###Close/Reopen Votes Questions that may need closing/reopening appear in these queues. Questions with active close votes or close flags show up in the close queue, and questions with active reopen votes, as well as questions which have been edited after closing, appear in the reopen queue. Along with the moderator tools, this is one of the best ways to find posts that need closing.
In these queues, you have four options. You can try to fix a close-able question via the Edit button, which will automatically dismiss it from the queue. You can also cast your own vote to close on the question (in the case of the reopen queue, obviously the corresponding option is voting to reopen). Any time you are unsure of whether a post should be closed or reopened, you can and should Skip it to allow another user to review it. Finally, you can also choose Leave Open (or Leave Closed in the reopen queue). What does this last option do? If enough people vote to leave a question open or closed, the question is removed from the close/reopen queue (respectively) and immediately begins aging the existing close or reopen votes on the question (it does not clear them).
You gain access to this queue with the ability to cast close and reopen votes.
##Guidelines for reviewing Reopen Votes
The items in the Reopen Queue may take more time to process than other queues. If someone votes to re-open a question, either community members disagreed, or the content of the post has changed in an attempt to improve it, so you will need to understand and evaluate the contention.
Review the question as it is now.
- Per the Guidelines for reviewing Close Votes, should the question remain closed? In short, does one of the five close reasons - Exact Duplicate, Off Topic, Not Constructive, Not A Real Question, Too Localized - still apply? If so, vote to Leave Closed.
- If not, vote to Reopen.
- If you aren't sure, Skip.
However, keep in mind there was some contention. Either someone felt the close votes were misguided and voted to open, or someone attempted to improve the question and make it passable. It will happen more often that you are unsure what to do with a question appearing in the re-open queue. Bear in mind these questions are difficult for everyone to evaluate, so we encourage you to take the time to research the question more rather than click "Skip" on the harder ones. The following questions may help your decision:
- Do you see why someone voted to re-open the question? Understanding the reason can make you feel more sure you considered all angles and are not "missing something."
- Has the question's content changed in an effort to improve it since then?
If "yes" to the second, but you still feel the question should remain closed, please consider leaving a comment explaining why the changes were insufficient. In many cases, an editor or the OP sincerely evaluated the content and tried to improve it to the best of their ability, and seeing the question remain closed will likely not help them learn our standards or how to improve the question.
- Do check the close reason to understand why the question was closed in the first place.
This is particularly important with duplicate questions, as when your question is closed as a duplicate, the OP gets a message to edit their post to clarify why it's not a duplicate of the linked question, so this may have occurred.
- Do read the comments.
Often the reason why the post was closed or is getting a reopen vote is listed in the comments, and that can help you understand what the community is trying to do with the question, and help you make a more informed decision.
- Do check the Revision History.
Was an edit done to address the reason it was closed in the first place? The edit may have been done prior to the question getting its last close vote, so don't forget to check the earlier revision history.
- Don't vote to reopen items that should be closed, however were closed with the wrong close reason.
If the item should have been closed, leave it closed, regardless of what the actual close reason says. Although do leave a comment if there isn't one already explaining the true reason why the question was closed. Furthermore, if the question is a duplicate and is closed for one of the other reasons, do flag for moderator attention and explain, because we would rather future visitors be routed to the correct answer than be stuck.