This is an administrative category, used for maintenance of the Wikipedia project. It is not part of the encyclopedia and contains non-article pages, or groups articles by status rather than subject. Do not include this category in content categories (except for eponymous maintenance categories).

This category contains essays in the User namespace about Wikipedia and related topics. A user may decide to categorize their essay here for more exposure. To add a page to this category, use template {{Essay}} (not one of its variants – this one auto-categorizes for you).

Except for necessary maintenance (like correcting categories or removing images without a fair-use rationale), you should generally not edit essays that reside in someone else's userspace without the user's permission. See WP:USERESSAY for further information.

An essay here may be moved categorically by its author into the Wikipedia namespace, Category:Wikipedia essays, if it is frequently referenced, as evidenced by becoming an evolving expression of multiple editors, or if the user wishes to relinquish editorial control of it to the community (and the essay was not userspaced as the result of a community decision). Additional essays may be found in the WMF-wide meta:Category:Essays. For non-Wikipedia-related essays, as article topics, see Category:Essays.