Wikipedia:Signatures

This page documents an English Wikipedia behavioral guideline. It is a generally accepted standard that editors should attempt to follow, though occasional exceptions may apply. Any substantive edit to this page should reflect consensus. When in doubt, discuss first on the talk page.

Shortcut WP:SIG

This page contains one or more sections that are English Wikipedia policies. These sections are each individually marked with {{policy section}}. Sections of this page that are not marked as such are not considered policies.

This page in a nutshell: Please ensure that your posts on talk pages are signed (using ~~~~ if not automatically handled by the software). Keep the coding of your signature short, do not make the signature too large, do not embed files in it, and ensure that the end result is easily readable by virtually everybody.

Signing your posts on talk pages, both for the article and non-article namespaces, is required, since it facilitates discussion by identifying the author of a particular comment. Other users can then navigate to a talk page and address their comments to the specific, relevant user(s). Discussion is an important part of collaborative editing, because it helps all users to understand the progress and evolution of a work.

Signatures are added automatically when using the reply tool or new topic tool. When editing in source text mode not using these tools, they must be added manually, which can be done by typing four tildes (~~~~) or clicking the signature icon in the edit toolbar.

Comments posted on user talk pages, article talk pages and other discussion pages must be properly signed. Signature use that is intentionally and persistently disruptive may lead to blocks.

When editing a page, main namespace pages (which are all Wikipedia articles) should not be signed, because the content is a shared work, based on the contributions of many people, and one editor should not be singled out or "credited" above others.