Wikipedia:Lead dos and don'ts

Wikipedia information page

This is an information page.

It is neither an encyclopedia article nor one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines; rather, its purpose is to explain certain aspects of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section . It may reflect differing levels of consensus and vetting.

The lead, or introduction, is the most important text in any article.

To get the lead right, generally:

DO:
Identify the subject and why it's notable early.
Summarize the most important points of the article.
Provide context if necessary.
Bold the subject's full and alternate names on first use.
Use discretion when putting citations in the lead .
See style guidance for leads for more guidance.

DON'T:
Don't promote the subject or use peacock terms .
Don't clutter the first sentence with parenthetical material.
Don't include significant info that is not covered later .
Don't reiterate descriptive article titles awkwardly.
Don't put links in a bolded reiteration of the title.
Don't use teasers .

v t e Wikipedia dos and don'ts
Encyclopedia content	Accessibility Biographies Living Categorization Disambiguation Long dabs Images Leads Links Lists References Tables Titles of articles
Collaboration	Consensus Talk
Simple rule set - Simple style manual - Style tips - Wikitext cheatsheet

See also