RULES AND GUIDELINES

The following is the law of the land. If something is still unclear you can send us a modmail and we will be happy to elaborate.

Commenting

Rule 1: Direct prompt replies must be good-faith attempts at new stories or poems

• 100 words minimum for stories, 30 for poems but include [Poem]
  • Note that this means no haikus or six-word stories (check out /r/haiku and /r/sixwordstories instead)
  • Low effort responses can be subjective, so there is some leeway. However, repeated minimum and low effort responses will be viewed as such
• Write something new using the prompt for inspiration
  • Don't just paste a story or poem you've written before
• Plagiarism will result in a ban
• No joke, copypasta, or AI-generated responses
  • Humor is OK, but don't write it just for the joke
  • Don't post the same responses or text to unrelated prompts
  • Using AI to generate responses doesn't count as writing new stories or poems
• Stories must also be in English
  • No other languages, strings of binary, emoji, wingdings, etc

• For off topic/clarification, reply to the sticky comment

  • Not an excuse to be rude or uncivil

  NOTE 1: "Prompts" refer to [WP], [EU], [CW], [TT], [MP], and [IP]. [PM], [PI], [CC], and [OT] work differently.

  NOTE 2: You may respond to your own prompt assuming you write it after it's posted like everyone else. Writing something in advance is not allowed

  NOTE 3: Mods are allowed to post top-level comments in their modly duties. (That's obvious, right?). If you have a question about the removal, please send us a modmail.

Rule 2: No explicitly sexual responses, hate speech, or other harmful content

• No explicitly sexual responses / erotica - Check out /r/DirtyWritingPrompts or /r/eroticliterature instead
• Includes, but is not limited to, pedophilia, bestiality, incest, rape, suicide, violence against children, and explicit abuse or torture

• Avoid racism and detailed uses of suicide and political debate

• The moderators reserve the right to remove such content without notice

  Use your best judgement, but mods have final say. See rule 7 for more inappropriate content not allowed when posting prompts.

  NOTE 1: Foul language is permitted to some extent. Use best judgement. It never hurts to put something like: "Some NSFW-ish language (swearing)" at the top of a response, if you think it may be in question.

  NOTE 2: Politics specifically refers to references to real-life politics, including alternate worlds or dimensions that attempt to incorporate real-life scenarios. Politics within an EU are allowed, as long as it is not a reference to real-life situations and diverges from the established universe.

Rule 3: Be civil in discussion, feedback, and critiques

Users are held to a high standard here. Think before you post or comment.

Prompts are meant to inspire new writing. Responses don't have to fulfill every detail.

• We are here to encourage writing
• Understand that people here are at all different levels:
  • New writers
  • Experienced writers
  • Professional writers
  • Users who are just learning English
• Typos and grammatical errors are possible. Be nice if you point it out
• Feedback and critiques are encouraged, but just saying something's bad is not helpful at all and will be considered trolling
• If you have an issue with a redditor (even a mod), please do NOT turn a prompt into your battleground. Alert the mod-team via modmail (compose a message to "/r/WritingPrompts") and we will all see it. We will then deal with it as amicably as possible

Submitting Posts

Rule 4: All submissions must be tagged

All submissions must include at the beginning of their title one capitalized tag in square brackets out of the following:

Click the [»] to see more detail. Click tag to filter.

• Prompt Posts (Inspire new writing)

  • WP - Writing Prompt: No restrictions (other than the rules of the sub) »
  • SP - Simple Prompt: Max 100 characters in the title (including the tag) »
  • EU - Established Universe: Based on existing fiction »
  • CW - Constrained Writing: Limitations or forced usage of words, letters, etc. (don't ask for less than 100 words) »
  • TT - Theme Thursday: Weekly prompts, announced Thursdays. »
  • MP - Media Prompt: Audio or video »
  • IP - Image Prompt: A striking image or album of images »
  • RF - Reality Fiction: Has happened before or should be able to happen in the real world to unknown people. »

• Response Posts (Write based on prompts)

  • PM - Prompt Me: Answer prompts by other users (if you've answered prompts before and must answer within 6 hours) »
  • PI - Prompt Inspired: Stories inspired by prompts older than three days (include link) »
  • CC - Constructive Criticism: PIs that you would like critiqued »

• Other Posts

  • OT - Off Topic: Not a writing prompt, but writing related. Not for complaints regarding subreddit content »

• Pick the most relevant tag only

  • For example, if you are submitting an [IP] that's tied to an established universe [EU], just use the [IP] tag
  • Use your best judgment to decide which is the most important tag

• Prompts are not meant to request services or advertise

  • In the case of using an [OT] to link to an external site and/or advertise a book, website, or service that involves money (subscription/purchase), please vet it with the moderators first via modmail
  • We reserve the right to remove or deny any such use of prompts that do not conform to the intent of our subreddit or do not appear in the spirit of appropriate use

• Prompts are not meant to share existing work, but to encourage users to write something new

  • Exception of [PI] and [CC] if those rules are followed
  • See related links for other sharing subs
  • Stop by Sundays for the Sunday Free Write posts

Rule 5: No recent reposts, even if changing small details

• Search before submitting! - Popular ideas can cause floods
• Reposts are allowed, given time (around two weeks is good)
  • If your prompt didn't gain traction, you may try again after two weeks, but repeated attempts will be removed and will be warned to stop
  • Important: If something on reddit sounds like a good idea for a prompt, you probably weren't the first. Check before you post.
• Don't take a recent prompt and change/invert small details
  • Same as recent reposts, give it a minimum of two weeks

Rule 6: Prompt users in the title, but don't play writing games or commission stories

• Prompts go in the title, do not extend into text. Avoid too many details
  • Exceptions: [IP], [MP], [PM], [PI], [CC], and [OT]
  • You can add commentary in the text, but don't add additional prompt restrictions
• No requesting writing or editing services, or homework help
  • Prompts are meant to inspire users to write their own work, not write something for you, especially if money is involved
  • Use /r/HomeworkHelp for homework. If the mods suspect a homework assignment we will remove it
• Don't prompt to advertise, modmail us before posting [OT] ads
• Don't ask writers to pick titles or content from another sub or site
• Prompts should not call for using autocorrect, autocomplete, or only emojis

Rule 7: Prompts will be removed if there's a high possibility for rule breaking responses

• Avoid real world drama (including politics, recent tragedies)
• No prompts for non-story/poem replies (including under 30 words, "in X words or less," jokes, fill-in-the-blank, questions that get simple answers)
  • Inspire writing that will require some effort, not a quick response, "write anything", word games, or fill-in-the-blank
• Don't ask for previously written responses or plagiarism

• Avoid post likely to generate harmful content (including explicitly sexual responses / erotica, hate speech, racism, politics, necrophila, pedophila, bestiality, incest, torture, rape, violence against children, and suicide). Other inappropriate content:

  • encouraging users to cyber-stalk random reddit users, people in real life, etc.
  • targeting specific redditors (having a redditor write about themselves is ok)
  • taking advantage/referencing of current tragedies in the media. If there is murder/slaughter of innocent people, leave it be.
    
  • obnoxious meme-based prompts (eg Jet Fuel Melts Steel Beams, tree-fiddy)
  • prompts must actually be a prompt, not just the suggestion of a genre or emotion.
  • specifically attempting to turn this sub into your political, religious, or other affiliation soapbox.
  • the Moderators also reserve the right to set up auto-mod to remove abused topics. Currently "Trump", "The Donald","Hilary","Clinton","Sanders" are on the list. "President" and "Election" are blocked for the time being too.

  When in doubt, keep it vague, these are supposed to be prompts anyways, not clear writing instructions.

• No troll, joke, poop, meme-based, or all CAPS prompts

  • They will be removed without notice or mercy (includes overdone meta prompts)

  See commenting rules for more detail.

  NOTE: Use your best judgment, but mods have final say

Community Guidelines

Rule 8: Keep it about the writing here, not competing or making money

• Wait until prompt is 24 hours old before linking from other subs to avoid vote manipulation and/or brigading
  • Text posts OK without providing a link back to /r/WritingPrompts
  • Authors are allowed to link to a personal sub or profile, but don't link back here until the prompt is 24 hours old
  • We enforce this because it stops large groups of people from jumping from another subreddit to ours. This is bad and breaks reddiquette. Users have been shadowbanned for brigading (not by us, by the Reddit Admins).
  • Don't spam the subreddit with links to other subreddits or crowdfunding sites like Patreon and Paypal
  • Authors are free to link to those from their personal subreddits
    

• Any recording or use of other people's stories must follow the guidance in the FAQ

• Examples:

  • OK: /u/Nate_Parker has 200 subscribers (he wishes) on his personal vanity sub /r/Nate_Parker_Books. Nate posts a link to /r/WritingPrompts (and JUST the sub) telling users to check the sub for his work
  • NOT OK: /u/Nate_Parker posts a link directly to a prompt he just wrote on /r/WritingPrompts on his sub, pulling his users to go vote for him elsewhere on Reddit (aka Brigading) Please wait 24hrs.
  • OK: Nate makes a weekly or monthly post on his vanity sub, linking to all his prompts from the past week/month (not including those from the past 24 hrs)
  • OK: Nate mentions his vanity sub AND links it with the following text: "Check out more of my work at /r/Nate_Parker_Books" at the bottom of his prompt responses
  • OK: Nate writes a full response to a prompt, but decides he wants to continue more of that story at his own sub (as a different thread) and chooses to link to it at the bottom of the initial prompt response.
  • OK: Nate writes something up all shiny and makes a PDF and/or uses an outside web service (non-reddit) and decides to link to his story rather than paste it into a Reddit comment box
  • OK: Nate copy and pastes his WP response into a NEW post on his sub with no linkages.

Rule breaking posts or comments may be removed without notice. Rule breaking may result in a permanent ban without prior warning.

If you spot a rule violation, please use the Report button underneath the post. This is the best way to help!

Additionally, if the prompt you wrote a story for has been removed or deleted, send us a modmail. Depending on the reason it was removed, we may allow a PI post. - We understand the frustration of writing a story only to discover the prompt has been removed or deleted.

See also:

How To Tag Prompts

How To Write A Compelling Prompt

FAQ

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