How to Change the Title of a Wikipedia Article

Last Updated: January 18, 2023 Tested

Are you frustrated by a really badly titled Wikipedia article? If there is a badly worded title that you know needs changing, follow the steps in this article and you'll be on your way to making the article a better-named article.

Steps

1
Visit and login to your Wikipedia account from the Wikipedia page in your web browser. Unlike wikiHow's New Article Booster rights to be able to change titles, on Wikipedia, as long as the user has a registered account that is at least four days old and has at least ten edits, you'll be able to change the title of an article. You'll need to enter your username and password to your Wikipedia account and click the "Log in" button.
- If you haven't created an account there already, create a Wikipedia account. (Visit the English Wikipedia Page for details.) While the sign-up process is similar to the sign-up process for wikiHow, your username for wikiHow is not transferable to Wikipedia.
2
Open the Discussion page of the article that you'd like to change the title to. On any wiki, the proper word for this changing is called a "Move. It may tell you that it is a good idea to change the title, or it isn't a good idea. If it says absolutely nothing, you can rest assured that you've done everything you could to ensure you weren't missing any users who would be opposed to such a change.
- If you are unsure of what a better title should be but know it should be changed, be sure to submit a suggestion and reason why you think it should be moved to the article's Discussion page.
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3
Open the article's Article page to the article you need to change the title of.
4
Click the drop-down arrow to the right of the "More" link (and can be found to the left of the search box) and click the "Move" option from the drop-down list. If you don't see a "More" link up at the top right corner (this could even be caused if the title you thought about changing has a user_rights issue with it), you will not be able to change its title.
5
Type the designated data into the appropriate boxes. You'll need to type a new name into the "To new title" box, as well as why you decided to change its title in the "Reason" box. Most often, you shouldn't need to fiddle with the "New title" drop-down box which will allow you to change the namespace, but that part of the change is rather rare on Wikipedia.
- What reason you type in the "Reason" box will differ on a case-by-case basis, so no one title change will ever have the same reason.
6
Ensure the "Move associated talk page" checkbox is checked. These two types of pages need to stay together unless otherwise told.
- Do not fiddle with "Watch source page and target page" unless you are planning to watch the article for further edits after your title change has gone through.
7
Click the blue and white "Move page" button that is located beneath the two-to-three checkboxes on this page.
8
Organize the articles on the "What links here" page for the old article's title on the left-hand side of the page underneath the "Toolbox" tab/drop-down on the left side of the screen underneath the "tools" grouped list. You'll be presented with every article that's ever been moved or redirected to the original article, where this title has been linked, and must now be changed.
- Click the link above the list that is titled "Show redirects only". You'll need to change all these to the current article's title name. Open each of the article pages listed on the resultant page, and change the article title listed within the square brackets (the same concept as redirects here on wikiHow) to the new name you've moved this article to.

Community Q&A

Question

I can't find the move button. What is going on?

Joel

Community Answer

To move pages on Wikipedia you must have autoconfirmed status, meaning you have to be there for more than 4 days and have more than 10 edits in article namespace (unless you are on the Tor network, in which case the threshold is much higher).

Warnings

Unless you created the article and made a mistake in naming, don't change any Wikipedia article title unless you understand the naming conventions and capitalization rules. Take it for granted that the person who originally wrote the article probably did come up with the best name for the article (if the article is well-established over several years).

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Wikipedia does not allow you to change the title of an article to one of a wide variety of featured articles that change every day from the Wikipedia home page.

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It is never acceptable to move a page without reading the discussion page of the article, and the notes provided on the requested moves page (without taking any other action: such as making additional edits to clarify the article even further). If you are not sure, rather skip the article, and let someone else handle it.

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Don't just copy and paste the article content from the original article to a brand new article's page. Doing so doesn't preserve the history of edits that have made their way onto the page. Contributors hold their copyrighted licenses, and by doing so, you're breaking their license and law.

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