A Canonicity Guide is this Wiki's guide regarding the canonicity of the Pretty Little Liars universe and its related works, including spin-offs and novels. If you have any questions, suggestions for what should or should not be considered canon, or concerns, please contact an administrator.
What Does Canon Mean?
According to Dictionary.com, canon in the sense of fictional worlds is "established or agreed-upon constraints governing the background narrative, setting, storyline, characters, etc., in a particular fictional world."
An extended definition courtesy of Wikipedia describes canon as, "the body of works taking place in a particular fictional world that are widely considered to be official or authoritative; [especially] those created by the original author or developer of the world."
Canon in PLL Universe
- Pretty Little Liars TV series
- Ravenswood
- Pretty Little Liars: The Perfectionists
- Season 1
- Material released via the official PLL social media accounts providing updates on existing PLL characters. This includes the "group text" promos.
- Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin
- Pretty Little Liars book series
- Arc 1 (only on novel pages)
- Arc 2 (only on novel pages)
- Arc 3 (only on novel pages)
- Arc 4 (only on novel pages)
- Pretty Little Secrets (only on novel pages)
- Short stories (only on novel pages)
- The Liars (only on novel pages)
- The Perfectionists book series
- The Perfectionists (only on novel pages)
- The Good Girls (only on novel pages)
Non-Canon Material
- The Emison Stories -- described and marketed as official fanon written by Sara Shepard.
- Deleted scenes from any of the television series. While this wiki chooses to document the existence of deleted scenes in Notes and Trivia sections or on relationship pages, they should be left out of the series sections and clearly labeled as non-canon material.
- Any comments made by showrunners after the ending of a series or season. The wiki documents events that occur on-screen. For example, I. Marlene King has voiced her desire to reconnect Emison after infamously breaking them up in The Perfectionists. Unfortunately, her remarks on their reconciling is purely non-canon material as is has not played out on-screen.
- Riverdale TV series - while Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa has laid the foundation of these series existing in one larger universe, the PLL wiki does not document the events of Riverdale or see them as canon to the PLL universe. We will continue to document and explain references to the series, but will not be including content from the series. For information on Riverdale and its extended universe, please visit the Riverdale Wiki.