Wikipedia:Merging

There are several good reasons to merge articles:

1. Shortcut

   • WP:DUPLICATEWP:DUPLICATE
   Duplicate: There are two or more articles on the same subject and with the same scope, also known as redundant content forks. If the content fork was unjustified, the article created more recently should be merged into the older one. If a duplicate article was created recently, it may also be a candidate for A10 speedy deletion.
2. Shortcut

   • WP:OVERLAPWP:OVERLAP
   Overlap: There are two or more articles on related subjects that have a large overlap and might be redundant. Wikipedia is not a dictionary; there does not need to be a separate entry for every concept. For example, "flammable" and "non-flammable" can both be explained in an article on flammability.
3. Shortcut

   • WP:MERGETEXTWP:MERGETEXT
   Short text: If a article is very short (consisting of perhaps only one or two sentences) and is, in your opinion as editor, unlikely to be expanded within a "reasonable" (unspecified) amount of time, it often makes sense to merge it into a article on a broader topic.
4. Shortcut

   • WP:MERGECONWP:MERGECON
   Context: Some topics that are independently notable are best covered in the same article in order to better serve reader understanding. For example, if a short article requires the background material or context from a broader article in order for readers to understand it.
5. Shortcut

   • WP:MERGENOTWP:MERGENOT
   Insufficient notability: Articles about non-notable topics can have content which if added to another article would make that article better. While this can also be implemented through the AfD process, merging directly may be more efficient. For example, parents or children of a celebrity who themselves are otherwise unremarkable are generally covered in a section of the article on the celebrity.

Merging should be avoided if:

1. the resulting article would be too long or "clunky";
2. the separate topics could be expanded into longer standalone (but cross-linked) articles.

Nominate the source article for merging at AfD if you have reason to believe that the proposal is controversial. As an example, if suggesting that Source article be merged into Destination article, nominate Source article for merging at AfD by following these instructions. It is recommended to make your merge nomination specific and clear; if relying on one of the reasons to merge, be specific as to how it applies.

If a an AfD discussion is already open but you would like to propose an alternative target or outcome (e.g., delete), do not nominate the article a second time. Instead, consider contributing to the open discussion.

You can optionally notify contributors to the articles involved. One way is to ping them in a comment on the merge proposal, such as {{ping|User1|User2|User3|...}} Notifying contributors to the articles. ~~~~. Alternatively, create a new topic on those users' talk pages with {{subst:Mergenote|Source article}}. Respect neutrality when making invitations to participate in the discussion; selectively notifying editors is not allowed.

The main reason that the merge backlog includes hundreds of articles is because the people who support the merge neglect to undertake this final step. Any editor, including the editor who originally proposed the merge, is permitted to perform a merge in accordance with consensus, as merging articles does not require intervention from an administrator.

To avoid manually making many repetitive and time-consuming edits, it is recommended to install the easy-merge script before proceeding; the instructions below will explain where and how to use it. To merge articles, follow the steps below:

1. Copy all or some of the content from the source article and paste it in an appropriate location at the destination article. If you think the merge is especially complex and will take you a lot of time to fully clean up, you can let other editors know by placing {{In use}} or {{Inuse-section}} atop the article. Then, immediately publish your edit, even if it duplicates some parts or it looks messy, and link to the source article in your an edit summary:

   [[H:M|Merged]] content from [[SOURCEPAGE]]. See the discussion at [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SOURCEPAGE]].
   

2. Do any necessary rearranging and copy editing ideally in a second edit, to simplify attribution. In this edit, also remove any leftover {{Merge}}, {{Being merged}}, or {{In use}} templates from the destination article.
3. Redirect the source article whose content was just merged.
   • To do this more quickly, install the easy-merge script and reload the source article. Then, click the "easy-merge" link in the "Tools" section of your sidebar and tick the box that says: Redirect this page to the target page. If you want to enable other options, read the optional step 6 below before clicking Submit.
   • To do it manually instead, replace everything in the source article with: #REDIRECT [[DESTINATIONPAGE]] {{Rcat|{{R from merge}}}}, or, if you merged the content to a section: #REDIRECT [[DESTINATIONPAGE#Name of the section]] {{Rcat|{{R from merge}}{{R to section}}}}. Then publish your changes using an edit summary such as: [[H:M|Merged]] content to [[DESTINATIONPAGE]]. See the discussion at [[Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/SOURCEPAGE]].
4. Check for non-free files used on the destination. In the rare cases where there are any, the article mentioned in the rationale should be updated to the destination article's per the non-free content criteria. You can recognise non-free files from their file descriptions, as they have a red copyright icon and a non-free use rationale (a summary box with Non-free use rationale in the title, or a Fair use section: see examples).

And that's it! You've successfully merged two articles!

{{Afd-merge to |DESTINATIONPAGE |discuss=AFDDISCUSSION |date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}} }}

{{Afd-merge from |SOURCEPAGE |discuss=AFDDISCUSSION |date={{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}} }}

Pages in certain other namespaces can also be merged, usually also on a bold basis, but merging on a consensus basis relies on different venues. For most non-article namespaces, the counterpart to AfD is MfD; unlike the former, it does not accept merge nominations, though a deletion discussion can yield "merge" as an alternative to deletion. Templates can be explicitly nominated for merging at TfD. The CfD process governs category merges; these fall entirely outside the scope of this page because “merging” categories is not merging in the usual sense (and is not done boldly either).

• Wikipedia:Proposed article mergers is a noticeboard for discussions about merging articles
• Category:Articles proposed for merging lists articles that have been nominated for merging but haven't reached consensus
• Category:Articles with consensus to merge lists articles with AfD discussions closed with consensus to merge.
• WikiProject Merge was used to coordinate the clearing of the merge backlog.

Jump to a random article from the active mergers backlog!

   Merge a random article!