Category:CS1 errors: empty citation

This is a tracking category for CS1 citations that are "empty".

Empty citation

A Citation Style 1 or Citation Style 2 template marked as "Empty" contains no recognizable parameter identifiers. For example, this citation is marked as "empty" even though it contains usable information:

{{cite web |http://www.foobar.com |The Foobar News}}

The citation is "empty" because it does not contain the necessary parameter identifiers (in this case |url= and |title=) that tell {{cite web}} how to use the information that the citation does contain.

A citation is also marked as "empty" when it contains only parameters that it doesn't recognize:

{{cite book |titolo=The Bazquux Uprising |anno=2015}}

This citation is "empty" because the Italian-language parameters |titolo= and |anno= are not recognized as valid parameter names on the English Wikipedia.

"Empty citation" may also mean that an editor meant to use another template entirely. Perhaps the editor used {{citation}} when the intent was to use {{citation needed}} or {{quote}}.

To resolve this error, add appropriate parameter identifiers, translate foreign language parameter names to their English equivalents, or replace the CS1/CS2 template with a more appropriate template.

Pages with this error are automatically placed in Category:CS1 errors: empty citation.[a]


  1. Pages in the Book talk, Category talk, Draft talk, File talk, Help talk, MediaWiki talk, Module talk, Portal talk, Talk, Template talk, User, User talk, and Wikipedia talk namespaces are not included in the tracking categories. In addition, pages with names matching the patterns '/[Ss]andbox', '/[Tt]estcases', '/[^/]*[Ll]og', and '/[Aa]rchive' are not included in the tracking categories.

Pages in category "CS1 errors: empty citation"

The following 8 pages are in this category, out of 8 total.