Wikipedia talk:Manual of Style/Lead section

Is the lead length realistic?

I’m not sure the length criteria accurately reflects how articles are being written on Wikipedia. It says, “The leads in most featured articles contain about 250 to 400 words”. Okay, but here’s the lead lengths for the top 20 of the (USA-oriented) Times 100 most significant people in history:

1. Jesus – 587 (article: 15,608; 3.8%)
2. Napoleon – 752 (article: 15,472; 4.9%)
3. Muhammad – 470 (article: 14,608; 3.2%)
4. William Shakespeare – 419 (article: 7,612; 5.5%)
5. Abraham Lincoln – 569 (article: 13,785; 4.1%)
6. George Washington – 474 (article: 10,617; 4.5%)
7. Adolf Hitler – 657 (article: 14,056; 4.7%)
8. Aristotle – 397
9. Alexander the Great – 628
10. Thomas Jefferson – 473
11. Henry VIII of England – 390
12. Charles Darwin – 477
13. Elizabeth I of England – 599 (article: 11,369; 5.3%)
14. Karl Marx – 541
15. Julius Caesar – 550
16. Queen Victoria – 303
17. Martin Luther – 435
18. Joseph Stalin – 597
19. Albert Einstein – 564
20. Christopher Columbus – 601

Here are some modern figures:

• Elon Musk – 419
• Beyoncé – 458
• Oprah Winfrey – 456
• Joe Biden – 500
• Donald Trump – 521

Only three of these articles satisfy the criteria. One would expect these leads to be particularly lengthy, but doesn't that suggest that 400 words is too short for these important articles? I've observed that the leads for notable Featured Articles tend to grow over time. Perhaps a clause for vital articles should allow for greater length? Praemonitus (talk) 13:59, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

How many of those are featured? I think all leads, especially those of complex articles, tend to grow longer over time, as people add summaries of new article content to the lead. So leads grow "naturally" over time, but to trim them to a more reader-friendly length requires a conscious process, as happens when an article becomes featured, but much less often under other circumstances. Hence I don't think it's very meaningful to look at well-read articles that didn't undergo such a conscious process (preferably fairly recently). Gawaon (talk) 15:25, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

A more common occurrence is new content being added directly to the lead. I would put a small bet on most lead edits taking no account of the article body at all. (Although as you say, addition, lead or body, is common. Trimming, consolidating, and similar is a bit harder.) CMD (talk) 15:44, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Yes that's true for many vital articles, but most of these leads seem to be in good form. I'm sure they receive a lot of editorial stewardship. Praemonitus (talk) 17:38, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Thanks. Okay, I'll ask this: if the MoS is a style guide for all articles, why does this length section only apply to featured articles? Shouldn't it apply to everything? It isn't even a firm guideline, only a statistic. Praemonitus (talk) 17:33, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

It doesn't apply to featured articles, it applies, in principle and as a recommendation, to all articles. It's just that featured articles are in better shape to derive such a recommendation, because are in excellent shape in general (or at least supposed to). Gawaon (talk) 17:50, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Perhaps. That wasn't how I interpreted the wording. Anyway, wouldn't make more mathematical sense to make the lead proportionate to the article length? Based on the results above, a cap at 5% ought to work in most cases. Praemonitus (talk) 22:06, 28 April 2025 (UTC)

Even if that were to work for long articles, I'd lead to way too short leads for short ones. Also the approach of the existing recommendation is not to make up an arbitrary rule (as such a percentage cap would be), but to describe what's already established as good practice – which is why the look at featured articles is to helpful. Gawaon (talk) 08:27, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

There's already a minimum length listed (100 words), so that's not an issue. Just say "for longer articles...". I think a percentage would allow for more flexibility. Praemonitus (talk) 09:05, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

Agree with Gawaon and CMD above. A lot of newbie editors add insufficiently important content to the introduction, so there is an irresistible tendency for intros to get longer with time. Regardless of the length and complexity of the article, there is a limit to the length of intro readers are willing to read. The maximum word count guideline is needed to give editors permission to prune. I liked the original guideline that the intro should not be more than 4 paragraphs. --Chetvorno^TALK 04:21, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

"Not more than 4 paragraphs" doesn't mean anything in practice though, when a paragraph can be a single ten-word sentence or hundreds of words and many sentences. Editors who want to wikilawyer will just restructure the text if paragraph count is used as a metric. DonIago (talk) 04:34, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

Good point, I've seen that happen. I guess we need the word count limit. --Chetvorno^TALK 04:59, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

Small paragraphs and long paragraphs remain discouraged per MOS:PARA in both cases. CMD (talk) 05:11, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

Maybe a hard limit based on word count/article percentage and a soft (recommended) limit based on total paragraphs? Praemonitus (talk) 16:27, 24 May 2025 (UTC)

A percentage is too burdensome; for editors to check if the introduction meets requirements they have to perform a calculation, which no one will do. We need a word limit anyway, because there is a limit to the size of intro people will read. Besides, people can game a percentage just by adding padding to the article body. --Chetvorno^TALK 02:08, 26 May 2025 (UTC)

• These aren't typical of "most articles" & you would expect them to be a good deal longer than "most articles" - especially these days, most FAs are on micro-topics. So I don't see the figures as demonstrating an issue. Try counting the 20 most-recently promoted FAs. Johnbod (talk) 23:33, 25 May 2025 (UTC)

MOS:LEADALT and reducing clutter

Is it acceptable to place significant alternative names in an {{efn}} instead of running text? Would doing so still satisfy MOS:LEADALT, which seems to suggest parenthesis? Even if acceptable in certain situations, should we generally have a preference against placing in an efn?

In situations where the alternative name is somewhat significant, but perhaps not highly significant, I can understand an editor's desire to reduce clutter in the lead and tuck it into an efn, especially when the alt name is long. Just curious what other editors think about this approach. Thanks in advance! --GoneIn60 (talk) 18:02, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

I would say the current practice on WP, which is consistent with this guideline, is if there is one or two alternate names, place them very early in the lead. If there is only one 0r two common alternate name(s), and they have significant use, then putting them in a footnote seems like an attempt to hide them. We place alternate names in the lead because a significant number of readers may have reached the article while looking for an alternate name, and we want them to know they are at the right place. It is only when there are multiple alternate names that we have to worry about clutter, and consider moving less prominent alternate names to a footnote. (The more alternate names there are, the less likely any one of them will be particularly prominent.) Donald Albury 19:55, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

I agree 100% with Donald Albury on this. Largoplazo (talk) 21:37, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

Rather than a footnote they should go into the body. Perhaps orthographical/dialectal spelling differences that are too minor to be of serious distinction (colour vs color) could go in a footnote. Traumnovelle (talk) 05:25, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

Because we keep getting questions about this, I have added a table demonstrating the usual options to Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#Alternative names. Please let me know if the table is insufficiently clear. All examples in the table are taken from actual, stable articles. WhatamIdoing (talk) 05:36, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

That table misrepresents what we mean by "lead clutter" because the Munich example shows exactly what lead clutter is. There are stable examples like Moscow, Belgrade, even London, where clutter of a lesser degree is appropriately avoided. I consider the examples to go against the principle of not interrupting the first sentence by long parenthetical additions. There's enough room elsewhere in the article where these things can go. 108.60.227.20 (talk) 13:45, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I copied the example from an article that appears to be stable. If you think it's poor practice, then I suggest starting by getting a consensus to change that article. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:19, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I do think the table is helpful, but should we consider a little more variety in the type of examples listed? Alternate titles in other languages tend to be less controversial in terms of lead inclusion and formatting, so they probably don't make the best examples. Other candidate types to consider: a company (Rockstar North) showing parenthetical use of a former name, a media format (Cassette tape) that simply lists alt names in running text, or a film (Terminator 2: Judgment Day) that chose to place a marketing title at the time of release into a footnote. If any of these FA examples are not good examples, then perhaps we can continue the discussion to explain why.

Also, it might be more helpful to place the table after Separate section usage, since one of the table's examples demonstrate the guidance in this section. --GoneIn60 (talk) 16:01, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

Yeah, man. Though I'd always chose listing them in running text, so you know exactly if something is a former name or full name or whatever. Note that the Munich example in the table contradicts Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#MOS:LEADCLUTTER and Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section#MOS:FOREIGNEQUIV. That row needs a better example. 108.60.227.4 (talk) 16:23, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

@GoneIn60, I thought about variety, and I'm not sure what the right choice is. If we use the same subject, then there can't be any misunderstandings along the lines of "Geographical entities are supposed to use this style, and biographies are supposed to use that style". What matters is the facts: How many names? How many languages? How many pronunciations?

I do like the idea of taking examples from FAs. WhatamIdoing (talk) 18:21, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

The table's recommendation of using parentheses for non-English names seems too restrictive. It's common for parentheses to be used when an article subject has English-language alternative names, especially when the alternative names are acronyms or other abbreviations, but also "when there are only one or two alternative names" (as described for the "In the first sentence" recommendation). — Newslinger talk 09:48, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

"Most popular when there are one or two non-English names" is not exactly "restrictive", or even a "recommendation", but I agree that abbreviations and also former names are common in this scenario. I'd be happy to have you expand that. WhatamIdoing (talk) 16:31, 18 May 2025 (UTC)

 Done in Special:Diff/1291115286. I was surprised when I linked MOS:LEADALT in an edit summary for an edit in which I used parentheses for abbreviations and then noticed that the previous sentence in this section was replaced with the current table. With the "When to use" column being suggestions rather than "recommendations" or something prescriptive, I think this table is a clear improvement over the previous sentence. — Newslinger talk 05:18, 19 May 2025 (UTC)

The "significant alternative names" need to be other names used by the speakers of the English language, according to published sources. That'd be the Peking/Beijing example. Londra or Londinium should not be significant other names for London, for example, since they are not in use by native speakers (any more). 108.60.227.20 (talk) 14:01, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

Translations in first sentence

There is a discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ontario#Should articles have French language names? about whether a French translation should be added to the first sentence of every article related to the Ontario government. Your input is welcome. --Magnolia677 (talk) 21:02, 20 May 2025 (UTC)

Make the Lead first paragraph more of an overview?

Drawing on some recent discussions about better tools for summarizing complex articles, and how to help make leads of even technical articles more readable at first glance:

• Perhaps the guidance for longer leads should include making the first paragraph an effective, simpler-language overview of the whole. In some articles that is exactly what has been done, while in others every paragraph in a long lead uses similarly complex language and progresses through the material in the rest of the article.
• Per isaacl, this would bring article structure closer to an inverted pyramid, which may suit the needs of many readers.

– SJ + 02:23, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

MOS:INTRO already states "It is even more important here than in the rest of the article that the text be accessible. Editors should avoid lengthy paragraphs and overly specific descriptions – greater detail is saved for the body of the article" and goes into some further detail, so the principle for the lead as a whole being simpler is already established. Is the specific suggestion here that the first paragraph should try to be even simpler than the rest of the lead? CMD (talk) 04:04, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

WP:TECHNICAL also already writes "It is especially important to make the lead section understandable using plain language". Do we really need more WP:CREEP on this? —David Eppstein (talk) 05:43, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I think that would be too constraining. MOS:LEAD is sufficient for this purpose. Praemonitus (talk) 21:30, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

I think we definitely need more advice to editors to keep the introduction simple and accessible. There is a definite tendency for the introduction of an article to become more abstract and specialized. Experts, who tend to dominate the article, want the introduction to be written in the field's technical jargon and buzzwords, and resist simple ordinary language descriptions.

However, an instruction to make the lead paragraph more accessible would just give editors permission to make the rest of the introduction more technical and inaccessible. The entire introduction needs to be comprehensible to general readers. So I oppose this. --Chetvorno^TALK 23:17, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

Why "simple"? What criteria should it provide? The article already says the lead, "should be written in a clear, accessible style". That seems sufficient. Praemonitus (talk) 05:12, 12 June 2025 (UTC)

Capitalization confusion in bolded title

Sometimes we see editors wanting to "match the title" in the bolded title in the lead, matching the initial capital letter even when the title is not a proper name and is not sentence-initial in the lead. E.g the edit summary in this over-capitalizing edit says "(Shouldn't this match the article title?)". It's not real common, but does recur now and then. Should we say something about that in the guidelines? Dicklyon (talk) 20:03, 19 June 2025 (UTC)

Examples are sparse and hard to find, but I did find Fall of Constantinople as an example of such anomalous capitalization after "The" (note that it's "the fall of Constantinople" in dozens of other places in sentences in the article, just not in the lead sentence; I had fixed this in 2021, and again in 2023, but the problem with inconsistent capitalization of "fall" therein goes back almost 20 years). Dicklyon (talk) 21:23, 19 June 2025 (UTC)

Is "lede" still deprecated?

I thought we were replacing all occurrences of "lede" with "lead section" on guideline pages because it's misleading. This isn't about talkspace, where people can spell it however they want. Recently, User:fifteen thousand two hundred twenty four opposed my edit. Should I have not made that edit? 174.138.212.166 (talk) 06:08, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

What fifteen thousand two hundred twenty four said on your talkpage is that MOS:NOTLEDE is not about the spelling of lead/lede, presumably to inform you that your edit summary did not explain the edit. CMD (talk) 06:23, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

I did say that, but I also expressed contention about their above raised lead/lede issue, stating that swapping synonyms like that pings watchpages without good cause and that I didn't see consensus for making such changes across projectspace.

But this isn't something I'm willing to ask many editors commit their time to discussing, so I'm presenting no further contest to any lead/lede changes. fifteen thousand two hundred twenty four (talk) 06:31, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

I agree with the above. It shouldn't matter what it's called. Our lead section and/or "lede" is subject to our own guidelines. Doesn't matter at all what it's called. -bɜ:ʳkənhɪmez | me | talk to me! 06:25, 24 June 2025 (UTC)

Any consensus against "lede" wasn't as strong as I thought. To address watchpages, I won't replace "lede" anymore in its own edit. 174.138.212.166 (talk) 23:17, 24 June 2025 (UTC)