Template:Full citation needed

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{{fcnTemplate:Fcn}}

This template is used on approximately 11,000 pages and changes may be widely noticed. Test changes in the template's /sandbox or /testcases subpages, or in your own user subpage. Consider discussing changes on the talk page before implementing them.

This template is an alternative to {{Citation needed}}, for the cases where a reference is alluded to, or given in part, but not specified in enough detail. The factuality may or may not be in question; this template is just about the completeness of the citation.

For an article with numerous partial citations, consider instead the banner template {{Full citations needed}}.

How to use

{{Full citation needed|date=October 2026}}

The template should be placed outside <ref>...</ref> tags.

Nixon resigned August 9, 1974.<ref>''The New York Times''</ref>{{Full citation needed|date=October 2026}}
Result: Nixon resigned August 9, 1974.^[1]^{[full citation needed]}

References

^ The New York Times

When to use

Use this when you find citations that are hopelessly incomplete, such as:

The Daily News (but no date or article title)
Smith 2000 (and no indication of the title, or which of the many authors named "Smith" wrote it)
According to a press release from the company... (they might send out hundreds every year)

Do not use this when there is enough of a bibliographic citation that you can find the source (e.g., the book or the article), but you want a page number, quotation, or other detail. Instead, use {{page needed}}, {{request quotation}}, or other specific template.

Other information

This template places the article into Category:Articles needing more detailed references or a dated subcategory thereof.

This template is a self-reference and so is part of the Wikipedia project rather than the encyclopædic content.

TemplateData

This is the TemplateData for this template used by TemplateWizard, VisualEditor and other tools. See a monthly parameter usage report for Template:Full citation needed in articles based on its TemplateData.

TemplateData for Full citation needed

This inline template is used where a reference is alluded to, or given in part, but not specified in enough detail to identify it.

Template parameters[Edit template data]
Parameter		Description	Type	Status
Month and year	`date`	Provides the month and year; e.g., 'January 2013', but not 'jan13' Auto value `{{subst:CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{subst:CURRENTYEAR}}`	String	suggested
More details	`reason`	A reason as to why more details are needed, or which details exactly are needed. Appended to the default hovertext, "A complete citation is needed."	String	optional

Redirects

{{Ref expand}} – banner version of this template, for when an article needs many citations to be completed
{{Incomplete short citation}} – variant of this inline template for when a short citation is too incomplete to identify which long citation it references
{{Citation needed}} – for when no source is indicated at all
{{Ref improve}} – banner template for when an article needs more than one citation to be added
{{Author missing}} – inline template for a specific issue
{{Year missing}} – inline template for a specific issue
{{Page missing}} – inline template for a specific issue
Wikipedia:Citing sources, especially Unsourced material
Wikipedia:Identifying reliable sources
Wikipedia:Template messages/Cleanup/Verifiability and sources
Wikipedia:Template messages/Sources of articles
Wikipedia:Verifiability
Wikipedia:WikiProject Fact and Reference Check

The above documentation is transcluded from Template:Full citation needed/doc.
Editors can experiment in this template's sandbox and testcases pages.
Add categories to the /doc subpage. Subpages of this template.

[1] The New York Times

[1]

v t e Citation and verifiability article maintenance templates
Sourcing	{{Circular}} {{Deprecated archival service}} {{Dubious}} {{Excessive citations}} {{Further reading cleanup}} {{Independent sources}} {{More citations needed}} {{More citations needed section}} {{More footnotes needed}} {{No footnotes}} {{No reliable sources}} {{No significant coverage}} {{One source}} {{One source section}} {{Only primary sources}} {{NRIS only}} {{Primary sources}} {{Primary sources section}} {{Religious text primary}} {{Self-published}} {{Self-reference cleanup}} {{Self-sourcing examples}} {{Refexample section}} {{Sources exist}} {{Text-source}} {{Unreferenced}} {{Unreferenced section}} {{Unreferenced category}} {{Unreliable sources}} {{Unreliable sources section}} {{User-generated}}
BLP-specific	{{BLP unreferenced}} {{BLP unreferenced section}} {{BLP primary sources}} {{BLP self-published}} {{BLP sources}} {{BLP sources section}} {{BLP no footnotes}} {{BLP more footnotes needed}} {{BLP one source}}
Topic specific	{{Localist}} {{Media IMDb refimprove}} {{More medical citations needed}} {{More science citations needed}} {{Neologism}} {{Science review}} {{Unreferenced law}} {{Unreferenced medical section}}
Dispute-related	{{Cite check}} {{Cite check section}} {{Content}} {{Disputed}} {{Dispute about}} {{Disputed section}} {{Disputed chem}} {{Disputed list}} {{Disputed map}} {{Expert needed}} {{Hoax}} {{Original research}} {{Original research section}} {{Speculation}} {{Speculation section}} {{Synthesis}} {{Verifiability}} {{Verify sources}}
Citation improvements	{{Citation style}} {{Citations broken}} {{Cleanup bare URLs}} {{Format footnotes}} {{Full citations needed}} {{Ibid}} {{Page numbers improve}} {{Page numbers needed}} {{Parenthetical referencing}} {{Shallow references}}
General advice	archive.today guidance Citing sources Reliable sources Maintenance template removal Citation needed Find sources Combining sources Referencing styles