Citation Generator: One Source, Multiple Styles
A citation generator — sometimes called a citation machine or a citation tool — turns the details of a source into a formatted reference and an in-text citation. This one is a source citation generator for twenty-one academic and journal styles. Add a book, an article, or a web page once, then switch between APA, MLA, Chicago, and eighteen other styles without retyping anything. The Writers Per Hour academic citation generator is free, runs in your browser, and needs no account.
How the Writers Per Hour Citation Generator Works
- Choose a style. Pick one of the twenty-one styles at the top of the tool. Some styles come in more than one variant, such as Chicago Notes and Bibliography or Chicago Author-Date, and then a second menu appears.
- Find or add a source. Paste a URL, DOI, or ISBN to look up the details that are publicly available. You can also upload a PDF, a BibTeX (.bib) file, or a RIS (.ris) file, or enter the details yourself.
- Check the details. Compare the author, date, title, and publication details with the original source. Fill in anything that is missing. If a style needs a field you left empty, the form points it out instead of guessing.
- Create the citation and add it to your list. You see the reference entry and the in-text forms for the chosen style. Add the source when it looks right, and edit it later if you need to.
- Copy or export. Copy one reference or the whole list, export the list to a new Google Doc, or download it as a BibTeX or RIS file.
For selected styles, the generator uses Citation Style Language (CSL) templates to format your sources. Check the result against your course or journal requirements.
Import Sources and Check the Details
A lookup or a file import fills in a draft. Nothing is added to your list until you confirm it. From a PDF, the generator takes whatever source details the file makes available. Some web pages and PDFs carry little or no metadata, and scanned PDFs may carry none, so the draft can be incomplete.
Have a PubMed ID or a PubMed Central link? Paste it into the PubMed / PMC search, check the article details, and add the source to your bibliography.
Already have your sources in a reference manager? Import a BibTeX or RIS file instead of entering each source again. Research tools and reference managers use these formats to share bibliographic records, and one file can hold many sources. Check the details, add the records you need, and format your bibliography in your chosen citation style.
The generator applies each style’s published rules. It does not check whether a source is reliable, and it does not know the extra rules your course may add. Compare the result with your assignment guide before you submit.
What You Can Cite
The source type decides which details a citation needs. The generator supports these types:
- Website. A web page, an online article, or a blog post.
- Journal article. A paper in a scholarly journal, usually with a DOI (a permanent identifier for the article).
- Book. A whole book, found by its ISBN or entered by hand.
- Book chapter. One chapter in an edited book.
- Report. A report from a government body, an organization, or a company.
- Video. A film, a lecture recording, or an online video.
- AI response. A reply from ChatGPT or another AI tool. Available in APA and MLA only.
The first five types work in all twenty-one styles, and videos in fifteen of them. OSCOLA also cites legal cases and legislation. The type menu only shows what the selected style supports.
A source type is not the same as the way you enter it. Search, manual entry, PDF, BibTeX, and RIS are five ways to fill in the same fields. So the tool can work as a PDF citation generator, but a PDF is not a style or a type of its own. A journal article saved as a PDF is still cited as a journal article.
Author–Date Styles
The text names the author and the year, for example (Smith, 2024). The reference list is alphabetical. You get a parenthetical citation and a narrative one, where the author’s name is part of the sentence.
- APA (7th ed.). Psychology, education, nursing, and other social sciences.
- Harvard (Cite Them Right, 12th ed.). Common at UK and Australian universities. Harvard has no single rulebook, so check your university’s own guide.
- ASA (7th ed.). Sociology.
- APSA (2018). Political science.
- ASCE. Civil engineering journals.
- Chicago (18th ed.) and Turabian (9th ed.), Author-Date variants. History of science, social sciences, and student papers. Turabian is the student version of Chicago.
- CSE Name-Year (8th ed.). Biology and the life sciences.
- ACS Author-Date. Chemistry.
Author–Page: MLA
MLA (9th ed.) works differently. Its in-text citation pairs the author with a page number, not a year: (Smith 24). The list at the end is called Works Cited. MLA is the usual choice for literature, languages, and the humanities.
Numeric Styles
The text shows a number, and the number leads to the matching entry in the reference list. Most of these styles number sources in the order you first cite them. CSE Citation-Name and ACM sort the list alphabetically first, then number it.
- IEEE (2018 guide). Engineering and computer science. Numbers appear in brackets, like [1].
- ACM. Computing. Brackets too, on an alphabetical list.
- AMA (11th ed.). Medicine. Superscript numbers.
- NLM (Citing Medicine, 2nd ed.). Medicine and health sciences. The full National Library of Medicine manual.
- Vancouver. Medical journals. A shorter form of the same NLM rules, so the two look alike.
- CSE Citation-Sequence and Citation-Name. The life sciences. Superscript numbers.
- ACS numeric variants. Chemistry. A superscript number or an italic number in parentheses.
Scientific and Medical Journal Styles
Some journals set their own reference format. Choose it by the journal’s instructions for authors, not only by your subject. Each of these four follows one journal’s rules. They are not interchangeable.
- Nature. Superscript numbers in the text and a numbered reference list.
- Science. Numbered citations and a reference list in the format of the journal Science.
- The BMJ. Numbered references for work prepared to The BMJ’s requirements.
- New England Journal of Medicine. Numbered citations and a reference list in NEJM format.
Notes and Bibliography Styles
Chicago and Turabian also come in a Notes and Bibliography variant, used mostly in history and the arts. Here the citation goes in a footnote or an endnote. For each source you get a full note for the first mention, a short note for later ones, and a bibliography entry. Paste the note into the footnote your word processor creates.
Humanities and Legal Writing
Two more notes styles cover the humanities and law. For each source you get a full note and a bibliography entry.
- MHRA (4th ed.), Notes and Bibliography. Modern languages, literature, and other humanities.
- OSCOLA (4th ed.). Law. The Oxford University Standard for Citation of Legal Authorities.
Copy the reference or full note you need. The generator does not insert footnotes into your document or track repeated citations.
Citations for Nursing and Medical Papers
Working on a nursing literature review or a medical research paper? Evidence-based practice assignments and case studies also rest on published studies, so research paper citations can run to dozens of journal articles. Keep them in one list and format them in the style your course requires.
No single style covers every nursing or medical paper. Your course may ask for APA, AMA, Vancouver, or NLM, and each journal sets its own rules. Follow your assignment brief or the journal’s instructions for authors. All four styles are in the menu, so the same tool works as a citation generator for nursing students and as a medical citation generator.
Writing for a specific journal? The generator also includes Nature, Science, The BMJ and New England Journal of Medicine styles. Check the journal’s instructions before choosing.
Before you copy or export your bibliography, check each journal article against the original: the authors, the year, the journal, the volume and issue, the pages or article number, and the DOI. The generator formats the source. It does not judge the quality of a study or confirm its findings.
Check the source. Then cite it. A correctly formatted reference does not make a study reliable. Read the original publication and check that it supports the point you are making.
Need more than citations? Our nursing assignment help connects you with a writer for the paper itself. Different tasks. The generator formats your references; the writer works with your assignment instructions.
Choosing a Citation Generator for College Essays
What is the best citation generator for college essays? Start with the one that covers the style your course asks for. Then look for three things: details you can see and correct, in-text citations as well as the reference entry, and a list you can keep while you write. An essay citation generator that hides its data, or cannot edit it, is hard to trust.
Looking for a free online APA citation generator? Choose APA in the style menu above. There is also a separate APA Citation Generator built around APA 7 alone.
Save, Copy, Download, and Export to Google Docs
Your list is saved in this browser, whatever style you used for each source. It stays after a reload. It does not sync to other devices, and clearing your browser data removes it. Change the style, and the whole list is reformatted.
Searching for a Google Docs citation generator? Writers Per Hour does not offer a Google Docs add-on. Instead, the generator can export your list to a new Google Doc, already formatted in the selected style. Google asks for access only when you export.
Moving your sources to a reference manager? Download the list as a BibTeX (.bib) or RIS (.ris) file and import it into a compatible reference manager. The file is a one-time copy, so later edits here do not reach it. It carries the source details, not the formatting. A citation style such as APA, MLA, or Vancouver decides how a reference looks. BibTeX and RIS are file formats that move the details from one tool to another.
Help Beyond Citations
The generator formats sources. It does not write the paper. If you need help with research, structure, or the writing itself, Writers Per Hour is also an academic writing service. You can hire a professional writer through the order form below. That is a separate, paid service. The generator stays free.
