Wikipedia:What the Good article criteria are not

This is an essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors. This page is not an encyclopedia article, nor is it one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints.

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The Good article criteria are the requirements that an article should meet in order to be listed as a Good article (GA). Any articles that have been reviewed, and meet these criteria, should be listed as GAs. Good articles are "satisfactory" or "decent" articles, not great articles. The standards for GAs are fairly high, but noticeably lower than the Featured article criteria. Importantly, the GA criteria are a standard, not the opinion of individual reviewers. This essay is intended to help reviewers make their decisions based on whether an article meets the criteria or not, rather than personal preferences.

Article editors and reviewers should have as a common goal the ideal to make the article as good as it can be. However, the decision to list or not list an article should be based on the GA criteria alone. Reviewers are encouraged to differentiate clearly between those improvements that are necessary for the article to meet the criteria, and suggestions to improve the article beyond the actual criteria. As a rule of thumb, if none of the six criteria plainly apply to a suggested improvement, it should be labeled as such or considered optional.

Regular editors of a nominated article should likewise assume and act in accordance with good faith and the goal of article improvement. The reviewer may have less expertise in the subject matter. If they make impractical or inappropriate suggestions (e.g., for the inclusion of information that isn't known, or images that simply don't exist), explain politely why this is impractical or inappropriate. Regular reviewers often have good suggestions for improvements that go beyond the GA criteria. These suggestions are optional with respect to GA status, but implementing them may result in an even better article, which may help it reach Featured article quality.

If editors and reviewers reach an impasse, Community reassessment is available to resolve disagreements, but all are encouraged to resolve as many outstanding problems as possible first.