The word stub means something that is very short. On Wikipedia, a stub is a short article. When writers begin a new article, they use the word stub to mean that it is still very short and that people can add a lot more useful information to it. Generally, articles with less than 1500 characters of text are called stubs here. If a stub has little verifiable information, or if its subject has no apparent notability, it may be deleted or be merged into another relevant article.

Stub alert!

If you make or find a stub, here is what you should do. You can make the article better, or if you think that someone else would do a better job, add the {{stub}} template to ask other users to make the article longer. The template will show this message on the page:

See Wikipedia:Template messages for more information.


Finding stubs



Making stubs better

Most stubs are only one paragraph or sometimes they are only a few lines. Stubs do not fully describe the subject of the article.

  1. Make a "This is a stub" message by adding {{stub}} (see Wikipedia:Template messages for more). This will tell people who read the article that more work needs to be done. Some people watch the New Changes page, but adding the message will tell more people.
  2. Write in Simple English. Use complete sentences.
  3. If you can easily read English that is not simple (for example, if English is your first language), you may want to look at the article on the main English Wikipedia and make a simple version of that article on this Wikipedia.
  6. Make sure any relevant linkable words have been linked, but be careful about which words you link; see Wikipedia:Naming conventions. e.g. Salvador Allende was the President of Chile from 1970 until 1973. The CIA might have been involved in the military revolt that put him out of government.
  7. Save the article with a change summary that will attract the attention of others to your stub.