APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard, IEEE & Vancouver for 12 source types.
Multiple authors: use commas (John Smith, Jane Doe) or semicolons. Use "Li, Wei" for family-name-first (one author).
Fill in author, title, and year below, then click Generate Citation.
Please verify: Always check citations against your style guide or professor's requirements. Formatting rules vary by edition and institution.
WriteScholar can automatically find and format citations from academic databases. Get relevant sources for your research in seconds.
Generate properly formatted citations for any source, book, journal article, website, podcast, video, thesis, in APA 7th, MLA 9th, Chicago, Harvard, IEEE, or Vancouver style. Fill in the fields you have, copy the formatted citation. No sign-up, no limit on how many you can generate.
APA is the default for psychology, education, and most social sciences. MLA is the standard for English and humanities. Chicago is common in history. Harvard and IEEE are used in UK universities and engineering respectively.
Book, journal article, website, podcast, video, conference paper, thesis, magazine, newspaper, pick the closest match. Each source type asks for slightly different fields (a book needs a publisher; a website needs an access date).
You don't need every field, leave optional ones blank. Author and title are the only universal requirements. For DOIs, paste the full URL or just the number; the tool handles both.
The full citation appears formatted in the chosen style with proper italics, capitalization, and punctuation. Copy it directly into your bibliography or works cited page.
APA 7th changed how DOIs and URLs are formatted (now without "Retrieved from"). The generator uses APA 7, the current standard at most US universities.
MLA 9th edition requires container titles, version numbers, and access dates for online sources. Most students miss the access date, the generator forces you to include it.
Podcast citations are notoriously inconsistent. The generator handles host, episode title, podcast name, publisher, episode number, and air date in the right format.
Medical and nursing students need Vancouver, numbered references, author initials, abbreviated journal names. The generator outputs the abbreviation rules correctly.
Harvard isn't a single style, Cardiff, Bath, Manchester all have variants. The generator outputs the most common variant (Anglia Ruskin); cross-check your school's style guide for edge cases.
IEEE uses numbered in-text references and a reference list ordered by citation appearance. The generator outputs both the formatted entry and the in-text reference number style.
There are dozens of citation generators online. Here's how WriteScholar stacks up against the most common ones students reach for.
| Feature | WriteScholar | Cite This For Me (free) | EasyBib (free) | Zotero |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sign-up required | No | No (limited) | Yes, after 5 cites | Yes (download) |
| Sources per session | Unlimited | 5 free | 5 free | Unlimited |
| APA, MLA, Chicago, Harvard | All | All (paid for some) | All (paid for some) | All |
| IEEE / Vancouver | Yes | Paid only | Paid only | Yes |
| DOI auto-fill | Pro | Paid | Paid | Yes |
| Ads | None | Yes | Heavy | None |
| Browser extension | Coming | No | No | Yes |
| Cost | Free + Pro $19.99/mo | Premium ~$10/mo | Premium ~$10/mo | Free |
Half APA, half MLA. The single biggest red flag a professor sees. Pick one style at the start of the paper and use only that style, including for in-text citations.
MLA 9, Chicago, and Harvard all require an access date for websites. APA 7 only requires it for content that may change (e.g. Wikipedia). When in doubt, include it.
When a website has no listed author, the corporate or organization name becomes the author ("World Health Organization", not "WHO logo" or "https://who.int"). Move the title to author position only if there's no organization either.
In APA and MLA, journal article titles are NOT italicized, only the journal name is. Book titles ARE italicized. Confusing the two is the most common formatting error.
Most styles say to use "Anonymous" only if the source explicitly identifies the author that way. Otherwise, treat the source as having no author and start with the title.
APA: (Smith, 2023). Period AFTER the closing parenthesis. The period goes inside the parenthesis only when the citation introduces a block quote.
APA 7: use "et al." for 3+ authors from the first citation. MLA 9: use "et al." for 3+ authors. Chicago: spell out up to 10 authors in the bibliography. Always check the latest edition rules.
APA 7: initial only for first name; year in parentheses; only first word of title (and proper nouns) capitalized; no city for US publishers; title italicized; no publisher city.
MLA: full first name; title in quotation marks (not italicized); journal name italicized; "vol." and "no." spelled out; "pp." prefix on page range.
When no individual author is named, use the organization or corporate author. If no organization either, move the title to the author position.
Add each source to your generator the moment you cite it in the draft. Don't leave it for the night before, that's when 3am formatting errors happen.
For unusual sources (legal documents, archival manuscripts, social media posts), the generator may format conservatively. Cross-check with your style's official manual.
DOI links are permanent; URLs can break. APA 7 prefers DOI as the URL format ("https://doi.org/10.xxx") over the publisher's site URL.
APA, MLA, and Chicago all require alphabetical order by first author's last name. The generator outputs each citation correctly but doesn't auto-sort the list, paste into Word and sort A-Z.
Every reference in your list MUST appear in the body text and vice versa. Missing citations or unused references are deductions in most rubrics.
A paper with 95% correct APA throughout reads better than one with 100% correct APA in some places and accidental MLA in others.
Citations are usually graded for two things: are they in the right style, and are they formatted correctly. This tool guarantees the second. The first is on you, match the style your professor specified (APA, MLA, etc.) and use the same one consistently throughout the paper. Mixing styles is a much bigger red flag than tiny formatting errors within a single style.
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