wikidoc:Image use policy

This page is a brief overview of the policies towards images &mdash; including format, content, and copyright issues &mdash; on the English-language edition of Wikipedia. If you have specific questions, you should go to the most specific policy page related to your question, for a prompt and accurate response.

For information on multimedia in general (images, sound files, etc.), see Media. For information on uploading, see Uploading images, or go directly to Special:Upload.

Rules of thumb
Below this brief checklist of image use rules is the detailed reasoning behind them.


 * 1)  Always tag your image with one of the image copyright tags.. When in doubt, do not upload copyrighted images.
 * 2) Always specify on the description page where the image came from, such as a URL, or a name/alias and method of contact for the photographer. Don't put credits in images themselves.
 * 3)  Use the image description page to describe an image and its copyright situation.
 * 4)  Use a clear, detailed title. Note that if any image with the same title has already been uploaded, it will be replaced with your new one.
 * 5) Upload a high-resolution version of your image whenever possible (this does NOT apply to fair use images see  for details), and use the automatic thumbnailing option of the Wikipedia image markup to scale down the image. MediaWiki accepts images up to 20 MB in size. Do not scale down the image yourself, as scaled-down images may be of limited use in the future.
 * 6) Crop the image to highlight the relevant subject.
 * 7) If you create an image that contains text, please upload also a version without any text. It will help Wikipedias in other languages translate them.
 * 8) Use JPEG format for photographic images, and SVG format for icons, logos, drawings, maps, flags, and such, falling back to PNG when only a raster image is available. Fair use icons, logos, drawings, maps, flags, and such should be uploaded in PNG format instead of SVG. Use GIF format for inline animations, Ogg/Theora for video. Do not use Windows BMP format images; they are uncompressed and take up too much space.
 * 9) Add a good alternative text for images.
 * 10) Think twice before uploading shocking pictures. If an image concerns you, discuss it on the relevant article talk page. See Image censorship

Adding images
Please note: this is not the official copyright policy &mdash; it is merely a reminder with helpful tips:

Before you upload an image, make sure that either:
 * You own the rights to the image (usually meaning that you created the image yourself).
 * You can prove that the copyright holder has licensed the image under a free license.
 * You can prove that the image is in the public domain.
 * You believe, and state, a fair use rationale for the specific use of the image that you intend.

Always note the image's copyright status on the image description page, using one of the image copyright tags, and provide specific details about the image's origin. If you created the image, for example, write image created by John Doe on Jan 1st, 2000 (replacing John Doe with your name, and Jan 1st, 2000 with the image creation date). Don't just write image created by me.

User-created images
Wikipedia encourages users to upload their own images, but all user-created images must be released under a free license (such as the GFDL and/or an acceptable Creative Commons license) or be released into the public domain (no license). If licensing, it is best practice to multi-license your images under both GFDL and Creative Commons.

Such images can include photographs which you yourself took (remember that rights to images generally lie with the photographer, not the subject), drawings or diagrams you yourself created, and other self-created work. However, simply re-tracing a copyrighted image or diagram does not necessarily create a new copyright &mdash; copyright is generated only by instances of "creativity", and not by the amount of labor which went into the creation of the work. Photographs of three-dimensional objects almost always generate a new copyright &mdash; photographs of two-dimensional objects often do not (see the section on "public domain" below). If you have questions in respect to this, please ask them at Copyrights.

Images with you, friends or family prominently featured in a way that distracts from the image topic are not recommended for the main namespace (user pages are OK). These are considered "vanity" images and the Wikipedia community has repeatedly reached consensus to delete vanity images.

Also, user-created images may not be watermarked, distorted, have any credits in the image itself or anything else that would hamper their free use, unless, of course, the image is intended to demonstrate watermarking, distortion etc. and is used in the related article. All photo credit should be in a summary on the image description page.

Free licenses
For a list of possible licenses which are considered "free enough" for Wikipedia, see Image copyright tags. Licenses which restrict the use of the media to non-profit or educational purposes only (i.e. noncommercial use only), or are given permission to only appear on Wikipedia, are not free enough for Wikipedia's usages or goals and will be deleted.. Sources of free images can be found at Free image resources. In short, Wikipedia media (with the exception of "fair use" media &mdash; see below) should be as "free" as Wikipedia's content &mdash; both to keep Wikipedia's own legal status secure as well as to allow for as much re-use of Wikipedia content as possible.

Public domain
Under United States copyright law, all images published before January 1, 1923 in the United States are now in the public domain, but this does not apply to images that were created prior to 1923 and published in 1923 or later. The year 1923 has special significance and this date will not roll forward before 2019.

Because Wikipedia pages, including non-English language pages, are currently hosted on a server in the United States, this law is particularly significant here. However, the interaction of Wikipedia, the GFDL, and international law is still under discussion.

While there are many places to acquire public domain photos at the public domain image resources, if you strongly suspect an image is a copyright infringement (for example, no copyright status exists on its image description page and you have seen it elsewhere under a copyright notice), then you should list it for deletion (see below).

Also note that in the United States, reproductions of two-dimensional artwork which is in the public domain because of age do not generate a new copyright &mdash; for example, a straight-on photograph of the Mona Lisa would not be considered copyrighted (see Bridgeman v. Corel). Scans of images alone do not generate new copyrights &mdash; they merely inherit the copyright status of the image they are reproducing. This is not true of the copyright laws of some other countries, such as the United Kingdom.

Fair use considerations
Some usage of copyrighted materials without permission of the copyright holder can qualify as fair use in the United States (but not in most other jurisdictions). For details as to Wikipedia's policy in regards to fair use, or to ask questions about a specific instance, please see the page at Fair use. Improper claims of fair use constitute copyright infringement and are illegal.

As a general rule of thumb, Wikipedia allows low-resolution images of copyrighted material if they are unlikely to affect the potential market for the material, are used for the purposes of analysis or criticism, and for which there is no alternative, non- or free-copyrighted replacement available.

Media which is mis-tagged as fair use or is flagrantly copyright violation can and will be deleted on sight. Frequent uploading of non-fair use copyrighted material can be justification for banning a Wikipedia user.