#ao3 filters

[incognitopolls]

Hypothetical scenario: someone is on Ao3, looking for fanfiction to read. This person only speaks/reads English, and they set the language filter to only show fics written in English.

We ask your questions so you don’t have to! Submit your questions to have them posted anonymously as polls.

[brattypagansub]

Bucky just drops random lore and the Avengers don’t know how to deal with it

Bucky: *with his flesh hand reaching around Steve to grab a slice of pizza* the one guy from PaPa John’s that got in trouble for saying racist stuff tried to get Hydra to fund his takeover

Steve:

Sam:

Tony:

Bucky: *eating it not seeing what the big deal is.* there’s a reason why you don’t see him in the news anymore. Thank me later.. Tony could you pass the wings please?

Tony: *so stunned that he just hands it over*

Bucky: *takes a bite and says contemplatively* I think there’s a word for ones like him at least from what I saw.. obsessive psychosis

Sam: *wondering if Bucky is fucking with them or actually did it* sure buddy

Steve: *checking later sits back and breathes a long sigh* damn it Bucky

[sarcasticsciencefictionwriter]

A Guide To Using AO3 Filters

Been seeing a lot of posts lately going on about how AO3's filters suck/don't work/people don't know how to use them/people don't want to use them.

So I decided to make this guide to help people understand how good AO3's filters are and how to use them!

For the example, we're going to use the Supernatural archive, because it's one of the largest and most varied archives on AO3, which makes it perfect for filtering.

(Instructions and guide with pictures under the cut!)

1. Basic Exclusion

These filters are your best friend. There are further tricks to using them, which I will get into.

Filtering something in means you can only select one of these at a time. Filtering them out means that you can get rid of all the ones you don't want to see.

These next ones are a little more complicated with the exclusion.

This one is with crossovers included. This means that if you want to read crossovers, but do not want to read a certain fandom, you can remove it here. .

The character one will remove the characters you don't want to see, but with a caveat--if they are only listed in a relationship tag and not a character tag, they will still crop up. That's what the next bit is for.

This removes ships. (Not every ship is tagged on a fic, because not every ship NEEDS to be tagged, bear this in mind. If there's one throw away sentence about a ship, or allusions in the background or it doesn't matter to the story in any way, it may still be included but not tagged. This is a personal choice and judgement of the author, they are not trying to trick you). . Additional Tags

Highly, highly useful for everything else you don't want to see. .

This bit is also your best friend, for both exclusion and inclusion. .

2. Actually Excluding.

This part is mostly just clicking the "x" next to what you don't want to see.

Unfiltered, this is what we see at the top of the archive, by the way.

This is what we're removing: General Audiences, Not Rated, Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings, Underage Sex, Multi, Other, Supernatural (TV 2005) RPF, Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Reader, Dean Winchester/Reader.

(Pictures are after filters have been applied)

Now we're down to this.

But! That's still a lot! That's still things we don't want to see, even if we had filters to include things on!

Have no fear, we're not done.

3. Adding to Your Filters and "Other Tags to Exclude"

You're going to have to type certain things in yourself. No way around that. AO3's filters display the most popular/common tags in the search engines. If something you don't want to see is less popular, you're going to have to manually remove it.

This box right here is a godsend.

Don't want to see Incest?

Type in the tags and hit "enter".

.

You'll also notice that excluding Dean Winchester/Reader did not remove all the "Reader" type fics and also did not take out /Original Character(s) Ships.

We have a fun little trick to catch them all since there are so many variations!

So we go back to our little best friend box.

Placing a * before the slash will remove any ship involving these characters.

Now we're going to filter again!

Now, with all my exclusions, there's still a lot to sift through. Personally, for me, I'm happy with what I've excluded and don't need to add any more. So, I'll add my wanted tags, take out crossovers, and pick my language. .

Pairing Included and Excluded Tags

Basically, the same as above, but reversed! Keep your excluded stuff locked in and now just add what you want to see!

But remember: Including only allows you to pick one (1) rating, category, and warning. For these purposes, I'm going to ignore those because I already took out the ones I didn't want to see.

If your character or tag isn't included in the most popular, use this box!

Now, with both implemented, this what I get:

245 works! I never would have narrowed it down so far without excluding and using the filters. I would have potentially seen things I didn't want to see!

For full disclosure, this is what my filter bar looks to achieve this.

But remember! Not every fic has everything tagged--and that's okay! No one can ever tag enough to accommodate everyone. No one but you knows your triggers and squicks.

If, after everything, you still encounter a fic you don't like, there are two more buttons you can hit!

Happy reading, everyone!

[nana-mizu-shiki]

What Do You Mean I read them all already??? What Do You Mean there's only two pages worth of this amazingly wonderful tag?????

[whateverimcurrentlyobsessedwith]

We can filter?! I remember when the fandom tag wa to small for that.

[batcavescolony]

’I wish ao3 would let me...’ p2

"I wish ao3 had a way to sort my bookmarks by finished works"

Put complete:true (exactly like that) in the Search Within Results section of the Sort And Filter section of your Bookmarks, now your bookmarks are sorted by completed works.

"I wish ao3 would let me sort works by chapter number"

put expected_number_of_chapters: 1 (exactly like that) in the Search Within Results section of the filter to get all fics with one chapter. If you change the number it changes the number of chapters so 5 will pull up fics with 5 chapters and on and on. if you want to sort out all fics with one chapter (or 5 for 30 whatever) put -expected_number_of_chapters: 1 (exactly like that) in the Search within results section of the filter.

"I wish I could sort by more then one language"

Step one go to here and find the code for your languages of choice it will be like fr for French, es for Spanish but find that for your languages.

then go to the Search Within Results section of the filters and put in language_id:abbreviation OR language_id:abbreviation

(exactly like that) but where it says 'abbreviation' put the language code so

language_id:fr OR language_id:es

Will pull up fics in only French or Spanish

"I wish ao3 would let me not see works by a certain author but I don't want to block them"

Find the author, copy their name, go to the Search Within Results section and put -(author) so -batcavescolony then sort and filter. Now for that section you won't see anything by that author

Link to my ao3 guide

[arothroughtheheart]

People complaining they see fics they don't want to on AO3 is frustrating, because yes the problem lies with them (1: Because they can exclude fics, and 2: because they need to get over the fact there are fics they won't like) but also I know exactly why they're* having this problem, and it's a very understandable mistake.

*(some of them, at least)

When looking for fics, a lot of them use this page:

The Work Search page, found by clicking 'Search' and then 'Works' on the navigation bar.

It's a great page! I use it all the time. Very useful when tracking down a fic you remember or looking for something specific.

The only problem is that there is no function for Excluding works, so if you're just browsing, its not the best option.

Instead, what they should be using is this page:

The fandoms page, found by clicking 'Fandoms' on the navigation bar. You then click the appropriate type of media (I.e. Anime or TV or books) and find the fandom you want.

Then click on it, and you'll be greeted to this page:

You can then click on 'Filters'

And Include and Exclude tags and warnings to your hearts galore. Yay!

So, yeah. Easy, understandable mistake. Fortunately, a simple resolution as well.

-

Alternate method (and the one I tend to use):

Instead of going through the Fandoms page, you go to Work Search, and scroll down to the Work Tags section. Then you type in the fandom you want, like so:

Or any Character, Relationship or additional tag:

Then scroll down and hit Search.

Then go to the first fic that comes up and click directly on the Fandom/Character/Relationship/Additional Tag you searched with

And you'll be shown this page:

Where you can Include and Exclude the same as the first method.

Why do it this way?

- I find it saves time compared to scrolling through the Fandoms list, but your mileage may vary

- You can search by characters or additional tags as well as fandoms

[onnahu]

Road Trips is the best underused tag on ao3 change my mind

[theficlistpodcast]

*cautiously removes some exclude filters* 🥲

[edwardpinestar]

This is pretty unreadable

I've got a larger than default font and whatever this is is so bad

[aveaveria]

[COMPLETE] Rating: Explicit Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Nemesis (Millarworld)/Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson & Blüdhaven Police Department, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd, Dick Grayson & Melinda Zucco Characters: Dick Grayson, Nemesis (Millarworld), Blüdhaven Police Department Officers, Nightwing Ensamble Additional Tags: Truth & Lies, Death & Destruction, Drugs & Toxins, Blood & Gore, Yandere Nemesis, Police Officer Dick Grayson, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Canon, Urban Legend Nightwing, Nemesis has a Cop Kink, Brothers in Blood Jason Todd, Identity Shenanigans, Trauma, Panic Attacks, Trickster Personas, Dirty Thoughts, Dirty Talk, Melinda Zucco Lied, BAMF Dick Grayson, side character death, Hero/Villain, Inappropriate Flirting, Dubious Consent, Compromise

Mere days before Dick joins the police academy to reshape Blüdhaven's police force, a new villain enters the world stage. Nemesis decimates his first police department overnight. To keep the villain’s attention from his city, Nightwing becomes an urban legend prowling the streets, but all contingencies turn out to be for naught.

Nemesis is coming.

Forced into the middleman position for a villain seeking revenge, Dick’s life is turned upside down. Is Nemesis telling the truth or is his life a lie? Does it matter if the evidence of the crime sits right in front of him?

Part of the @dick-rarepairs Collection

[marinamar4]

Hi! I'm looking for a story on ao3, which I swear I have bookmarked but now I can't find it anywhere.

Easy summary: Vader tortures Leia instead of Han in Bespin, and Luke feels it much more strongly this time. To the point that he feels the same pain and has the same wounds as Leia.

Which is kind of funny in a creepy way, because he decides to change into Leia and when Vader asks him who did those wounds, he did them indirectly, injuring his twin sister.

[brattypagansub]

Simon Riley headcannons that help flesh out his character (exclusively Simon Riley centric)

Has a fear of a lot of animals due to his abusive father

Ironically this fear doesn’t extend to horses and his adoptive family owned a horse breeding ranch

Soap found out he can barrel race to the tune of Summertime sadness and it ended up on TikTok

Wears color changing contacts and only two people have ever seen him without them in

Has a dirty mind and even filthier mouth but lets Soap believe he’s a smol anxious bean who needs protecting

Thought about growing his hair out to Legolas’ length

Loves Lord of the Rings and will fight anyone who says the movies are bad

Resolved himself to the fact that if anything ever happened to Johnny he’d take it the darkest place he’d need to. If it’ll get justice for the chaos gremlin.

Can speak elvish and often does when he doesn’t want anyone to know what he’s saying

Can draw and paint well

Has an ultra realistic drawing of Soap as Aragorn that’s protectively sealed in his sketch book

Once ended up with a head injury so bad that he forgot a solid year of his life. He proceeded to make it his personal mission to make Soap blush as much and as often as possible.

Is very very smart but acts dumb to piss off Price

Has a bad habit of sneaking up on people then not announcing his presence. Which actually got him punched square across the jaw one on accident by Soap.

Smokes but tries to limit it around Soap because he doesn’t want him picking up such a bad habit

Collects bobbles odds and ends because crow brain then gifts them to Soap

Grew his hair out to Bucky Barnes civil war length and neither Price nor Soap will let it be.. they both like to run their hands through it.

Fucks off every now and again to his comfort place Norway and several times had kidnapped Soap to go with

Sleeps like a Victorian child with a rare disease

Soap found a picture of him as a kid where he hsd long hair blue eyes and was a tiny spec of a child

Had to relearn volume control after taking off his mask more.

Is on the spectrum but he’s high functioning

Likes to tinker and work with his hands

Has sensory issues as it relates to people touching his face only two are allowed Soap and Price

Nearly tackled Roach when the man almost revealed his fear of most animals while Soap had a raven on his hand

Likes to call Price an old man exclusively to piss him off

When shit hit the fan in Los Almas his primary goal was to keep them off Soap to allow the man to escape. He didn’t want to have to tell Price that he’d lost the kid.

Only he can tell Soap to speak English

Once hid in a pyramid for a day because he needed to wait for the heat to die down after a kill

Macgyuver’d a rad counter when he was forced to chase a target through Chernobyl

Once when startled awake his brain auto piloted finishing an explanation about an equation. Then when asked was just asleep enough reply. ‘Giving a lecture on Lagrange theory and advanced calculus to a classroom of like ten hobbits.’ And that’s how Soap found out that he’s a genius.

When half asleep will pick up Soap and move him out of the way like he weighs nothing to get to the coffee machine

Has landed in bed with Price more times than he can count in their younger days thanks to a bottle of bourbon

Used to be very different personality wise almost like Soap until he nearly lost Roach on an op.

[eowyn-igneelcheshire]

I don't know how to use AO3 anymore.

I used to be really good at filtering tags I wasn't interested in and picking specific relationships I wanted to find, but now the specific "filters" option is gone on mobile and there's just "Edit Search Details" which I don't know how to use at all. I can use it to add details to my search, but I don't know how to filter out fics. I can't find instructions on AO3, the instructions I've found through Google are all either desktop specific or for the old system. The one and only thing I've found talking about the new system was a reddit post where someone was asking where the filters are now to which someone replied "you have to use tag search not work" which doesn't help in the SLIGHTEST because this is what the tag search looks like:

How are you supposed to exclude tags with this????

Also, if someone could explain how to exclude anything with any of this, that would be fantastic:

[nana-mizu-shiki]

No.....I Can't Have Finished Them All!!! No!!! I Wnat More! I Need More!! Torture for my boy can only do so much!! I Need REVENGE!!! GUILT!!!! REVELATIONS!!! DRAMA!!!! CONFRONTATIONS!!!!!!!!!

[barkingzerbra]

one thing i'd like to appreciate about ao3 is that the archive's tagging system. it's been really useful to have that kind of experience with filtering through an entire database now that i'm in a high school english class.

"algorithm this," "algorithm that," it's refreshing and useful to be in complete control of what kind of content i see, etc., and to be able to bring that knowledge to other databases on the internet.

ProQuest Issues Researcher got nothing on me.