Help:Links

Note: When you edit this page, you agree to release your contribution under the CC0. See Public Domain Help Pages for more info.

Links are used to reference pages within MediaWiki, other wikis, or external websites.

There are five types of hypertext links in MediaWiki:

1. Internal links to other pages in the same wiki (commonly called "wikilinks")
2. External links to pages at other websites
3. External links to internal pages in the same wiki
4. Interwiki links to other websites using special prefixes registered in advance
5. Interlanguage links to other wikis registered as different language versions of the current wiki

Please note that this list does not include category links and file links, which are used to place pages into categories and display images or other media files, respectively.

To create a so-called internal link to a page on the same wiki (a "wikilink"), use double square brackets wiki markup, [[like this]]. When you preview or save your changes, you will see a link that can be followed to the target page. If the page exists the link is displayed in blue (like the word "create" in the first sentence of this paragraph); if the page does not exist, the link appears red (so the [[like this]] link is actually rendered like this). Note that the colors could be different if the color scheme of the wiki has been changed from the default. Following such a "redlink" to a missing page (whether or not it is actually red) will usually enable the user to create the page.

To markup any arbitrary string of text (not necessarily a page title) as a link, use a "vertical bar" or "pipe" character, like this: [[Help:Categories|category links]] results in the link category links.

The first letter of the link target is usually not case-sensitive (unless the wiki is configured otherwise), meaning links can be capitalized or not (so How to contribute and how to contribute are equivalent). However, the case of every subsequent letter must match the target page exactly (so How to contribute and How To Contribute are not equivalent). Spaces in the page title may be represented as underscores (so How to contribute and How_to_contribute are again equivalent), but using underscores in links will make them visible in the page text (but this can be prevented by using a "pipe").

If the page title you are linking to is that of the page you are editing, the result is not a hyperlink at all but simply bold text (for example, on this page the markup [[Help:Links]] gives the result Help:Links). If you're trying to create a wikilink to the current page, you probably want to link to a specific section or to an anchor within the page; see the examples below.

MediaWiki uses the pagelinks table to keep track of internal wikilinks.

Name/Description	Syntax	Result
Internal link	[[Main Page]] [[Help:Contents]] [[Extension:DynamicPageList (Wikimedia)]]	Main Page Help:Contents Extension:DynamicPageList (Wikimedia)
Piped link	[[Help:Editing pages|editing help]] Links to a section/anchor within the target page. [[Help:Editing pages#Preview|previewing]] Piped link to an anchor on the same page [[#See also|different text]] See also Help:Piped link.	editing help previewing different text
Pipe trick	[[Manual:Extensions|]] [[User:John Doe|]] [[Extension:DynamicPageList (Wikimedia)|]] [[Extension:DynamicPageList (disambiguation)|]] The transformation done by the pipe trick can result in the same text for different link targets, as seen in the DynamicPageList examples.	Extensions John Doe DynamicPageList DynamicPageList
Word-ending links	[[Help]]s [[Help]]ing [[Help]]ers [[Help]]almostanylettersyoulikehere [[Help]]BUTnotalways Follows so-called "linktrail rules" localised per each language.	Helps Helping Helpers Helpalmostanylettersyoulikehere HelpBUTnotalways
Avoiding word-ending links	[[Help]]<nowiki />ful advice [[wikipedia:GNU General Public License|GPL]]<nowiki />v3	Helpful advice GPLv3
Link to an anchor on the same page	[[#See also]] Anchors are provided automatically on section headings and to the top ([[#top]]) of the page.	#See also
Setting an anchor for incoming links	<div id="Unique anchor name 1">optional text</div> <span id="Unique anchor name 2">optional text</span> Rendered block-level and inline, respectively. Doing this would allow for [[#Unique anchor name 1]] on the same page or [[Help:Links#Unique anchor name 1]] on a different page. Omit the "optional text" for an invisible anchor. Setting an anchor in a section heading ==<span id="Alternate Section Title"></span>Section heading== Note the placement. This must be a "span" tag, not a "div". (Such anchors allow sections to be retitled without breaking incoming links.)	optional text optional text Section heading
Link to an anchor at another page	[[Help:Images#Supported media types for images]]	Help:Images#Supported media types for images
Link to the current page's talk page	[[{{TALKPAGENAME}}|Discussion]] See also Help:Magic words#Page names	Discussion
Link to a subpage	[[/example]] Shortcut for [[Help:Links/example|/example]]. See also Help:Subpages .	/example
Link to a subpage without the leading slash	[[/example/]] Shortcut for [[Help:Links/example|example]].	example
Link to a subpage of parent page for current page. Can only be used on subpages.	[[../example2]] Shortcut for [[Help:Links/example2|example2]] if you post the link on [[Help:Links/example|example]] page.	example2
Visible link to a category page	[[:Category:Help]] Without the leading colon the link would not be visible and the page would instead be placed into the category; this is a very common mistake. See also Help:Categories .	Category:Help
Visible link to an image or media file	[[:File:Example.jpg]] [[:File:Example.jpg|file label]] [[Media:Example.jpg]] [[Media:Example.jpg|file label]] Without the leading colon on the "File:" examples, the images would actually be displayed. See also Help:Images . The Media: prefix is used to link directly to the uploaded file, rather than the file-information page.	File:Example.jpg file label Media:Example.jpg file label
Link to a page specific to each reader (user page, etc.)	[[Special:MyPage]] [[Special:MyTalk]] [[Special:Preferences]]	Special:MyPage Special:MyTalk Special:Preferences
Internal link to a specific revision	[[Special:PermanentLink/2393992]] Revision numbers can be found in each page's edit history. (It is very common to see links to specific revisions implemented as external links because it's easy to cut-and-paste an entire URL to form an external link.)	Special:PermanentLink/2393992
Internal link to a "diff"	[[Special:Diff/2393992]] [[Special:Diff/2390639/2393992]] The default (in the first example above) is to show the changes from the previous revision. See also the comments in the previous item.	Special:Diff/2393992 Special:Diff/2390639/2393992
Redirect	#REDIRECT [[Main Page]] Should be the first line on the page. See Help:Redirects .	Main Page

To create an external link, usually to a page at a different website, enclose the URL followed by space and the link text in single square brackets (see examples below). When you save or preview the page, you will see a link rendered slightly differently than an internal wikilink. It may be a different color and/or be followed by an arrow icon to show that it may lead to another site.

[https://mediawiki.org MediaWiki]

[https://mediawiki.org]

https://mediawiki.org

<nowiki>https://mediawiki.org</nowiki>

[//en.wikipedia.org Wikipedia]

[//en.wikipedia.org //en.wikipedia.org]

https://{{SERVERNAME}}/pagename

https://google.com/search?q={{PAGENAMEE}}

[mailto:info@example.org email me]

[mailto:info@example.org?Subject=URL%20Encoded%20Subject&body=Body%20Text info]

[skype:echo123 call me]

Email links use mailto: before the address. They're written like this: [mailto:anyone@example.org address name] (resulting in address name). If there's no name, the address is automatically numbered, like this: [mailto:anyone@example.org] becomes [2]. Addresses without square brackets won't be linked, e.g., anyone@example.com. You can also add a CC using [mailto:anyone@example.org?cc=anyone2@example.org address name] (resulting in address name). To add a subject, use [mailto:me@me.com?subject=Me] "

To add a link to a page on the same wiki using URL query parameters, you may need to use external link syntax.

[https://www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=Help:Links&action=edit Edit this page]

[{{fullurl:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|action=edit}} Edit this page]

<span class="plainlinks">[https://www.mediawiki.org/w/index.php?title=Help:Links&action=edit Edit this page]</span>

Some skins add an arrow icon after each external link by default. However, this can be avoided by using class="plainlinks". For instance:

• [http://a a] gives a
• <span class="plainlinks">[http://a a]</span> gives a

Special:Linksearch is a built-in tool that helps find pages linked to a specific URL. By using the externallinks table, it generates a comprehensive list of page names where the link originates, along with the complete target link for each source page. You can search in all namespaces or just one. It supports wildcard (*) use, so you can search by top-level domain (e.g. [3]), second-level domain (e.g. [4]), etc. or refine your search by specifying parts of the URL e.g. [5].

Notes:

• Avoid including "http://".
• The program might not return any results if there is a colon in the URL.
• MediaWiki page names in URLs should have underscores instead of spaces. The Linksearch function also requires underscores in URLs.
• Linksearch is sensitive to capitalization, multiple underscores, and the use of "index.php". It may not find alternative URLs even if they lead to the same target. Therefore, when creating an external link, it's best to use the canonical form of the URL. If the address bar displays a modified URL after following a link, update the URL in the link accordingly for optimal use of Linksearch.
• The list is sorted by URL, using standard page name order. Note that an underscore, unlike a blank space, is alphabetically positioned between "Z" and "a".

Normally, internal links within a project are easy to spot and useful for finding related pages. But when there's a mix of internal and external links, it can be tricky to track backlinks, it necessitates the use of both "Help:What links here" and "Linksearch". However, for links to specific sections or anchors, it's possible to include both an internal link and, with CSS styling using "display=none" an external link to provide backlink.

External links are better than interwiki links. With Linksearch, you can even find backlinks to specific sections or anchors. So, combining both internal and external links while hiding the external ones "<span style="display:none">http://...</span>", gives us the best of both worlds.

1. External links doesn't support Word-ending links.
2. External links doesn't count toward Special:WhatLinksHere (What links here).

Interwiki links are internal-style links to other websites (which do not have to be wikis, despite the name). For example, you can link to the article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunflower by typing [[wikipedia:Sunflower]] or, on this wiki, the shorter [[w:Sunflower]]. Both will result in a link wikipedia:Sunflower. This works because by default MediaWiki configures wikipedia: as an "interwiki prefix" that turns into https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ when used inside [[ ]]. (It may not work if the admin of your wiki has changed the setting.) Unlike internal links, interwiki links do not use page existence detection, so an interwiki link will appear blue even if the page does not exist on the remote wiki.

Similar to internal page links, you can create piped links , with alternate link label, e.g. [[wikipedia:Sunflower|big yellow flower]] is the link big yellow flower and [[wikipedia:Sunflower|]] is the link Sunflower.

Basically, interwiki links are abbreviations for commonly-used longer external links. A very similar link could be created as [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunflower big yellow flower].

More details are at Manual:Interwiki . Your wiki may have a Special:Interwiki page listing the interwiki prefixes it supports; here is the default interwiki list. You can edit the interwiki table on your site.

If your wiki has other language versions, you may find interlanguage links in the sidebar, just below toolbox in a section titled “in other languages.”

In wiki markup an interlanguage link looks very much like an interwiki link, but behaves similarly to a category link in that it is rendered in a special way. While category links appear in a special list at the bottom of the page (usually), interlanguage links appear in a special list in the sidebar of the page (or elsewhere, depending on the wiki's configuration and the skin used).

The purpose of interlanguage links is to link pages on the same topics in different languages. To create an interlanguage link, type [[language prefix:page name]] anywhere in the page (preferably at the bottom, like category links); the language prefix is the prefix specified at your wiki for the other language version (typically the ISO 639-1 language code). The interlanguage link is unilateral, it does not point back from that page in the other language. For that purpose, an equivalent back-link needs to be placed there as well. It does not work like the "Edit links" in the languages section of Wikipedia-language versions. But it can be used across all name spaces, including 'User:' to point to ones other profiles in other languages.

If you want to make the interlanguage link appear at a specific place in the content of the page rather than in the sidebar, add a colon before the language prefix:

[[:en:Sunflower]] → en:Sunflower

When a link is both interwiki and interlanguage, the order is wikipedia:en:Sunflower.

For more information, see Interlanguage links .

A piped link is an internal link or interwiki link where the 'target page name' of the link and its 'label' are both specified. This is useful in cases where the user wants to values of 'target page name' and 'label' to be different. This also enables linking a contextually relevant word or phrase within the text of a page rather than using the generic value "see also". The wording does not need to match the name of the target page. Depending on the preferences set for the current user and a supported browser, you can still see the link target: when you hover your cursor over the link, the name shows up in a pop-up window and is also shown in the status bar. For example:

[[coffeehouse setup|Get Piping Hot Coffee Here!]]

will show: Get Piping Hot Coffee Here!

Let's take another example: [[help:Piped link|piped link]] will be displayed as piped link. This can be done when context makes it clear that the page being linked to is in the help namespace. The piped link is a better way of doing this, rather than mistakenly linking to piped link which might be a disambiguation page or not exist.

Fun Fact: The term piped refers to the use of the pipe character "|", which in this context is used to separate the more descriptive description from the actual name of the linked page. The Pipe character was named after an alternative use of it; see Pipe (computing).

An alternative way is to use redirect pages. To create Get Piping Hot Coffee Here!, use [[Get Piping Hot Coffee Here!]] and make it redirect to coffeehouse setup (please note: unlike above, what pops up when you point at the link, depending on your browser's support, is the text that is already shown).

It is convenient if the redirect is already there or will also be of use elsewhere. However, there are a few drawbacks.

• the popup does not show the destination page
• "Related changes" shows the changes in the redirect page not the redirect target
• the redirect message that is shown on the target page slightly clutters it

Using a piped link and a redirect together, it is possible to provide information in the hover box that is not the name of the linked page, for example, the value of a unit in terms of other units. In that case, it is possible to make a page whose page name is the information that you'd like in the link title, and which redirects to the page with a more appropriate name. For example, the page w:30.48 cm redirects to w:Foot (unit).

If the part after the "|" in a piped link is left empty, it is converted to an abbreviated form of the page name on the left, based on the following rules:

1. Any word that is before the first colon (:), as well as the colon character itself, is removed. This word may or may not be a 'namespace' prefix (such as "Help:") or an 'interwiki' prefix (such as "commons:"). If the name of the page is preceded by a colon (:), "first" refers to "first after this".
2. If there is some text in the parentheses at the end, then it will be removed.
3. If there are no parentheses, but there is a comma (,) character, the comma and everything after it is removed.
4. Note that this does not work for sections/anchors as [[Help:Piped_link#Pipe_trick|]] outputs [[Help:Piped_link#Pipe_trick|]].

Similar to using the three or four tildes when signing on Talk pages, and using 'subst', in a preview, the result shows up in the preview itself, but the conversion in the edit box is not shown yet. Click on the "Show changes" option to see the change in the wikitext.

• [[Help:Template|]] is converted to [[Help:Template|Template]], which is shown as Template
• [[Music: My life|]] is converted to [[Music: My life| My life]], which is shown as My life - although "Music:" itself is not a namespace (therefore the space after the colon character is not automatically removed), however, the shortcut works anyway
• [[w:en:Pipe (computing)|]] is converted to [[w:en:Pipe (computing)|en:Pipe]], which is shown as en:Pipe.
• [[commons:Boston, Massachusetts|]] is converted to [[commons:Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]], which is shown as Boston.
• [[w:{{{1}}}|]] does not give [[w:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]], and calling the template with a value of parameter 1 gives a working link, but in the case of substitution only.
• [[w:en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|]] does not give [[w:en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}]] and [[m:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|]] does not give [[m:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|{{FULLPAGENAME}}]]
• [[Wikipedia:Village pump (technical)#Pipe trick|]] is not converted, so it does not give a working link.

* [[project:a (b)|]]
* [[w:project:a (b)|]]
* [[:de:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wiktionary:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wiktionary:de:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wikibooks:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wikiquote:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wikisource:project:a (b)|]]
* [[wikisource:project:a (b)#c|]]
* [[w:en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|]] [[w:en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|en:{{FULLPAGENAME}}]]
* [[m:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|]] [[m:{{FULLPAGENAME}}|{{FULLPAGENAME}}]]

* a
* project:a
* project:a
* project:a
* de:project:a
* project:a
* project:a
* project:a
* [[wikisource:project:a (b)#c|]]
* [[w:en:Help:Links|]] en:Help:Links
* [[m:Help:Links|]] Help:Links

Since the sortkey syntax of the category is similar to a piped link, the pipe trick also works for category tags, even though technically, it is not useful there.

• [[Help:L{{tc}}k|]] using template:tc is not converted, so the result is rendered as [[Help:Link|]] which is not as a working link. This is because like substitution, the pipe trick expansion occurs before ordinary expansion of the templates, etc. The pipe trick does not work if the linked page includes invalid characters. Therefore, while ordinarily the acceptability of the target page name is assessed after template expansion, the pipe trick expansion judges it before that. The braces are therefore considered invalid characters in the page name. Instead, a template can be used like template:pipe trick: {{pipe trick|Help:|L{{tc}}k}} which renders as Link.

On page "A (c)", [[|b]] is converted to [[b (c)|b]] automatically.

Similarly, on page "A, c", [[|b]] is converted to [[b, c|b]] automatically.

Links in the format [[#anchor_name]] will direct to the first matching anchor on the page, typically corresponding to the first identical section heading.

You can add an [[#anchor_name]] to a link, directing it to the first matching section heading (or anchor) on the named page:

[[Help:Editing#Advanced editing]]

https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Editing#Advanced_editing

Section headings serve as anchors, using the heading text as the anchor name. If there are multiple sections with identical headings, each subsequent occurrence is appended with "_2", "_3", etc.

The anchor #toc links to the page's table of contents, except when there's a section titled "toc."

Manually-set anchors are beneficial for linking to "unlinkable" elements such as tables (titles or cells) or sections of plain text. For instance, in the External links to internal pages section above, although the column text "Description" resembles a (minor) heading, it is not.

There are several methods to set an anchor at any position:

• The "anchor" template, if it exists on your wiki, specified as {{Anchor }}, offers a standardized method to create anchor points. Place the template where you want, using the syntax {{Anchor|Name_of_Anchor}}. For instance, {{Anchor|Description}} is placed in the "Description" column of the table below the "External links to internal pages" section. Clicking on #Description links to that anchor point created on the table. The anchor is only visible via the source code.
• Use the generic anchor tag <span id="anchor_name">some text</span> with optional text for visible anchors. For hidden anchors, omit the text. To point to the anchor use [[#anchor_name]].
• Avoid using manual HTML headings like <h2>Editing Instructions</h2>. This text serves as an anchor_name.
• In certain instances, adding an ID attribute similar to HTML within a Wiki-element is necessary. Take, for instance, the table mentioned earlier, titled External links to internal pages:

border="1" class="wikitable" id="You type"

• A top of a page can be accessed using the reserved term [[#top]].

See also Help:Section#Linking sections using an arbitrary id.

As mentioned above, if external link style is used, e.g. [6], we can use Special:Linksearch: [7].

When using Linksearch, it's helpful to add leading zeros to numerical anchor names to prevent unintended matches. For example, instead of searching for "1", use "01" to avoid including "10". This practice is seen in w:Portal:Current events/DateHeader2. Similarly, if there are anchors like "a" and "ab", using "_a" can distinguish them in search results.

The #anchorencode parser function encodes input to use as an anchor. For example, to external link to #Using linksearch anchors above, you would use https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Links#{{anchorencode:Using Linksearch anchors}}, which resolves to https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Links#Using_Linksearch_anchors

MediaWiki has a subpage feature that may or may not be active depending on the project and namespace. If it's activated, the following rules apply; otherwise, "A/b" is simply a standalone page with that name.

A page's tree structure is formed using forward slashes in page names: A/b is considered a subpage of A, making A the parent of A/b; additionally, A/b/c is a subpage of A/b; meanwhile, A/a, A/b, and A/c are categorized as sibling pages.

The subpage body automatically displays links to all parent pages without needing specific wikitext. These links appear even if the parent page doesn't exist. However, if any ancestor page in the sequence is missing, the chain of links will stop before that point. Additionally, the capitalization of letters after the forward slash in the page name matters, meaning "/subpage" and "/Subpage" refer to different pages.

The functions, What links here and [Help:Related changes|]] do not consider these automatically generated links."

When the subpage feature is enabled within a namespace, any forward slash in a page's name automatically creates a subpage structure, regardless of whether it was intended or not.

You can find a list of subpages using Special:PrefixIndex.

When utilizing the subpage feature within namespace A on page A:B/c/d, {{BASEPAGENAME}} shows B/c while {{SUBPAGENAME}} shows d.

Within a subpage hierarchy, you can utilize the following relative links:

• [[../]] links to the parent page of the current subpage. For example, on page A/b, it takes you to page A, and on page A/b/c, it directs you to page A/b.
• [[../../]] links to the grandparent page of the current subpage. For example, on page A/b/c, it points to page A.
• [[../s]] links to a sibling page of the current subpage. For example, on page A/b, it leads to page A/s.
• [[../../s]] links to an "uncle" page of the current subpage. For example, on page A/b/c, it points to page A/s.
• [[/s]] links direct to a subpage. On page A, it functions similarly to [[A/s]]. However, linking from a namespace with an enabled subpage feature to a main namespace page starting with "/" requires a workaround: adding a colon before the page name.

Relative links remain functional even when all pages within a hierarchy are renamed to reflect a change in the root's name, even if the root becomes a child of a new parent. Users with the appropriate permissions, such as administrators and those with the move-subpages right, have the option to move both the main page and its subpages during a renaming process.

Learn more about subpages at w:Wikipedia:Subpages. See examples at Help:Link/example and Help:Link/example/example2

This feature is only enabled in namespaces specified in the $wgNamespacesWithSubpages configuration setting, either its default namespaces, or any additional namespaces set in LocalSettings.php

The guidelines outlined in Manual:Page naming state that in wiki and interwiki links, conversions are made to non-literal characters automatically. For example,"[[Manual:Page%20naming]]" will display as "Manual:Page naming". Conversely, external links operate oppositely; literal characters are transformed into non-literal characters. For example, browsers typically convert ".../wiki/!" to ".../wiki/%21".

Applying a code like %70 to a redirect deactivates it, even though the link remains accessible from the redirect page. To ensure a successful redirect, the redirect page displays the canonical form of the target, unlike the preview page which shows the link in its regular format.

• Related changes
• Backlinks, Linksearch
• When you include a space after the pipe symbol ([[main Page| ]]), the outcome can vary depending on the browser. In some cases, it might only display a space (" "), without creating a clickable link. However, it's still recognized as a link by the "what links here" feature.

In certain web browsers, when you place the cursor over a link, a tooltip may appear, displaying the content of the link's HTML title attribute. MediaWiki assigns different values to this attribute depending on the type of link: for internal wikilinks, it displays the page name and (page does not exist), if the page does not exist; for interwiki links, it displays the page name with a prefix; and for external links, it displays the URL.

The browser might also display similar information in its status bar, possibly showing which section it belongs to.

Using a piped link , even if it isn't clicked, can help clarify acronyms (like displaying "neutral point of view" as NPOV) or adding annotations. Hover boxes can also be created without links, you can customize the hover box content using markup like [[Link title|<span title="hoverbox">Display text</span>]].

You cannot include a title attribute directly within the href element for external links. Nevertheless, you can achieve a similar outcome by using a span element instead, like this: [http://www.example.com <span title="hover text on external link">www.example.com web site</span>] :
www.example.com web site

The MediaWiki API allows users to retrieve all links from a page. For example, you can utilize the API query called API:Links to achieve this.

You can utilize images to direct users to other pages. For further details, refer to the guidance on utilizing an image to link to a specific page in the help section.

An internal wiki link is limited by maximum page title size.

• Manual:Linked images
• Help:Editing#Links
• Help:URL
• Help:Self link
• Help:Template#Restrictions (and the next section)
• Guide to setting up interwiki linking
• Manual:Links table
• Interwikimap
• Manual:brokenlinks table
• Red Link
• Wikipedia:Canonicalization
• Special:Mostlinked - Displays the number of links.
• Special:Lonelypages - A list of pages not linked to any page.