Every detailed, interesting stop I recommend is rejected, but near me there are approved stops that are: a photo of a sidewalk (literally just a photo of cement), a up close photo of a fancy construction nail (in another sidewalk, again, just… a sidewalk), a photo of a brick, and for some reason 100s of trash cans all over the city. It makes no sense. To be clear, I want more stops, so I’m fine that those stops exist, but the review criteria was definitely not met with them.
I’m not sure if this is the right forum for this question, but are there plans to help the reviewers get better at giving approvals? We need more stops, not fewer, and tbh getting rejected all the time for good stop ideas makes participating in building the game world a little less fun.
I recommend that you share your nominations in Nomination Support and get feedback on the community.
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Been there, it’s definitely a learning curve. I’ve had my fair share of rejections (both in Wayfarer and in real life 
), but once I took the time to review what went wrong and how I could improve my future submissions, things started turning around. Now, my acceptance rate is much better, and the only rejections I get are usually due to photo quality something I am actively working on.
In my early days, I didn’t really take the time to review or follow the acceptance criteria. I was mostly influenced by the existing wayspots (mainly PokéStops) around me and used those as references for my own nominations.
- There’s a really busy mart near where I reside. I saw several large supermarket/general mart chains already as wayspots and thought, "Hey, this qualifies too - Rejected
- Government Buildings - Ward, Municipality Building that existed on the game, submitted a new one - Rejected
- Restaurant/Café Chain without good reviews/low reviews - Rejected
- New Wayspots that would have been too close to existing one, hey let me tweak the location a bit - Rejected
- Mural/Wall Arts that were fading or although looks cool but might have been offensive - Rejected
I had the same questions you’re asking now, but I eventually realized that the criteria keep evolving over time. Many existing wayspots in the database were approved under older guidelines and don’t necessarily adhere to the current criteria.
Having said all these it is also quite easy for people to game or exploit the current wayspot system. You can report or reject such submissions to help improve overall quality. Since it’s community-driven, much of the responsibility for maintaining standards rests on us, giving us the power to make a real difference.
So don’t let rejections discourage you, keep trying! It can be frustrating in the moment, but the satisfaction it brings in the end is truly hard to put into words, at least for me.
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So sorry you are feeling so down. Those other game locations you question could have been accepted in error, imports that never had to meet criteria just to seed the game so it could be played, or maybe there was a fantastic case made in the supporting statement that you don’t see as a player. Don’t just submit what you see in game without knowing why they are eligible, or something random where you think it would be great to have a Pokestop. You will have the most success if you can make a convincing statement that your nominations meet current criteria. Here is a handy reference: Wayspot Criteria — Wayfarer Help Center
If you want to share screenshots of a nomination that you don’t feel should have been rejected, we can try to give you advice on whether it can be improved. I don’t want to give you a list of things to improve if you aren’t doing anything wrong, but this is a great guide for people having trouble getting things accepted: Top Mistakes Made When Nominating, and How to Avoid Them
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