Why are some questions closed, and what does "closed" mean?

Questions that are not a good fit for this site may be voted closed by experienced community members. Closed questions cannot be answered, but are eligible for improvement (and eventual re-opening) through editing, voting, and commenting. See How to Ask for guidance on editing your question to improve it.

Questions that fall in one of these categories may be closed:

  • exact duplicate
  • This question covers exactly the same content as earlier questions on this topic; its answers may be merged with another identical question.

  • off topic
  • Questions on Stack Overflow are expected to relate to programming within the scope defined by the community. Consider editing the question or leaving comments for improvement if you believe the question can be reworded to fit within the scope.

  • not constructive
  • As it currently stands, this question is not a good fit for our Q&A; format. We expect answers to be supported by facts, references, or specific expertise, but this question will likely solicit debate, arguments, polling, or extended discussion. If you feel that this question can be improved and possibly reopened, please comment on or edit the post.

  • not a real question
  • It's difficult to tell what is being asked here. This question is ambiguous, vague, incomplete, overly broad, or rhetorical and cannot be reasonably answered in its current form. To clarify the question so it can be reopened, please comment on or edit the post.

  • too localized
  • This question is unlikely to help any future visitors; it is only relevant to a small geographic area, a specific moment in time, or an extraordinarily narrow situation that is not generally applicable to the worldwide audience of the internet. If possible, edit the question to make it more broadly applicable.

Users with 3,000 reputation can cast up to 50 close votes per day. When a question reaches 5 close votes, it is marked as closed, and will no longer accept answers. Closed questions may be opened by casting reopen votes in the same manner. However, you may only vote to close or reopen a question once.

Moderators may close or reopen any question with a single vote.

For more about reopening questions, see "What if I disagree with the closure of a question? How can I reopen a closed question?"