Wikipedia:Soft redirect

A soft redirect is a replacement of usual or "hard" redirects and is used where the destination is another site—including . Soft redirects differ in that they leave the user on the redirect page, requiring the user to click through to the redirected link as opposed to automatically taking them there.

The technique is particularly likely to be used when redirecting users across —for example is a soft redirect to . Normal redirects would be undesirable in these circumstances, and hard redirects are disabled. (Reasons: they could not be easily edited without hand-crafting the correct URL, since clicking on a link to the redirect page would take you straight to the redirect's target and there would be no "Redirected from foo" message to click, so it would be difficult to return to the redirect page itself; there would also be infinite-loop security considerations.)

Another situation where soft redirects are used is when the intended target is a special page, and the system automatically "softens" attempted hard redirects to special pages. For example, redirects to .

Soft redirects are intended mostly for external use, where hard redirects will not function. For internal use in general, hard redirects should be used instead.

Do not put redirect categorization templates on soft redirects ({{}} is an exception).

The following templates are used to create a soft redirect link:

For purposes of administration, particularly deletion, soft redirects are subject to the same administration processes as regular redirects, and should not be handled by processes that are intended for articles. For deletion this means that soft redirects are subject to R2 - R3 speedy deletion criteria, and are not subject to A1 - A10 speedy deletion criteria. For more deliberative deletion, soft redirects should be handled through , and are not subject to either or . They are also specifically subject to G8 deletion if their target does not exist, as this has replaced the old R1 criterion.

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