

Userbox for those that have successfully nominated a Vital featured article.