TagDocumentation.txt

tag what you see (locked)

Regardless of what you know from outside sources, only tag what you can see in the image.

Also, make sure you check out e621:Tag What You See (Explained) for the reasoning behind the TWYS policy.

Unlike many other art sites, e621 has a tagging policy called "Tag What You See", or TWYS for short.
TWYS states that all General category tags on a post must be directly evident from within the post itself. TWYS applies only to visual elements within a post, such as objects, characters, and the actions taken by characters that are visible. Audio content is not tagged, except in the Meta category.

For example, a solo picture of a character who appears male must be tagged male.
That remains true even if the artist or the character owner themselves state that the character is not male, or if text within the image states that the character is not male. These tags refer strictly to a character's outward appearance and nothing more.

This policy exists to make search results more predictable and objective.
Note that you can use Lore tags to describe the stated genders of the characters, rather than the visible ones.

Tags in other categories are not entirely subject to the Tag What You See principle:

    Tags in the Lore category are meant to convey the artist's intentions or other background information that cannot be reliably determined via TWYS, such as gender identity or familial relations.
    Tags in the Character and Species categories are partially dependent upon TWYS: that is, external information can be used to help identify what character or species is supposed to be depicted in the post in cases where it isn't obvious, but it cannot actively conflict with what is seen in the post. For example, you can tag character a if the artist claims that a disembodied hand in the post belongs to character a, unless the hand looks nothing like character a and instead looks exactly like it belongs to character b. In that case, TWYS overrides the artist's word.
    Tags in other categories are valid if the information that they convey is objectively true, such as the artist's name, the image's aspect ratio, or the IP holder of the characters in the post. For MP4, WebM, and Flash posts, audio-related tags may be included in the Meta category, but only to the extent of describing the presence and type of audio in the post (see the sound article for more information).

There will be times when it's still not clear what tags should be applied to an image. An administrator should be contacted to help resolve such cases.

Leeway may be given to hybrid characters, as the components of the species by which they are comprised are not always obvious.

Note: tag_what_you_see is not a tag to be used. If a post is contains this tag, please remove it.
See also

    Help with tags
    How to tag genders
    Overly Specific
    Tag What You See (Explained)
    Tagging Checklist

Posts (view all)

Nobody here but us chickens!


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 e621:tag what you see (explained) (locked)

[Back: e621:index]

The text below is intended to be a sort of "introduction" to e621's Tag What You See policy. The text below is NOT the policy itself, which you can view here: Tag What You See

Reading and understanding the TWYS policy is extremely important if you intend on editing tags on posts at all, so please make sure you read the policy itself as well as this introduction.
The Policy

A brief summary of what the TWYS policy is:

Unlike many other art sites, e621.net has a tagging policy called "Tag What You See" (aka: "TWYS"). With very few exceptions, TWYS says that all tags on a post must be directly verifiable within the post itself. Example: a solo picture of what APPEARS to be a male character will be tagged "male". Even if the character was defined as "female" on other sites by the artist or character owner themselves, the picture would still need to be tagged "male" on e621, because of the TWYS policy.

This may seem unusual and even insensitive, but please read on to understand why the site functions this way.
The Debate

The dispute between "Tag What You See" and "Tag What You Know"

The Reasons

There are several reasons for the necessity of the TWYS policy.

The Problems

Of course, no method of tagging is perfect, and there are a few problems that tend to arise as a result of using TWYS:

    Sometimes users are just going to disagree over what is "seen" in a post or not. This is simply an expected consequence of having a TWYS policy. These situations will often need intervention from an administrator in order to resolve.

    Gender tags (male, female, herm, etc) are typically at the heart of most TWYS debates. The reasons for this are numerous, but it boils down to A) artists drawing characters in ways that make it difficult to determine gender, and B) characters designed in such a way that they can easily appear to be either one gender or another (e.g. a herm wearing clothes typically looks just female). Again, there's nothing "wrong" with doing this, but it undoubtedly leads to confusion and people getting the wrong ideas if the artwork is ever viewed by itself. Again, e621 currently is interested only in a character's APPARENT gender, not their DEFINED gender. But sometimes even the apparent gender isn't obvious; in these cases, an administrator will need to make the final decision.

Tip:

To quickly link other e621 users to this page, simply type [[twys]] in your message. Example: "Check out twys for an explanation of the TWYS rule."

[Back: e621:index]


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 e621:tagging checklist (locked)

[Back: e621:index]

This is an informal and unofficial supplement to the tagging rules and guidelines, meant to encourage better and more complete tagging.

Make sure you're also familiar with our Tag What You See policy before editing tags: tag_what_you_see for the policy itself, and e621:Tag What You See (Explained) for a more in-depth explanation why we use TWYS.

Each entry below poses a general question about a post, with some example tags that answer it. A good post will probably have most of these answered (but not necessarily all).
Basics

Tags that all posts should have, to maintain minimal searchability.

    Artist(s)? Use their best known alias. If a picture has more than one artist, tag them all, along with collaboration. If you're not sure who the artist is, tag unknown_artist. If the artist wishes to remain anonymous, use anonymous_artist instead.
    Rating?
        Explicit for fully or partially exposed genitalia (penis, pussy, cloaca, sheath, balls, or anus), various sex acts even if no genitalia are visible, high amounts of violence/gore, sexual fluids such as cum or pussy_juice, and extreme sexual fetishes such as scat, watersports, or BDSM.
        Safe for anything that can be viewed in public without much uproar: no genitals, no sexual overtones or poses, no realistic violence, or any questionable activity.
        Questionable for everything in between, such as topless females and suggestive poses.
            For more help on ratings please see e621: Ratings
    Copyright? The original series or company a character or game is owned by.
    Character? Tag the character's best known name. If not that, their full name.
    Body type? anthro, feral, humanoid, taur, anthrofied (pokemorph, digimorph), ponified, feralized
    Species? human, canine, feline, bovine, cervine, equine, lagomorph, rodent, avian, insect, marine (cetacean, shark), scalie (click for detailed lists)
    Sex/gender? male, female, intersex (herm, maleherm, gynomorph, andromorph), ambiguous_gender
        See How To: Tag Genders for a detailed guide
    How many? solo, duo, trio, group, zero_pictured
    Clothing? fully_clothed, partially_clothed, skimpy, nude, bottomless, topless, underwear, open_shirt
    Location? inside, outside, bedroom, kitchen, forest
    Perspective? front_view, rear_view, side_view, three-quarter_view, low-angle_view, high-angle_view, worm's-eye_view, bird's-eye_view, first_person_view

Sexually explicit

    Male bits? penis, balls, sheath, knot, erection, half-erect, flaccid, humanoid_penis, equine_penis, tapering_penis, veiny_penis, uncut, circumcised
    Female bits? pussy, clitoris, plump_labia, equine_pussy, canine_pussy
    Other? butt, anus, puffy_anus, gaping_anus, urethra, genital_slit
    Sex act? sex (male/female, female/female, male/male, bisexual), masturbation, handjob, footjob, fellatio, cunnilingus, vaginal_penetration, anal_penetration, threesome, foursome, orgy, gangbang, frottage, tribadism, orgasm, cum_inside
    Position? Common ones: missionary_position, cowgirl_position, reverse_cowgirl_position, from_behind, 69_position, stand_and_carry_position.
        See also: tag group:sex positions
    Sexual themes? bondage, domination, rape, rough_sex, happy_sex, presenting, internal, impregnation, bestiality, interspecies, public, exhibitionism
    Fluids? cum, cumshot, precum, pussy_juice, pussy_ejaculation, saliva
    Toys? dildo, vibrator, buttplug, egg_vibrator, strapon, feeldoe

Pose / Activity / Appearance

    General activity (if any)? walking, running, fighting, sleeping, dancing, eating, kissing, licking
    Posture? standing, bent_over, sitting, crouching, kneeling, all_fours, on_front, on_side, on_back, ass_up (see tag group:pose for full list)
    Body decor? glasses, ring, necklace, bracelet, anklet, tattoo, piercing, collar, hat
    Fur style? mane, chest_tuft, pubes
    Hair? hair, long hair, short hair
    Breasts? breasts (small_breasts, big_breasts, huge_breasts), nipples, under_boob, side_boob, teats
    Limbs? crossed_arms, raised_arms, arms_behind_head, spread_legs, crossed_legs, raised_leg, legs_up, raised_tail, tailwag
    Gaze? looking_at_viewer, looking_back, eye_contact, eyes_closed
    Expression? blush, wink, smile, grin, tongue_out, naughty_face, embarrassed, happy, sad

Information and Requests

    Quality/medium? sketch, line_art, monochrome, shaded, pencil_(artwork), watercolor, 3D, digital_media_(artwork)
    Picture organization? comic, multiple_scenes, sequence, close-up, portrait, pinup, solo_focus, wallpaper
    Style? toony, detailed, realistic
    Text and languages? english_text, japanese_text, spanish_text, runes, dialogue, speech_bubble, symbol
    Information? translated, partially_translated, unknown_artist_signature, not_furry, bigger version at the source
    Requests? translation_request, source_request, tagme
    Image size? low_res, hi_res, absurd_res, superabsurd_res
    Year of creation? 2016, 2015, and so on

Heavily vetted tags.

Tags that can be found on our global blacklist, and heavily vetted tags MUST be added upon upload.

    young, gore, scat, watersports, diaper, my little pony, vore, not furry, rape, hyper, feral, nazi, politics, zoophile iconography.
    Everything pedophilia 

Do NOT tag

    Subjective tags that express opinions. Common examples include beautiful, sexy, hot, good, crappy and most other adjectives. Subjective themes can be collected into a set instead. (See https://e621.net/help/sets )
    Generic tags such as legs, eyes, big, image and organism.
	
	
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Help: Tags


← E621 Wiki – Tags
Table of Contents

    Guidelines
    Categories
        Artist
        Contributor
        Character
        Copyright
        Species
        General
        Meta
        Lore
        Invalid
    Changing Tag Category

Read More: Aliases | Implications | Bulk Update Requests
      Search Cheatsheet
Tags

Tags are keywords that you can use to describe posts.
They serve a dual purpose: they allow you to both find the content that you like, and to filter out stuff that you dislike.

Tags may belong to various categories, and may interact with each other via relationships.

See the cheatsheet for examples of the search syntax.

 
↑ Guidelines

When tagging a post, you must follow the following guidelines.
Tag What You See

Full article: Tag What You See.

Unlike many other art sites, e621 has a tagging policy called "Tag What You See", or TWYS for short.
TWYS states that all General category tags on a post must be directly evident from within the post itself.

For example, a solo picture of a character who appears male must be tagged male.
That remains true even if the artist or the character owner themselves state that the character is not male, or if text within the image states that the character is not male. These tags refer strictly to a character's outward appearance and nothing more.

This policy exists to make search results more predictable and objective.
Note that you can use Lore tags to describe the stated genders of the characters, rather than the visible ones.

Tags in other categories are not entirely subject to the Tag What You See principle:

    Tags in the Lore category are meant to convey the artist's intentions or other background information that cannot be reliably determined via TWYS, such as gender identity or familial relations.
    Tags in the Character and Species categories are partially dependent upon TWYS: that is, external information can be used to help identify what character or species is supposed to be depicted in the post in cases where it isn't obvious, but it cannot actively conflict with what is seen in the post. For example, you can tag character a if the artist claims that a disembodied hand in the post belongs to character a, unless the hand looks nothing like character a and instead looks exactly like it belongs to character b. In that case, TWYS overrides the artist's word.
    Tags in other categories are valid if the information that they convey is objectively true, such as the artist's name, the name of a voice actor, the image's aspect ratio, or the IP holder of the characters in the post.

Minimum tag requirements

Code of Conduct 2.2 - Tagging, Rating, and Sourcing Abuse
All posts are expected to have at least ten general, non-implied tags upon upload. This refers to tags in the General tag category: Artist, Character, Species, Copyright, Lore, Meta, and Invalid tags do not count towards this requirement. "Non-implied" means that a tag which is added by implication from another tag does not count. For example, forest implies tree which implies plant. If you add the forest tag, both tree and plant will be added automatically. However, only the first tag counts towards the minimum tag requirement.

This restriction will be eased if the post does not have ten distinct tags that are reasonably applicable to it. For example, extremely simplistic posts such as some zero pictured images may not depict enough to create ten tags.

Contentious or objectionable content must always be tagged upon upload. This includes any strange, unusual, or extreme fetishes depicted within the post.
Forbidden characters

Tags may only contain English letters, numbers, and some symbols.
No unicode characters, or characters belonging to languages other than English, may be used.

The following characters are reserved for potential future uses.
No new tags containing them can be created.

    %,#\\*: anywhere in the tag
    -~: as the first character

Note that some existing tags already contain such characters.
These tags predate the rule change, and will likely be phased out at some point in the future.
↑ Categories

There are eight categories (or "types") of tags on e621. They help to organize the many tags listed on this site and its many, many posts.
This page will provide a quick rundown of what they are for and how to change the categories of tags from one to another.
artist

Arguably the most important tag on any post is the one that identifies the person who made the post itself.
This (usually) isn't the e621 member who uploaded the post, a person who edited the post, and certainly not anyone who merely commissioned or requested the post.

Artist tags are essential, as we maintain and respect an Avoid Posting List.
If you are unable to identify the artist, then unknown_artist should be used. If the artist does not want to be identified, then anonymous_artist should be used instead.

There are a few non-artist tags that are deliberately typed as "artists" in order to bring attention to them.

    avoid_posting and its variant conditional_dnp tags identify artists with DNP or conditional DNP status
    epilepsy_warning is used for flashing lights in animated, Flash, and video posts that could trigger epileptic seizures
    sound_warning is for any loud sound playing in Flash and video posts
        jumpscare_warning is for posts featuring loud sounds (typically screams) accompanied by unsettling or scary visuals. 
    unknown_artist_signature is for posts where there is an artist's signature on it, but the artist who made it could not be immediately identified

contributor

People who did not create the specific artwork in the post but who did provide creative contributions that are considered significant and essential to the artwork itself. (See topic #54179 for the discussion thread about this new category.)

Currently, only two types of contributors are recognized for this category.

    Voice actors, whose tags are suffixed with the disambiguation _(va).
    Character modelers, whose tags are suffixed with the disambiguation _(modeler).

Note that the primary artist(s) of a post are not to be tagged as contributor; they are still tagged as artists as normal. If the artist is also the modeler, they are to be tagged as just an artist; modeler tags are to be used if they created or provided a character model but did not provide the composition of the post. Likewise, if the artist of a video post voice acted for their own video, they still don't get a separate contributor tag.
character

Any identifiable fictional or real world individual who can be seen in a post, even if they're not actually "there".
A statue or a kigurumi modeled after a character, or the cover of a solo music artist's album, would still be tagged as their corresponding characters
Characters can range from mere fursonas to globally famous copyrighted characters like Mickey Mouse, Bugs Bunny, and Mario. Fan characters are also covered here.

If you cannot identify a character, but you do know that they either are owned by someone or come from the real world, then unknown_character should be used.
copyright

Any recognizable brands and franchises (as well as the companies who own them) that can be identified through the use of their characters, settings, or other recognizable elements.
Parodies of copyrights are also tagged with the copyrights that a post is parodying. Specific holidays like Christmas, Easter, and Halloween are also given copyright status.

The real world is also a copyright tag, for what it's worth.
species

The bread and butter tags of this curated furry image archive, covering many real and fictional creatures.
Cats, dogs, horses, fish, scalies, aliens, robots, spirits, Pocket Monsters, Digital Monsters, regular monsters, and the dreaded but mostly harmless humans are among the many kinds of creatures that you can find here.

If you can't properly identify a species, then there are two tags you can use: unknown_species for creatures with identifying features, and ambiguous_species for creatures that cannot be determinable at all.
general

These plain-colored tags are for anything else that don't fit with any of the aforementioned four categories. Genders, objects, distinguishing features, locations, fetishes, sexual positions, sexual acts, and so on.
New tags are automatically categorized as general tags. Artists, contributors, characters, copyrights, and species that haven't been properly re-typed to such yet are most likely typed as general tags as well.
meta

Tags that describe facts about the image itself, rather than what's in it, are placed in the meta category.
Some of these tags are added automatically, like hi_res. Others, like 16:9 or 1:1 are added by dedicated bots.
Tags describing what year the image was made also belong in this category, from 2025 all the way back to 6th_century_bc.
lore

Unlike other categories, lore tags are entirely outside the realm of TWYS. Instead, lore tags provide information that is either incorrect when following TWYS, or simply cannot be confirmed visually in the image itself, yet still relevant to the post.
Keep in mind that standards TWYS tags should still be used where applicable. Lore tags do not replace them.

Whenever a submission must be tagged as something that is "wrong", a lore tag should be added to provide the correct information.
The most common use for lore tags is to correct gender tags – for example, a post that is tagged gynomorph might also need a herm_(lore) tag if that's what the character is, despite there not being any evidence of that in the image itself.

Conversely, some fetish tags (like incest) cannot always be definitively confirmed through the image itself, and thus belong in the lore category.

New lore tags can be requested on the forums.
invalid

Some tags are too ambiguous or broad to be useful, so they are placed in the invalid category.
They should be replaced with better-fitting or more specific tags.

Please, do not simply remove invalid tags without fixing the issue.


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