# Why do topic titles need to be unique?
**URL:** https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215
**Category:** Support
**Created:** [June 16, 2022, 5:40pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215 "2022-06-16T17:40:30Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Ondrashek06](https://meta.discourse.org/u/Ondrashek06)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 5:40pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/1 "2022-06-16T17:40:30Z")
Why is there even a feature that prevents 2 threads/topics of the same name being created?
No other forum software has this, and there’s a legitimate reason for topic names to be the same, such as with “What is this thing?” or other common questions being posted.
Also, topics have IDs, so it isn’t due to database keys.
So… Does someone know why is this needed?
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### Author:  [@itsbhanusharma](https://meta.discourse.org/u/itsbhanusharma)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 5:45pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/2 "2022-06-16T17:45:32Z")
The primary reason is to prevent spam and encourage people to participate in an existing topic instead of opening a billion topics just expressing their views about something.
Not to say it is a moderation nightmare to have multiple topics discussing the same thing.
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### Author:  [@not-ethan](https://meta.discourse.org/u/not-ethan)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 5:46pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/3 "2022-06-16T17:46:17Z")
I have 2 guesses as to why.
1. To prevent spam. This would make it hard for spammers to just name their topics `Go to for 5 bitcoin`. They would need to at least add an extra character.
2. To make people be more creative and help with the search. So instead of `I am having trouble with x topic` 5 times you would need to explain in more detail what your problem is in the title.
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### Author:  [@david](https://meta.discourse.org/u/david)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 5:56pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/4 "2022-06-16T17:56:41Z")
This is an optional thing - administrators can toggle a setting to allow duplicate topic titles. In some communities, duplicate titles can make sense. In others, as you said, they generally mean spam or duplicate content. 👍
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### Author:  [@not-ethan](https://meta.discourse.org/u/not-ethan)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 6:29pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/5 "2022-06-16T18:29:19Z")
> [@david](#):
>
> In some communities, duplicate titles can make sense.
Out of curiosity what kind of communities
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### Author:  [@david](https://meta.discourse.org/u/david)
#### Post date: [June 16, 2022, 6:33pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/6 "2022-06-16T18:33:01Z")
One example is that we have a category on our internal forum which is for “alerts”. Whenever there is an issue with our systems, a topic is created automatically with a title like “increased 5xx error rates”. We resolve it, then close the topic.
In future, the same issue might happen again, and so an fresh automatic topic gets created with the same name.
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### Author:  [@system](https://meta.discourse.org/u/system)
#### Post date: [October 27, 2022, 6:35pm UTC](https://meta.discourse.org/t/why-do-topic-titles-need-to-be-unique/230215/7 "2022-10-27T18:35:19Z")
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