Help:Frequently used properties

This page provides some guidelines and examples of frequently used properties. When in doubt about how to use a property, please consult the property's discussion page or ask for help at Wikidata:Project chat. Another good resource is the list of WikiProjects — if a task force already exists for the relevant topic or domain, the correct use of the property may be discussed and documented on the task force page.

Hierarchical properties

Taxonomy

Taxonomy refers to the classification of organisms into groups such as genus or species. Use 'taxon name (P225)', 'taxon rank (P105)' and 'parent taxon (P171)', which links to nearest "higher taxon". For more information, see Wikidata:WikiProject Taxonomy.

Example:

item: dog (Q144)

taxon name: Canis lupus familiaris

taxon rank: subspecies

parent taxon: wolf

Administrative divisions

Use 'located in the administrative territorial entity (P131)' to create a hierarchy of administrative divisions. For more information, see Wikidata:List of properties/Geographical feature#Administrative division.

Examples:

item: Vancouver (Q24639)

is in the administrative-territorial entity: Metro Vancouver Regional District (Q1061069)

item: Metro Vancouver Regional District (Q1061069)

is in the administrative-territorial entity: British Columbia (Q1974)

item: British Columbia (Q1974)

is in the administrative-territorial entity: Canada (Q16)

Classes (instance of and subclass of)

Individual concepts, objects, and things are assigned to a class using the 'instance of (P31)' property.

An item "A" can usually be regarded as an instance of class "B", if their relation is such that it makes sense to say: Item "A" is a "B".

Examples:

Item British Columbia (Q1974) is an instance of province of Canada (Q11828004),

because "British Columbia" is a "province in Canada".

Classes are, in turn, organized in a hierarchy using the 'subclass of (P279)' property. The "A" is a "B" test also works for subclass/class relationships.

Item province of Canada (Q11828004) is a subclass of province (Q34876),

because a "province in Canada" is a "province".

For more on instances and classes, see Help:Basic membership properties and Help:Classification (essay).

If the "A" is a "B" test fails, it can usually be assumed that item "A" is not an instance of (P31) class "B", but instead: a part of (P361) the item or group "B".

Part of

The 'part of (P361)' property is used to link individual concepts, objects or things to larger individual concepts, objects or things.

Examples:

item: Mars (Q111)

part of: Solar System (Q544)

item: Battle of Kursk (Q130861)

part of: World War II (Q362)

For more on using the part of (P361) property, see Help:Basic membership properties.

Properties for Wikimedia Commons files

Images

Images may exist within Wikimedia Commons (Q565) that visually summarize an item (Wikibase item (Q29934200)). Add an image (P18) statement to the item linking to the filename of the image hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565).

It is also common for items to be explained using multiple types of images. For example, physical object (Q223557) can typically be explained through symbol (Q80071) as well as multiple architectural drawing (Q184784) and photograph (Q125191) from different viewpoints.

For a full list of image properties available, refer to the following query:

#Subproperties of image (P18)
#defaultView:Graph
PREFIX gas: <http://www.bigdata.com/rdf/gas#>
SELECT DISTINCT ?property ?propertyLabel ?parent ?parentLabel WHERE {
  SERVICE gas:service {
    gas:program gas:gasClass "com.bigdata.rdf.graph.analytics.SSSP";
    gas:in wd:P18;
    gas:traversalDirection "Reverse";
    gas:out ?property;
    gas:out1 ?depth;
    gas:maxIterations 10;
    gas:linkType wdt:P1647.
  }
  ?property wdt:P1647 ?parent.
  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }
}

Try it!

Video

Videos may exist within Wikimedia Commons (Q565) that visually (and sometimes auditorily) summarize an item (Wikibase item (Q29934200)). Add an video (P10) statement to the item linking to the filename of the video hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565).

It is also possible for some items to be explained using multiple types of video. For example, taxon (Q16521) could be explained with multiple videos for different behaviors including eating (Q213449), parturition (Q34581) and mating (Q228395).

For a full list of video properties available, refer to the following query:

#Subproperties of video (P10)
#defaultView:Graph
PREFIX gas: <http://www.bigdata.com/rdf/gas#>
SELECT DISTINCT ?property ?propertyLabel ?parent ?parentLabel WHERE {
  SERVICE gas:service {
    gas:program gas:gasClass "com.bigdata.rdf.graph.analytics.SSSP";
    gas:in wd:P10;
    gas:traversalDirection "Reverse";
    gas:out ?property;
    gas:out1 ?depth;
    gas:maxIterations 10;
    gas:linkType wdt:P1647.
  }
  ?property wdt:P1647 ?parent.
  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }
}

Try it!

Audio

Audio recordings may exist within Wikimedia Commons (Q565) that auditorily summarize an item (Wikibase item (Q29934200)). Add an audio (P51) statement to the item linking to the filename of the audio recording hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565).

It is also possible for some items to be explained using multiple types of audio recording. For example, taxon (Q16521) could be explained with multiple audio recordings for different auditory signals including mating call (Q24962783), alarm call (Q109037552) and advertisement call (Q90876095).

For a full list of audio properties available, refer to the following query:

#Subproperties of audio (P51)
#defaultView:Graph
PREFIX gas: <http://www.bigdata.com/rdf/gas#>
SELECT DISTINCT ?property ?propertyLabel ?parent ?parentLabel WHERE {
  SERVICE gas:service {
    gas:program gas:gasClass "com.bigdata.rdf.graph.analytics.SSSP";
    gas:in wd:P51;
    gas:traversalDirection "Reverse";
    gas:out ?property;
    gas:out1 ?depth;
    gas:maxIterations 10;
    gas:linkType wdt:P1647.
  }
  ?property wdt:P1647 ?parent.
  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }
}

Try it!

Documents

For documents that are freely licensed or in the public domain, upload the document to Wikimedia Commons (Q565) and add a document file on Wikimedia Commons (P996) statement to the item linking to the filename of the document hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565).

Tabular data

For freely licensed or public domain tabular data hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565), a number of properties listed by the query below can be used to link items (Wikibase item (Q29934200)) to this data.

In some cases, there are alternative properties of other data types typically used on items, and tabular data provides an alternative method for storing large amounts of historical statements that would cause performance problems if created as individual statements on an item. For example, the recorded temperature of a location may be available in 5 minute increments over 20 years and this data could be hosted as tabular data on Wikimedia Commons (Q565). However adding all one million plus individual statements to an item would cause performance problems for Wikidata and related tools.

#Tabular data properties
SELECT ?property ?propertyLabel ?subject ?subjectLabel ?relatedProperty ?relatedPropertyLabel WHERE {
  ?property rdf:type wikibase:Property.
  ?property wikibase:propertyType wikibase:TabularData.
  OPTIONAL {
    ?property wdt:P1629 ?subject.
    ?subject wdt:P1687 ?relatedProperty.
    FILTER (?relatedProperty != ?property).
  }
  FILTER NOT EXISTS {?property wdt:P31 wd:Q18720640}.
  SERVICE wikibase:label { bd:serviceParam wikibase:language "[AUTO_LANGUAGE],en". }
}

Try it!

Geoshapes

Geographic shapes (also known as map data) may exist within Wikimedia Commons (Q565) as a means to define the geographic extents, region or distribution of an item (Wikibase item (Q29934200)). Add a geoshape (P3896) statement to the item linking to the filename of the geographic shape hosted on Wikimedia Commons (Q565). For example, geoshape (P3896) could be used to define the boundary of an administrative territorial entity (Q56061).

There exists a special case for items which are subclasses of taxon (Q16521). distribution map of taxon (P8485) is used instead of geoshape (P3896) to define the distribution of the taxon.

Properties for sources

Please see Help:Sources for guidance on how to apply properties to source items, including books, newspaper articles, scientific journals, and databases.

Books

The WikiProject Books maintains a detailed list of "book properties"—that is, work item and edition item properties.

See also

For related Help pages, see:

• Help:Properties, which explains what properties are and what rules they follow
• Help:Basic membership properties, which explains instance of (P31), subclass of (P279) and part of (P361)
• Wikidata:List of properties, a community-maintained list of Wikidata properties
• Special:AllPages/Property:, a special page showing all properties
• Wikidata:WikiProjects, a list of users who work together to improve representation and coverage of a specific topic or domain

For additional information and guidance, see:

• Project chat, for discussing all and any aspects of Wikidata
• Wikidata:Glossary, the glossary of terms used in this and other Help pages
• Help:FAQ, frequently asked questions asked and answered by the Wikidata community
• Help:Contents, the Help portal featuring all the documentation available for Wikidata