Commons:Picture of the day/Instructions

Anyone can select a Picture of the day from the Featured pictures that have not already been Picture of the day. Featured pictures are selected by vote here.

Steps to add a picture

The following steps can be used to add a picture:

1. Find a suitable Featured Picture which has not already been used as Picture of the day. A list of images that may be usable for Picture of the Day is here. Try to vary the type of image so that there are not only animal images one week, followed by only landscapes the next.
2. If you have a choice of images, choose an image which had strong support during the nomination process.
3. Find a date which does not already have a picture of the day, by looking at the POTD gallery. Some images have connections to specific dates that may be good choices. If the date is already occupied, try to find another day or postpone inclusion a year ahead. Examples:
   • Historic events on the day of year the event happened
   • Portraits on the day of birth or death
   • For landscape and nature shots, a date close to the day of year the photo was taken
4. Go to the chosen date on the POTD gallery and click on the red link named "change image". Add the image name of your selected image without the File: prefix to that template (if the image is "File:Abc.jpg", the template should contain only "Abc.jpg"). Save the template.
5. Add a short description of the image in the language you know (by editing the red template next to the image). Use {{Potd description}}. It is good if the description includes links to well-curated image galleries (in the main namespace) at Commons, so that visitors can find more interesting images.
6. Then add this template : {{picture of the day|year=0000|month=00|day=00}} on the page of the selected image, change |year=0000, |month=00 and |day=00 with the real year/month/day of the calendar.
7. There is a limit of two images/month per author (starting from January 2021)

Changing picture of the day

It is generally discouraged to replace existing POTD inclusions with other ones. But in some cases it can be done:

• The original inclusion did not provide a reasonable diversity in subjects, creators, etc. over a couple of days.
• There are substantial arguments for replacing with an image which fits much better with the given day.
• The original picture is not suitable for the Main page (for example Commons talk:Picture of the day/Archive 1#Picture of the Day: September 14 2007).

Replacing one image with another based on an argument that it is a better image is not a valid argument. Most images which have been promoted to featured status are all equally worthy for inclusion on POTD once promoted. If you think a current unused featured picture is not up to current featured picture standards consider nominating it for delisting. If delisting succeeds, the image is removed from the pool of unused featured pictures.

Changing a picture of the day needs to be done as early as possible, so that there is time for translators to write new captions in different languages and if necessary to discuss the change in Commons talk:Picture of the day.

If a replacement is done, it is the responsibility of the replacing user to:

1. Move the original image to a vacant day including already completed translations. (Not applicable if the original was unsuitable as POTD.)
2. Update the Picture of the day templates on the file descriptions of both the new and the old picture.