Artifact

Artifact is the highest level of item quality in World of Warcraft, above. Although speculation of these items is documented across fan sites and the official World of Warcraft website, no such items have ever been available to players in the released game.

Artifacts are also the term used for famous and legendary items in lore. Famous artifacts aren't necessarily of Artifact quality in World of Warcraft, however. Several items that are said to be artifacts according to lore, as stated in Warcraft II-III or the RPG, are epic quality or less in World of Warcraft (for example, ). However, it can be argued that since Illidan absorbed the skull, its power has been reduced to Epic-quality level; and the original skull could have been of Artifact quality. A blue post mentioned in regards to this that Illidan had one hell of a digestive system.

Additional notes

 * Artifacts do not exist in WoW, and can't normally be linked.
 * It has previously been stated that artifacts are red, but the color currently used is pale gold , according to API GetItemQualityColor in version 3.0.3.
 * items currently share the same in-game color as artifacts. They are special, scalable, Bind to Account items introduced with Wrath of the Lich King.  These items are usable by any character on your account and their stats will scale with that character's level, becoming the equivalent of a equal level  quality item.  However, it appears that heirloom items are currently labeled as Artifacts: when you try to mail one to a character on another account, you receive an error message which reads "Artifacts can only be mailed to your own characters".
 * According to an older version of the Item Basics page on the WoW website, the names of Artifact-quality items were planned to appear in red. A listing for Artifacts no longer appears on this page however.  The red-linked version still exists in archive form under the dates Jul 15, 2005 through Jun 15, 2007.
 * The web color code for artifact itemlinks is #e6cc80.

List of artifact items

 * , GM Weapon
 * , GM shirt
 * , GM artifact ring
 * , GM artifact single item version of set. Not to be confused with the player obtainable The Twin Blades of Azzinoth
 * , GM Weapon
 * GM Weapon

Speculation
If artifacts are actually implemented for players, they will likely be changed from the pale gold now shared with heirlooms. It is likely that they will change to the previously planned red.