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Wikipedia:Merging articles

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This page is a how-to guide detailing a practice or process on the English Wikipedia.

A merger is a non-automated process by which the content of two pages is united on one page.

Merging is a normal editing action, something any editor can do, and as such generally does not need to be proposed and processed. If you think merging something improves the encyclopedia, you can be bold and perform the merger, as described below. Because of this, it makes little sense to object to a merger purely on procedural grounds, e.g. "you cannot do that without discussion" is not a good argument.

If the merger is controversial, however, you may find your merger reverted, and as with all other edits, edit wars should be avoided. If you are uncertain of the merger's appropriateness, or believe it might be controversial, or your merger ends up reverted, you can propose it on either or both of the affected pages.

Proposing a merger

1. Create one discussion section, typically on the destination article's Discussion page (also known as the talk page). This should include a list of the affected articles and a merger rationale.
2. Tag each article with the appropriate merger tag. All tag Discuss links should be specified to point at the new discussion section.

Do not use "subst" on these templates.

To propose a merger of two or more pages, place the template {{merge|OTHERPAGE|discuss=Talk:THIS PAGE#Merger proposal|date=March 2010}} at the top of each page or section. The date parameter is used to add the article to Category:Merge by month. If the date parameter is not used, a Wikipedia bot will add it in a day or two.

Please use the discuss parameter to direct to the same talk page. Otherwise, two separate discussions could take place in each of the respective talk pages. If the discuss parameter is not specified, the "Discuss" links lead to the top of each article's Talk page.

If you know which page should be removed, use {{mergeto|DESTINATIONPAGE|discuss=Talk:DESTINATIONPAGE#Merger proposal|date=March 2010}} on that page, and {{mergefrom|SOURCEPAGE|discuss=Talk:DESTINATIONPAGE#Merger proposal|date=March 2010}} on the page that will remain and will receive the contents of the source page. Unless a discuss parameter is specified in these templates, all "Discuss" links to lead to the talk page of the destination page, avoiding the two separate discussions problem that may occur with {{merge}}. It may still be preferable to link direction to a section on the talk page; this is useful for directing the reader to a specific section of a long talk page, when it may not otherwise be obvious where the discussion is located.

If multiple articles are proposed to be merged, their titles can be separated with a vertical pipe. For example, {{merge|OtherPage1|OtherPage2|discuss=Talk:Destination1#Merger proposal|date=March 2010}} proposes that the tagged page, as well as OtherPage1 and OtherPage2, be merged together.

After proposing the merger, place your reasons on the talk page.

You may be able to evoke a response by contacting some of the major or most-recent contributors via their respective talk-pages. The {{mergenote}} template is available for this purpose, which must be "subst:"ed. For example, place {{subst:mergenote |SOURCEPAGE |Talk:DESTINATIONPAGE#Merger proposal }} on the talk page of contributors to the source page; and {{subst:mergenote |DESTINATIONPAGE |Talk:DESTINATIONPAGE#Merger proposal }} on the talk page of contributors to the destination page.

If there is clear agreement with the proposal by consensus, or if there is silence, proceed with the merger.

Caveats

• If you are unable to merge the pages, or you believe that the merger may be controversial, you might want to add a listing to Wikipedia:Proposed mergers.
• When proposing a merger of pages within "Wikipedia" namespace (any pages that begin with the "Wikipedia:" prefix), do not include this prefix in the parameter.
• Due to technical limitations, the above templates are incompatible with cross-namespace mergers (mergers between pages from both the article and Wikipedia namespaces). Such instances are rare.
• Do not use the above templates to propose a category merger. This should be requested at Wikipedia:Categories for discussion, which uses a separate {{cfm}} template.

Closing/archive a proposed merger

To provide clarity that the merger discussion is over and that a consensus has been reached, it may be important to close and then archive the proposal discussion. To close a merger proposal discussion, indicate the outcome at the top. If the merger is particularly controversial, one may take the optional step of requesting closure by an uninvolved administrator at Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard.

To archive a merger proposal discussion, a {{Discussion top}} template is generally placed between the header and the top of the discussion and a {{Discussion bottom}} template will need to be placed at the bottom of the discussion.

Here is an example of how to archive a merger proposal discussion:

 == Header ==
 {{Discussion top|1=The result was '''merge''' into DESTINATION PAGE. -- ~~~~}}
 Hi, I would like to discuss...
 {{Discussion bottom}}

You can also place the {{oldmergefull}} template at the top of the talk pages of the articles proposed to be merged.

Performing the merger

There are two basic types of merger; which to use depends on how much content of the source page you want to keep:

• Full-content paste merger - most content, clean and fast
• Selective paste merger - some content, clean but slow

Also remember that almost all article pages have a talk page. To avoid losing quick access to that historical discussion, a link to the source page's talk-page should be placed at the top of the destination's talk-page, such as:
Article merged: See old talk-page [[talk:PAGENAME|here]]
or use a template like
{{merged-from|Source page name}}

Actions which must be performed for both merger types

1. After copying the content, save the destination page with an edit summary noting merge content from [[SOURCEPAGE]] (This step is required in order to conform with Wikipedia's licensing requirements. Do not omit it nor omit the page name.)
2. Delete all the text from the source page and replace it with #REDIRECT [[DESTINATIONPAGE]] {{R from merge}}, note the merger (including the page name) in the edit summary, and save the page.

Full-content paste merger

Full content merger in a nutshell: A full merge copies all the text from the source page.

1. Open the source and destination pages in two separate edit windows/tabs.
2. Cut/paste the entire content from the source page into the destination page and remove the {{mergefrom}} tag.
3. Save the destination page, with an edit summary noting "merge content from [[article name]]" (This step is required in order to conform with Wikipedia's licensing requirements. Do not omit it nor omit the page name.)
4. Delete all the text from the source page and replace it with #REDIRECT [[PAGENAME]] {{R from merge}}, note the merger (including the page name) in the edit summary, and save the page.
5. Edit the destination page again and delete the redundant content, editing until it looks good and consistent.
6. Save the destination page. (Edit summary of "cleanup after paste/merger" is appropriate.)
7. Check "What links here" on the source page for double-redirects.
   • Double-redirects will fail to link, and must be renamed to redirect to the current page name.
8. (optional) Add {{copied|from=source|to=destination|diff=permanent diff}} onto the talk pages of both articles. This not only helps clarify attribution at the destination, but helps prevent inadvertent later deletion of the source history.
9. Afterwards, DO NOT ask for a history merger between the two articles. See this link for the reason

Performing a merger in this manner is beneficial when you want to include all the content from both articles in the article history of the final article.

Selective paste merger

Selective merger in a nutshell: A selective merge (or SMERGE) transfers only some of the text from the source page into the target article.

1. Open the source and destination pages in two separate edit windows/tabs.
2. Cut/paste the non-redundant content from the source page into the destination page.
3. Be sure to remove the {{mergefrom}} tag from the destination page before previewing
4. Preview and edit the destination page until it looks good and consistent.
5. Delete all the text from the source page and replace it with #REDIRECT [[PAGENAME]] {{R from merge}}.
   • Note that PAGENAME in the code above should be the title of the destination page.
6. Save both, and note the merger (including the page names) in the edit summaries. (This step is required in order to conform with Wikipedia's licensing requirements. Do not omit it nor omit the page name.)
7. Check "What links here" on the source page for double-redirects.
   • Double-redirects will fail to link, and must be renamed to redirect to the current page name.
8. (optional) Add {{copied|from=source|to=destination|diff=permanent diff}} onto the talk pages of both articles. This not only helps clarify attribution at the destination, but helps prevent inadvertent later deletion of the source history.
9. Afterwards, DO NOT ask for a history merger between the two articles. See this link for the reason

Performing a merger in this manner is beneficial when the source document includes a great deal of material that is not needed in the final article.

List of merger templates

See also

• Wikipedia:Article size
• Wikipedia:How to fix cut-and-paste moves
• Wikipedia:Splitting
• Wikipedia:Summary style
• Help:Moving a page
• Category:All articles to be merged

Notes