Wikipedia talk:Reviewing pending changes

Anonymous/New editors can revert a reviewer's edit so that their reverted edit is reinstated

Today while doing reviewing I came across something that frankly shouldn't be allowed for anonymous/new editors to do. A new editor (Jankrapper$) created a pending edit (1171340297) which I reverted due to the edit being opinionated and not from an NPOV (1171340640). The new editor then reverted my revert back so that their edit was reinstated, effectively overriding me (1171349653). Another editor than reverted his edit back to mine, cancelling out the new user's revert (Permalink/1171354108). Now I'm checking the page again and now the new user has reverted their edit, and now it's an edit war. I'm going to figure out how to fix this but I wanted to finish this by stating that if new users weren't able to revert edits reverting their own edits, none of this would have happened. Thanks, Urban Versis 32^KB ⚡ ^{(talk / contribs)} 17:04, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

If you have a problem with me, you can say it to my face instead of being a coward about it. Jankrapper$ (talk) 17:08, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

After multiple users with thousands of edits each revert your edit in your account with barely ten edits, it may be wise to ask them in a polite manner what the problem with the edit was and they would be able and happy to help. Urban Versis 32^KB ⚡ ^{(talk / contribs)} 17:16, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

And by the way, having the reviewer right doesn’t make you a big deal. They hand those privileges out to everyone to make them feel like the are important and valued and even have a shot at becoming an admin so they keep editing. Jankrapper$ (talk) 17:11, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Really? If so, feel free to submit a request to become a pending changes reviewer and see if it's granted then. Urban Versis 32^KB ⚡ ^{(talk / contribs)} 17:14, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Haha wow, you really do have an inflated sense of importance, don’t you? I bet you’re gunning to become an admin too? Jankrapper$ (talk) 17:15, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Tht user is blocked for disruption and likely block evasion. Either way, there's nothing to be done here. The pending change system is working as intended. -- ferret (talk) 17:20, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Thanks. But again, new users shouldn't be able to revert a reviewer's revert otherwise it basically undermines the importance of the whole pending changes system. Urban Versis 32^KB ⚡ ^{(talk / contribs)} 17:23, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

That's not the design of pending reviews. Pending reviews goal is to prevent problematic edits from being shown live to readers until they are reviewed. The reason the editor's third edit was not under pending review is because they were autoconfirmed at that point. -- ferret (talk) 17:45, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Oh, okay. I see. Thank you for the clarification! Urban Versis 32^KB ⚡ ^{(talk / contribs)} 17:58, 20 August 2023 (UTC)

Requirements

How many edits do you need to have before applying? Also, if applicable, how long do you need to have been editing for? ThatOneWolf ^{(talk|contribs)} 19:09, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

@ThatOneWolf. There's no edit requirement for this permission. The requirements are laid out at Wikipedia:Reviewing pending changes#Criteria to receive this permission. This is one of the "easier" perms, so I'd encourage you to read over the page in detail, make sure you understand everything, then apply :) –Novem Linguae (talk) 20:41, 21 November 2023 (UTC)

Recognition: Barnstars for top Pending changes reviewers

Hello everyone, I have created a page in my userspace at User:DreamRimmer/Reports/PendingChanges to recognize and award the top pending changes reviewers from the last 30 days. Anyone interested can join me in this effort. – DreamRimmer (talk) 14:37, 25 November 2023 (UTC)

Accepting multiple changes

I responded to 2 pending changes by the same IP to Ojamajo Doremi, selected the diff of both edits (linked) to understand the totality of the effort for context, concluded that it was good to go, and then was unsure if accepting the changes would function as one might expect.

I came here and read through the apparently related parts several times, and although will admit to being in the middle of other things too, could see no clear statement about the ideal, best practice, procedure. I chose to trust in the developers and accept both together – only the latter was accepted. I came back here and re-read it all again several times, and am still not sure. I went back to the page and manually also accepted the earlier of the two changes, since it just seems logical.

Could someone who knows the best practice, or required procedure, please make it clear in this documentation, or make clear where the information is if it's somewhere else (I would have to wonder why in that case)? Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 07:15, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

@Fred Gandt. I think I wrote a little bit about this at Wikipedia:Tips for pending changes reviewers#Other tips. In short, I agree with your technique of reviewing one editor's group of edits at a time. As long as a bunch of edits in a row are by the same editor, it should be safe to review them together. Just be careful if edits are by DIFFERENT editors, or not in a row. Hope that helps. –Novem Linguae (talk) 10:05, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

I appreciate the response. The technical aspect to this process is my main concern. Apparently if a reviewer accepts multiple edits (as linked: two edits by the same editor viewed as the difference they both made compared with the previous version), the system only marks the latest of the edits as accepted, leaving the intermediate edits as unreviewed. Should we mark each and every edit that leads to an acceptable result as accepted, or as the system does, just the latest of those edits? i.e. if an editor fumbles their way through, say 9 bad edits, then on their tenth, it all comes together and the whole is acceptable: do we go through the history marking each and every one of the 10 edits as accepted, or just the tenth (as the system does if a diff with intermediate edits is accepted)? Clearly marking 9 edits as unaccepted, but the tenth as accepted would be bizarre. This is not explained in this project page. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 16:02, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

I remember being confused by this too. I concluded that if there are multiple pending edits, accepting the most recent one accepts them all, but this wasn't clear from the documentation.

There's no need to explicitly accept the interim edits.

It would be nice if this was explicit in the documentation. If nobody else replies I'll try adding something. Dan Bloch (talk) 17:39, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

You can leave some revisions unreviewed. PC protection shows to the public the newest reviewed revision. Anything older than that doesn't matter from a "display to the public" perspective, and is only important from a "make sure a reviewer checked it" perspective. You as the reviewer checked it even if it doesn't get marked (since you viewed a big diff with the unchecked revisions in it). –Novem Linguae (talk) 17:46, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

Okay, that's what I was thinking, and it did appear that with the most recent edit accepted, the previous was implicitly accepted (while that doesn't seem technically sound to me). And thank you Dan; I think this needs to be properly explained in Wikipedia:Reviewing pending changes § Reviewing edits by a single user. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 18:21, 16 September 2025 (UTC)

Okay, this is done. Danbloch (talk) 01:41, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Very good Dan, thank you :) One point I think could be highlighted is that part about all earlier pending changes being implicitly accepted, making it essential to verify that all currently pending changes earlier than the one you're accepting are good to go. While it is clear that this note is referring to reviewing changes by one user, it is possible (correct me if I am wrong) that: if a block of edits by user B came after any number of edits by user A, and the reviewer is checking user B's changes as a block, then accepts the most recent, user A's get implicitly accepted too – all, by any editors. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 04:52, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

Yes, this is right. Are you saying you think this should go in the Reviewing edits by a single user section, or the Reviewing edits by multiple users section? Danbloch (talk) 18:05, 18 September 2025 (UTC)

I'd say it forms a crossover between the two conditions, and might require a restructure to (1) make clear and (2) not require potentially confusing repetition of a process description from two perspectives. I see you're currently cleaning up the page, and I don't want to throw you off too much. Ultimately it's that all pending changes prior to any accepted change will be implicitly accepted that needs to be clear, and a process of reviewing all pending changes in chronological order from least-to-most recent to avoid inadvertently accepting unreviewed changes that perhaps should be suggested, no matter if there are multiple changes by any one editor. Fred Gandt · talk · contribs 19:55, 18 September 2025 (UTC)