Wikipedia:Basic copyediting

This help page is a how-to guide. It details processes or procedures of some aspect(s) of Wikipedia's norms and practices. It is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, and may reflect varying levels of consensus and vetting.

Shortcuts WP:COPYEDIT WP:CE WP:5C

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Discovering that pages need basic

Step one

Scan the article for errors or ways in which it can be improved. The entire article or particular sections may be tagged as needing a copyedit. There is a list of common mistakes below.

Step two

Edit the page by clicking the "Edit" or "Edit source" tab near the top of it or one of the section [edit source] links.

Step three

Make your changes and fill out an

edit summary. Be helpful to the editors who follow you by giving a summary of what you have done. Simple "Copy edit" is fine, but "Edited for tone" is even better. The most commonly used abbreviation

for "copy edit" is "ce", which is better than nothing, but it is more helpful to include one or more words or phrases such as "capitalization", "subject-verb agreement", "fixed dangling modifier", "logical quotes", or whatever describes your edit.

Step four

Preview your change and save.

Step five (optional)

If you think the article does not need further basic copyediting, click Edit again and remove the "copy edit" template at the top of the article, which is what flags it as needing improvement. The template typically is a markup that looks like {{copy edit}}, with a date inside the braces.

• WordCounter counts characters and sentences, and makes other measurements. It can also help improve grammar, word choice, and writing style, as well as detect plagiarism.
• LanguageTool has a free plugin for popular web browsers that checks spelling, grammar, usage, and punctuation.
• Most word-processor software, such as Microsoft Word and LibreOffice, has built-in spelling and grammar checkers; for instructions, see Wikipedia:Spellchecking § Using Microsoft Office or LibreOffice.

Please be careful when using these and other tools; they are not infallible. You should manually check the output of online tools and spelling checkers for factual accuracy, grammar, spelling and the

These are some common errors you may find in articles:

Commonly confused words

its and it's; there, their, and they're; your, you're, and you; lose and loose; lie and lay (and their tenses); who's and whose; have and of (should of for should have)

Capitalization and formatting

• Words defined, described, or referenced as words should be italicized, e.g., "The term style also refers to the layout of an article."
• Wikipedia article headings should generally be noun phrases (History of ...) and not prepositional phrases (About the history of ...).
• Headings begin with a single capital letter, i.e., they use
  sentence case. The only other capital letters in headings are in proper names and acronyms
  .
• Titles of works of art (paintings, sculpture), plays and operas, television series, films, novels and nonfiction books, song cycles, and long poems should be italicized rather than put in quotation marks, e.g., Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
• Titles of songs, short stories, individual episodes of television series, and brief poems, e.g., "Strawberry Fields Forever" or "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", should be in quotation marks. Italics, however, are required for a song cycle, such as Winterreise or the title of a longer poem, such as Four Quartets. Individual episode titles of television series need quotation marks, while the series name itself is italicized, e.g., "Welcome to the Hellmouth" is the premiere episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Punctuation

• Location constructions, such as Vilnius, Lithuania, require a comma after the second element, e.g., "He was born in Vilnius, Lithuania, after the country had gained independence."
• The
  month–day–year
  style of writing dates requires a comma after the year, e.g., "On September 15, 1947, she began her first year at Harvard."
• Decade names should not include an apostrophe before the s, e.g., "She was born in the 1980s." Generally do not refer to a decade without its century. See
  WP:DECADE
  .
• Make sure apostrophes are used correctly, and watch out for greengrocers' apostrophes.

Style

• Avoid affected, pompous or excessive language, e.g., "due to the fact that" for "because", "ascertain the location of" for "find", and (in almost all cases) "utilize" for "use".
• Check articles for unnecessary words and redundant phrases. Vigorous, effective writing is clear and concise. See
  Plain English
  .
• Quotations should not be changed, except for trivial spelling and typographic errors. Otherwise, obvious errors and censorship in the original can be marked with {{
  WP:MOSQUOTE
  for details.
• Watch out for jargon and overly long sentences, which can reduce readability.
• In lists, ensure parallelism. Use bulleted lists for more than a few elements, for readability.