How to Create a Wikipedia Page About Yourself? Complete guide

Wondering if you can have a biographical Wikipedia page about yourself, your company, your association, your work or anything else you’re connected with?

This is a frequent request from people who call on my services.

In this article, I’ll give you as much information as possible so that you can :

• find out if you can have your own wikipedia page right now;
• create your own Wikipedia page without the risk of it being deleted.

Check if a Wikipedia page has already been created about you

If a Wikipedia article has already been created on the same subject and then deleted, you won’t need to re-create an article from 0. You’ll need to make what’s called a page restoration request.

That’s why you first need to check whether a page about you already exists. Here’s how to do it.

1. Go to Wikipedia’s public diaries: here (in french)
2. In target, enter your name (or the subject of the page you want to create).
3. Click on List

If “No corresponding operation in logs” appears, this means that no page has been created.

✅ So you can create your Wikipedia article from scratch.

If pages are listed, this means that a page about you has already existed.

❌ In this case, you need to make a page restoration request.

Identify the applicable criteria to justify your reputation in the eyes of Wikipedia

Anyone can edit or create articles on Wikipedia. But not everyone can have their own Wikipedia article.

To get your own dedicated page, you need to meet the notoriety criteria defined by Wikipedia.

There are :

• general notoriety criteria, valid for everyone;
• specific criteria, depending on your sector of activity (artist, sportsperson, company, etc.).

The general criteria are those from which you can rarely derogate. Here they are.

If a subject has received significant and sustained coverage by reliable sources independent of the subject, it is presumed to be sufficiently notorious to make it possible to create an independent article or list.

General notoriety criteria on Wikipedia(here)

What does this mean in concrete terms?

You must have :

• at least 2 media appearances;
• at least 2 years apart;
• that talk ONLY about you;
• in well-known national media (no regional daily press or trade press);
• that are not copy-pasted press releases or sponsored articles.

So you need to find these media publications, which you can then use to write the content of the article.

💡 If you’d prefer to delegate this work, I can also conduct a notoriety audit for you. This will help you determine if you are eligible for a Wikipedia page and provide an assessment of the quality of your press relations and online reputation. Contact me.

If you’re not well-known enough to have an article on Wikipedia, you might be interested in this article: 8 alternative sites to Wikipedia.

Create a Wikipedia account

Do you meet the criteria for a Wikipedia page?

✅ In that case, you may want to consider creating a page!

Start by creating a Wikipedia account if you don’t already have one.

To do this, go to Wikipedia in the language version in which you want to create the page (example: French) and click on Create an account.

You will then need to provide a valid e-mail address and choose a username.

Create a draft of your new page

There are several ways to create a new article on Wikipedia. Here’s the method I recommend if you have little experience of Wikipedia.

Once you have logged in to your Wikipedia account, go to :

• Getting started on Wikipedia
• How to create an article
• Start

You will then be asked to answer several questions to make sure you understand the article creation process. Then you’ll be taken to a page where you can start creating your article.

Do you want to go faster? In that case, you can create your article from scratch.

• Log in to your account
• Access your draft by typing in your browser’s URL: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:[your wikipedia username]/Draft

This is where you can start writing your page, but it won’t be officially published until you click Publish my draft.

🚨 This second, faster way is not recommended if you’re not used to contributing to Wikipedia: your page creation process may come to nothing, or your page will be quickly deleted as soon as it goes online.

Write your page using a quality template

Your Wikipedia page must comply with strict criteria regarding form and content:

• is put online;
• is not deleted;
• is not emblazoned with unsightly red “self-promotion” and “promotional tone” banners.

I recommend that you use a good-quality Wikipedia article as inspiration for your page.

You’ll find a list of good-quality items here.

For example, I like to draw inspiration from the pages of :

• Preity Zinta for the creation of a page about an entrepreneur;
• Vincent van Gogh for that of an artist;
• Hydro-Québec for that of an institution or company.

I’ve created my own template for creating your first Wikipedia article.

🚨 Every piece of information on the page must be supported by a source external to the subject of the article. This means you can’t rely on your personal website to support the page’s content.

Submit your article for proofreading

You’ve finalized your article and complied with all the formal and substantive requirements of Wikipedia?

You can publish it in two different ways.

Or ask for a proofreading beforehand. This is recommended if you’re not used to contributing to Wikipedia.

Or click on “Publish my draft”. The article will go online straight away, but robots and humans will still pass over it to check that it belongs on the encyclopedia.

🚨 Wikipedia does not prohibit you from creating a page about yourself, but it does require you to declare your link of interest (personal benefit or remuneration). Indicate it on the discussion page of the newly created page and on your profile, following Wikipedia’s recommendations.

What’s the risk if you don’t? You run the risk of having an unsightly “this article may have been modified in exchange for undisclosed compensation or benefits” banner displayed at the top of your page.

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I hope you’ve found this article useful! If you have any questions, I’m always available to answer them in comments.

If you’d like me to accompany you on Wikipedia, please contact me for a quote.

Good contributions 🙂 !

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