Template:Autobiography

Template documentation[view] [edit] [history] [purge]

When and where to use

This tag may be placed at the beginning of an article page (i.e., it should not be placed on the article's talk page) which has significant, non-superficial content written or modified by either its subject or by someone using an implied shared account of a business or other organization for which the subject apparently works or is otherwise obviously very closely associated, regardless of the veracity or verifiability of that content, as autobiographical editing of Wikipedia is strongly discouraged. It should be used only when autobiographical content in a Wikipedia article has been reasonably well established, not when it is merely suspected. If a user creates an article on themselves and then announces on their userpage that they wrote this article, that would be evidence of autobiographical writing. Other examples, though which in isolation might not be enough evidence but which together with other information might, would include a strong similarity between a user's username and an article they created/edited (i.e., a user named GTWilson editing an article called "George T. Wilson" may very well be doing so from an autobiographical perspective, although it is always best to attempt to contact the user and ask for verification before applying this tag) or a user disclosing on the article's talk page that they are the subject of the article and that they also wrote it. The mention within the article of multiple unreferenced personal pieces of information such as the number and names of non-notable children, a list of hobbies, preferences for taste in music or food, etc. is not by itself evidence of an autobiography, though it may be part of a body of evidence which convincingly is. An article written like a résumé also stands a high chance of being autobiographical.

This tag is more specific than the widely-used {{COI}} template. It should be used preferentially to that template when the article in question is not only affected by a conflict of interest but when that conflict is specifically autobiographical in nature.

Do not use this tag when doing so would reveal the identity of a pseudonymous Wikipedia user. Violating the privacy of users by revealing their real names or other personal information can result in an indefinite block. If this is the case, please use the more-general {{COI}} tag.

Do not use this tag to mark an autobiographical article which contains neither references nor external links— such articles may instead simply be proposed for deletion: see WP:PROD.

Do not use this tag to identify articles whose content has been modified by their subjects in strictly superficial ways such as the correction of spelling mistakes or the fixing of layout errors (note that changes to dates or places of birth, names of employers or spouses, titles or awards the subject has won, etc., are not superficial).

Do not use this tag for any article which cannot possibly be autobiographical by virtue of its subject (articles about a species of animal, for example, or an article about an historical landmark).

Do not use this tag for articles whose subject matter is an institution or corporation (however, a biographical article written under a prohibited institutional or shared account may be assigned this tag, as the connection between the institution and the person is clearly a conflict of interest and the subject matter is a biographical one).

When to remove

This tag should be removed when the autobiographical edit has been reverted or when the content of such an edit has been verified independently by another Wikipedia editor and evaluated/edited for neutrality, balance, and impartiality. That editor should indicate this in the edit summary in which they remove the tag. The user who made the edit that caused the tag to be placed should be warned not to make similar edits to the article either by placing the {{uw-coi}} template on the user's talk page or by leaving a more personal message there explaining that they should not directly edit the article in the future and should review the guidelines set out at WP:COI to avoid having the tag placed again on the article.

This tag may also be removed if the article's content is either limited or reduced by anyone to a few independently verifiable and relevant facts which do nothing more than establish the subject's notability and which effectively make it a STUB article. A stub autobiography that includes references to reliable, independent, verifiable sources which clearly establish the subject's notability will not benefit from having this tag placed on it.

Do not remove this tag if you are the subject of the Wikipedia article and have made significant edits to or have written the entire article yourself. The correct way for the subjects of articles to propose changes is via the article's talk page and by disclosing the inherent conflict of interest either in the text of that proposal ("I am the subject of this article and I would like to propose the following changes to it...") or on the subject's userpage with the {{UserboxCOI}} template. The template {{edit COI}} can be used to alert other editors to consider the proposed changes. The proper channel to request that someone write an article about you is via Wikipedia:Requested articles.

This template will add pages to the monthly subcategory of Category:Autobiographical articles.

Usage

• {{Autobiography|date=October 2024}}
• {{Autobiography|talk=talk page section|date=October 2024}} — to specify the talk page section
• {{Autobiography|section|date=October 2024}} — to replace the opening sentence with This section is an autobiography ...

TemplateData

This is the TemplateData for this template used by TemplateWizard, VisualEditor and other tools. See a monthly parameter usage report for Template:Autobiography in articles based on its TemplateData.

TemplateData for Autobiography

To indicate that an article is an autobiography, i.e. a biography of a living person written by its own subject (or someone closely connected to them).

Template parameters

Parameter		Description	Type	Status
Area affected	1	The part of the article that is an autobiography. Suggested values section subsection article Example section	String	optional
Talk page section	talk 2	The section of the article's talk page on which you have started a discussion about the autobiography concern, if such a section is present. Example Autobiography concern	String	optional
Month	date	The month in which this template was added. This parameter is used for adding the page to the monthly cleanup category. Example February 2024 Auto value {{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEARNAME}}	String	required

See also

• {{COI}} – for articles that were mostly written by editors with a conflict of interest.
• {{Like resume}}
• {{uw-autobiography}} – used to warn editors when they wrote an article or draft about themselves.

The above documentation is transcluded from Template:Autobiography/doc. (edit | history)
Editors can experiment in this template's sandbox (create | mirror) and testcases (create) pages.
Add categories to the /doc subpage. Subpages of this template.