The output of `<ref>` tags and the `<references>` section is customizable using MediaWiki messages. So it might make sense to keep an eye open on what's done in the wild to these outputs. And ideally we have a good reflection of what's going on in production on the beta cluster.
See [[ https://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/Help:Cite#Customization | Help:Cite#Customization ]]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_reference_link_key_with_num
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_reference_link_prefix
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_reference_link_suffix
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_prefix
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_suffix
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_reference_link
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_one
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_many
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_many_format
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_many_format_backlink_labels
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_many_sep
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MediaWiki:cite_references_link_many_and